I had 2 PS5s. Gave them to a local gaming cafe, made ₹30K in 3 months.
Few months back, I visited a small gaming cafe near a school in my city. The owner has been running it for 10 years now.
He started from Retro → PS2 → PS3 → PS4
But he stopped at PS4.
When I spoke to him, he said:
People still come, but a lot of them now specifically ask for PS5 games. He did not want to invest ₹50K+ without knowing if demand will actually convert and plus he had some financial constraints too.
Then I remembered I had 2 PS5s lying unused. One in my homestay, one personal. I did not feel like selling them, so thought I’ll try something different.
So I pitched him to try for a month. No fixed cost. You pay me only if people actually play :)
What we did:
- Installed both PS5s
- Kept pricing lower initially (₹30-40/hour/player)
- Later moved to ₹50/hour/player
- My cut: ₹10/hour
I did not charge anything in Jan. Just wanted to test.
Footfall (as per him):
Before:
- 10-15 weekday
- 20-25 weekend
After adding PS5:
- Weekends 35-50
- Weekdays slightly improved
Nothing crazy, but something noticeable
I used PS app activity and his weekly logs
(Tracking player-hours, not just console uptime)
My payout (₹10/hour share):
Feb: ₹10K
March: ₹12.2K
April (till now): ₹7.5K
Total so far: ₹30,020
(Attached sheet for reference)
Why this worked:
Demand was already there, he just did not want to take the risk and I had idle assets. Simple :)
What I learnt:
You don’t always need a new idea.
Sometimes you just need an asset and someone who already has demand!
If someone wants to try something similar:
Look for:
- Shops getting customers but missing 1 key thing
- Your unused assets (electronics, space, vehicles, anything)
- Partnerships instead of investments
You don’t need to build from scratch. Sometimes you just plug into an existing system and take a small cut.
Hoping for a jump now since summer holidays are coming soon. That’s when this should ideally peak.
Someone might say what if he ends up buying his own PS5 after seeing demand… Lelo yaar 😄
I did not invest anything, still made a decent amount.
Even if it works short-term, I’m happy.
Thanks for reading :)