See the Cardboard Arcade That’s Earned a 9-Year-Old $79K for His Scholarship Fund
- Posted on April 11, 2012 at 5:41pm by
Liz Klimas
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Caine stands proudly in front of his arcade.
Parents know all too well what children can do with a little imagination and a cardboard box. One young man took his fascination for taking things apart and putting them back together, coupled it with his love of arcade games and the abundance of cardboard boxes available at his father’s East Los Angeles auto parts shop, and created a now-famous cardboard arcade.
Caine’s Arcade, as it’s called, was founded in June 2011 when Caine spent his summer vacation at his dad’s shop. It started with a basketball toss game and grew to include soccer — played with plastic army men goalies — a “claw”, bowling and more.
So how much is it to play? For $1, Caine’s business will give you four turns on any game. But wait, for $2, you can get a Fun Pass. A Fun Pass is worth 500 turns. No brainer, right?
“It’s a great deal,” the budding entreprenuer said in a video, which has since gone viral, about his project.
But just because Caine hand makes his Fun Passes, don’t think you can put one by him with a forged one. He has calculators on every arcade game “for security” to validate Fun Passes. “You put the pin number in [found on the back of the Fun Pass] and push the checkmark button and a big number comes out. That‘s how you know if it’s a real fun pass,” Caine said.
When you score a point, Caine has even devised a way for your prize-winning tickets to come out like an honest-to-goodness professional arcade machine. Caine crawls into the back of the box and pushes the tickets through a slit.
With all this arcade infrastructure, you may be surprised Caine waited a long time before he got his first customer.
“Caine’s always waiting out front and sitting on his little chair and trying to convince people to play, but there’s not too much luck,” Caine’s father said, explaining that most of his business has switched to online resulting in fewer drop by customers. “But, he never gets discouraged. He’s always sweeping up, dusting off the games, waiting for customers.”
Caine cleans up for his customers.
Caine waits patiently for a customer to drop by.
With that, it was a big deal — huge — when someone stopped by to be Caine’s first customer and play in the arcade. More specifically, it was Nirvan Mullick who couldn’t have been a better first customer. Naturally, he bought the fun pass, but he went on to do so much more.
Security footage shows Caine's first customer.
Mullick wanted to create a short video on Caine’s arcade, which lead to a scheme to invite everybody in Los Angeles to play the 9-year-old’s arcade in a “surprise, flashmob style.” Within an hour of creating the Facebook event for the surprise mob at Caine’s arcade on Oct. 2, 2011, the local NBC affiliate had shown up to get the scoop.
When Caine spotted the flashmob, he smiled a steady smile and let out a surprisingly calm laugh for a man whose one customer turned into hundreds.
Watch the film:
In the just two days that Mullick’s finished product has been posted on Vimeo, it has started the Caine’s Arcade viral sensation all over again. Beverly Macy, a marketing professional and professor, wrote on the Huffington Post blog that while Caine’s story is touching in and of itself, it also speaks volumes about the Web community and how it works:
The bigger picture is why discovery and amplificationare two of the most intriguing elements of social web. Yes, it‘s always fun to be out in the real world and just ’happen‘ across something you weren’t expecting — a recipe book, an antique chair, your favorite flowers in Spring, a puppy up for adoption.
Evidently, that‘s how Nirvan Mullick discovered Caine’s Arcade — he just happened upon it. What he did from there demonstrates the power of social media… the flashmob, Reddit, and the rest that the film chronicles.
Today the story is trending on Twitter and the video has gone viral. Caine’s full story is at the Caine’s Arcade website and donations are even being taken for a scholarship fund to benefit Caine’s education.
So far, the scholarship fund set up for Caine has raised more than $79,000. If it’s any indication how quickly that fund is growing, Forbes reported the wee hours of Wednesday morning that the fund had raised $57,000 at that point. Nearly 30,000 people like Caine’s Arcade on Facebook at the time of this posting.
If you’re in the East L.A. area and interested in checking out the arcade, find its weekend hours and location here.
[H/T: Wired]
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Comments (53)
ObserverOnTheHill
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 4:09pmQuick, Holder shut this young entrpreneur down before he thinks he can make it on his own !
Report Post »Cesium
Posted on April 13, 2012 at 12:10pmby the time Steve Jobs was 9 he was probably beyond cardboard..
Report Post »Rowgue
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 3:57pmI like the big sign hanging in the back:
“CHEMICALS IN THIS AREA HAVE BEEN KNOWN TO CAUSE CANCER”
You think they’d have covered that up before taking the picture lol. They’re just begging the fools at CPS to come sniffing around.
Report Post »Cat_Ion
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 6:17pmIts California.
Report Post »Everything causes cancer in California.
desertspeaks
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 2:29pmawaits obama to employ the buffet rule to STEAL the money from the kid and redistribute it to other children who are arcadeless. It‘s completely unfair that he has an arcade when other children don’t have one! We must tax it, regulate it and then destroy it.
Report Post »mperkins37
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 4:21pmIRS will be swooping in to Grab HAlf, City will join in demanding a special permit & EPA will stomp the rest of the dream by fining him for whatever reason they think of, leaving the kid owing 1.25 million. Taking Bets.
Report Post »carlitamonique
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 1:00pmwhat an amazing and supportive dad!!!! LOVED IT!
Report Post »Gamaliel
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 12:07pmOh, oh. . . when the feds see this they’ll need to prosecute this kid for using USPS priority mail boxes. Boxes are free but are to be used ONLY for shipping of priority mail.
Report Post »TheLeftMadeMeRight
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 10:47amSTOP THIS KID BEFORE HE HURST HIMSELF OR OTHERS!
HE IS USING HIS imagination….
Report Post »swoods08
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 10:44amThere are no more arcades in california, I drove 6 hours and looked around. Maybe I’ll go to this kids arcade and use… my I M A G I N E AAaaaaaAAAaay Shawn.
Report Post »RACSAN20
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 10:01amI hope the kid knows he has to give half of his arcade to couch potato/occupier of the playground down the street.
Report Post »ElChupaCabraDeUSA
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 9:49amI love this little future 1%er. I’m waiting for the sequel where the city fines him $50,000 for lack of license, IRS comes down on him like storm troupers to take the rest of his profits and the occupiers show up to trash the arcade. After he’s left with nothing he rebuilds his empire and becomes a millionaire. Then Obama will say he is not paying his fair share.
Report Post »politicianssuck
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 9:08amThat is awesome! That kid will probably grow up to be the next bill gates because he has applied himself. Not to mention he does not look like he started out rich. It’s just to bad Americans think whats mine is yours and he will be taxed away because he is a millionaire/billionaire. Sorry kid, but you can’t be rich in todays america. It’s not fair.
Report Post »FreeEnterprise
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 8:24amIt is over $100,000 now!
Report Post »chips1
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 12:05pmCrap draws flies. Money draws Obama.
Report Post »3rd and North
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 8:23amThanks for showing us a creative, imaginitive kid who sticks to his work and ideas with a positivie attitude. Thank you also for the adults that encouraged these good character traits.
Report Post »Magyar
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 7:25amWith Socialism sitting on America’s doorstep, this kind of creativity and initiative will be strongly discouraged because it might make others feel inferior….
Report Post »socialism.rocks
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 8:29aminnovation and creation is in human genetics and has nothing to do with crapitalism
Report Post »ElChupaCabraDeUSA
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 9:56amso is laziness and treachery which are bankrolled by the innovators and producers in your socialist utopia.
Report Post »colt1860
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 11:54am@socialism.rocks LOL. Try telling that to the Cubans and North Koreans.
Report Post »Nick84
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 3:13pmcolt1860-
Are you really that ignorant to think that nothing comes from those countries? Furthermore, capitalism is not the only drive to succeed. Take Jonas Salk for example.
Report Post »EP46
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 6:31amWell, I guess the DOJ will have to shut this down and take Caine to court, or possibly jail, for at least a hundred laws he has probably broken. Those pesky regulations and then the IRS rules could employ at least a dozen EPA and IRS agents for the nest 10 years in their prosecution of Caine.
Report Post »LovinUSA
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 4:16amHow cute! Thanks people, you made thuis little boys day! Can‘t wait to see what he has conjured up by the time he’s 20 !
Report Post »donaldchar
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 1:12amLet‘s hope that America will have available the education Caine wants and deserves by the time he’s ready for it. Good goin’, guy!
Report Post »BubbaT
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 10:30pmI can see why people here can be “snarky” and pessimistic because that‘s how we’ve been groomed the way things are today. But this is a feel good story about a kid that got lucky. Let’s wish him well. It should happen more often.
Report Post »unrealistic
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 10:39pmRemember when those little girls had their lemonaid stand shut down by the government because they were vending without a permit from their front yard? kind of strange how the gov will pick and choose.
Report Post »Ronald Wilson
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 9:13pmI feel bad for the kid, any amount specifically for college is useless, give him gold instead.
Report Post »chershaw8
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 8:48pmMy God people…leave the kid alone….
Report Post »witchrunner
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 6:45pmThe comments here are mild. Now that this has made it on a “right wing” site, how long do you think it will take for the State of California and the IRS to track the kid down and demand taxes be paid and the place be spruced up to meet OSHA and other “safety” regulations? My bet is not long. We’ve all read about lemonade stands being shut down so you know it will happen here.
Report Post »Bottomgun
Posted on April 13, 2012 at 12:27am@scruffycat Yep, MM trolls are out in force. You think it’s sad this kid has what you think is unrealistic ambition? I suppose your reality is to just keep borrowing or printing money to live a live of utopia, food stamps and welfare.
Report Post »hcartexas
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 8:11pmStupid Idea, Stupid Kid….. somehow gets rewarded. If he were truely “bright” he wouldve bought some real games with his 79k and made a real business. Instead his make believe retarded nonsense continues….
Report Post »bassist237
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 8:49pmC’mon… it’s not the kids fault someone made a video and blew it up on social media. If anything, its the people that support it…. just like any other business, if you don’t like them – don’t support them. He is no different than Wal-Mart – other than he would be an ant on that mountain. The kid had a stroke of luck and timing and someone was willing to help him. Kudos.
Report Post »ktmk36
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 9:35pmAs a small business owner and a father, I find the story fascinating and inspirational and quite frankly my jaw hits the floor reading some of the snarky rude arse comments on here…I mean, really???
Report Post »jdickiso
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 1:37amYou must be “new” to the blaze. Any ridiculously offensive or snarky comments are made by Media Matters, and Moveon.org employees who have nothing better to do than get paid to destroy anything and everything good in this world. Of course no one believes this is a dumb story. The only people dumb enough to say such overtly, over the top, hateful comments are those “plants” trying to make conservatives look bad. This is an amazing story. Frankly, the blaze should have more. It’s inspiring and full of the spirit. Whatever brings light, warmth and lasting happiness is from God. So the obvious conclusion is that Media Matters and Moveon.org (and their transparent employees) come straight out of the bowels of HELL. Now that’s where global warming REALLY takes place. And Global Cooling is in the hearts of their employees.
Report Post »jdickiso
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 1:48amHcartexas? That’s the best screen name you could come up with Media Matters? Talk about no clue in clandestance…try not to be too obvious you’re trying to “represent” some “crazy” conservative. We see right through you…pathetic… If we weren’t living in such horrible, outrageous and serious times, I would laugh at how pathetic your attempts are. But unfortunately these are sickening times and you just add to the vomit mire of it all. You’re pathetic and disgusting.
Report Post »scruffycat
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 5:50amI got that same feeling reading this story. Creepy. Very creepy. And sad for the kid. And totally delusional to think you can tape a bunch of boxes together and the money will start to roll in. Almost like some junior refugee from Las Vegas that is testing to see if that Desert Pinball Gambling Mojo that brings in the bucks in Nevada will work where he is. Kind of like a Cargo Cult where the natives build big huge representations of airplanes on their ground in hopes that the giant metal bird that came bearing goods and supplies once long ago in legend will again return loaded with its fortunes to bestow upon the waiting faithful…
Report Post »jdickiso
Posted on April 12, 2012 at 10:57am@Scruffycat…way to double down! Just like Saul Alinsky, Jay Carney, or Wassmanschultz teach you to do. If you’re exposed as a liar and deceiver, double down on the lie! GREAT!! That way, without addressing my comment, we may actually believe you to be an actual “crazy” right wing conservative! Nope sorry….doubling down on stupidity leads to greater and greater amounts of it. With such dumb and weird comments like yours that this is somehow creepy, we obviously know you work for Media Matters. You’ve been exposed, now go troll some other Blaze story…you’ve got a lot of work to do….lol…
Report Post »Bottomgun
Posted on April 13, 2012 at 12:17am@hcartexas Ya it may seem stupid to you, and you probably think I’m stupid for donating to that kid but my donation is just $2 out of the $130K + he has collected as of 11:35 PM, 6 hours after this story was posted on the blaze. Lot of stupid people making a stupid donation to a kid that may well become the next Henry Ford or Bill Gates. Look around you, this is only a symbol of what we all wish to do by thinking creatively. In real life, you have Glenn Beck being creative and building a tv network. I only hope this country weathers through the storms threatening our creative spirit.
Report Post »colt1860
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 7:44pmJust wait until the IRS and City Hall find out. : (
Report Post »dmforman
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 8:02pmHe won’t have $79,000 for long.
Report Post »colt1860
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 9:58pmMy comment is not meant to discourage the kid, or any like minded kid. The kid is doing a great job. I hope he inspires other children to work hard and follow their dreams.
Report Post »RamonPreston
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 10:51pmRight on. Does he have a permit? Business license? Filed income tax on it? Has records? His problems have justed started. The media did not do him a favor.
Report Post »Itsjusttim
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 6:38pmFrom the time I was 12 throughout my teenage years I invented roughly 20 devices, and then destroyed all my innovations except for the vague memory of them because I wasn’t going to feed the beast, and quite frankly money doesn’t mean that much to me.
Report Post »Itsjusttim
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 7:17pmBut nearly almost all Americans will call me a liar because they are motivated by fame, wealth, and to claim in their alternate reality – that they are doing good, when it‘s just they ’like a dog’ enjoy a pat on the head.
Report Post »DeathTongue
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 8:42pmI was thinking about calling you a liar, but since that’s what you expect, I’m going to trust you wholeheartedly instead. Now, where’s my pat on the head, bro?
Report Post »Beckofile
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 5:59pmHe has surpassed Buffet’s secretary in income and is fast approaching the 1%. Time for Obama to give a speech stating that we should take part of his earnings and give them to the kids down the block that have been forced to sit inside and play Xbox all day. This just is not fair that he makes enough money to go to collage while others in the hood do not have the same opportunity.
Report Post »Mapache
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 5:58pmI wonder how long before the IRS shows up to take 25% of his earnings as well as medicare and social security taxes. Oh, and the state is sure to hit him up with licensing and entertainment fees along with the fire department finding a fire hazard and occupancy violations. Is his establishment ADA complaint? I did not think so, so here comes a lawyer with a class action law suit. It was a nice, cute story until the government heard about it.
Report Post »Itsjusttim
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 6:33pmDon’t forget about zoning/ property ordinances – if he can even have it there; not to mention carrying insurance, and he will be sued by the industry to charge a certain amount. I know many people who when they were children came up with innovative ideas, and then as they get older all the governmental and societal red-tape wipes-out their ambition, because the bottom-line is this country just sucks.
Report Post »Itsjusttim
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 6:44pmAnd the only reason almost all people don‘t think this country sucks and they don’t view it as a lesser third world nation is because the U.S can print money when it wants to, but not for long.
Report Post »right-wing-waco
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 10:18pmTim,
Report Post »It’s not the country that sucks. It’s the people in Washington that are running it. (First reply was deleted)
Beckofile
Posted on April 11, 2012 at 5:54pmBut wait is Caine acting as a free Capitalist American???? I can‘t wait for about 2 days when we learn Caine did not obtain the proper state and federal tax ID’s, business license, Gameing license, vendors license and street sweeping license to operate such a venture. The revenuers will be after that college fund to repay the state for all the lost revenue that this boy robbed from the people by use of the sidewalk and streets and other infrastructure. Time to shut these underground businesses down for good.
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