Trying to get some feedback on what everyone else does with old bowling pins.   Also, how often are you finding your center needing to bring in new pins? 

Thanks again everyone.

Ken Maxey

Titan Bowl and Billiards

Cal State Fullerton

Ken,

When I was at St. Cloud State, we used old bowling pins as giveaways at our birthday parties. The student workers would color them with sharpie pens a variety of different themes. (transformers, barbie, dora, thomas th tank, sports, etc...) This would be the gift given to the b-day boy or girl. The parents and children loved them. One area of warning is the kids under 7 would get jealous so we'd give a eraser or something to everyone. Pictures: http://www.stcloudstate.edu/atwood/underground/BirthdayPictures.asp

We also used them as promo on tables tops in the dinning hall.

-Bill

Ken

We sell ours to another bowling center here in town. The pins are not real good but they get some more use out of them. Also see if there is a person that does yard art with them. I get rid of my old bowling balls to a lady that makes lawn art. (Google bowling ball lawn art to get a good laugh. It is not her but she gets ideas from there)

We also have donated them to a school here in town.

I would look to schools, churches, boys and girls clubs, etc.

Charlotte Dare

University of Florida

Ken,

We usually try to get pins every year.  Because of our volume it is hard to get pins to last much longer. 

Some of our better old pins we will use as gifts for birthday parties and we make them available for groups that make reservations to use as prizes.  We will give some to the bowling team who will paint them and sell as fund raisers.  The remainder we sell to people for landscaping and target practice.

I will also let you know that we went with AMF Amflite Glow Pins for our last order.

Mike

We have given them to gun clubs and, more recently, sold them to the Clermont Pin Company in Clermont, Iowa.  They recondition them into birthday party pins and resell them.  They only give a few bucks per case, but that is better than throwing them away.  We try to make pins last two years.  We do about 5,000 games per lane in our center each year, so we try and make them last 10,000 games.

Rich Renollet

William H. Smith Bowling & Recreation Center

Wichita State University

Ken,

We have to order new pins every year and a half to two years.  The old pins we usually split in half.  We contact our campus police department and sell some to them...which they use as target practice.  The rest we send off to get refurbished and use them for birthday pin gifts.  Other pins are either donated or sold to some of the fraternities and/or sororities on campus.

Andre Adams

TerpZone Recreation Center

University of Maryland