Chuck E. Cheese ditching animatronics, adding venues, including 1 on Long Island

The big cheese is going bigger but the band is not going along for the ride.

Chuck E. Cheese plans to open eight to 10 new family entertainment centers this year, including one on Long Island in February at Green Acres Commons in Valley Stream.

The kid-friendly chain — known for its Chuck E. Cheese mouse mascot, arcade games, pizza parties, animatronic  bands and the slogan “where a kid can be a kid” — is expanding its footprint and spending millions to remodel its existing venues to have more technology-based entertainment, said Allison Chouinard, spokeswoman at CEC Entertainment LLC, Chuck E. Cheese's Irving, Texas-based parent company.

That means the animatronic characters are being removed, but jumbo video walls, interactive dance floors, new arcade games and more Kidz Bop content (family-friendly covers of popular music) are being added, she said.

The only Chuck E. Cheese location in the nation that will retain animatronic band members, called Munch’s Make Believe Band, is in Northridge, California.

The Chuck E. Cheese mascot is still present at all the locations, and he leads a live show for kids every hour on the interactive dance floors at the remodeled venues, she said. 

“Really we’re just evolving with the trends and likes of today’s kids and families … and that means evolving technology to be more what kids of today look for, more interactive and digital,” she said.

There are 461 corporate and 13 franchise Chuck E. Cheese centers in the United States and 10 corporate locations in Canada. There are also 88 franchises in 18 other countries, mostly in Latin America and the Middle East. (CEC also has more than 120 Peter Piper Pizza restaurants in the U.S. and Mexico.)

The Chuck E. Cheese remodeling started with a small number of centers in 2017 but was ramped up after the chain emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in December 2020, following a decline in business amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Chouinard said.

CEC, which is spending $40 million to $50 million remodeling 100 to 125 Chuck E. Cheese centers annually, has completed about 80% of the revamps, she said.

The remodeling of all U.S. and Canadian corporate locations is expected to be completed by the end of this year, she said.

Long Island remodeling

Of the four Chuck E. Cheese locations on Long Island, two — in Patchogue and Hempstead — were remodeled in 2023. The Hicksville and West Islip centers will be remodeled this summer.

The Hicksville location is among the fewer than 30 Chuck E. Cheese centers that still have operating animatronic bands because the venues haven’t been remodeled yet. 

Beth Brooke was at Chuck E. Cheese in Patchogue on Sunday with her son, 7, and daughter, 6, for the birthday party of one of her daughter’s friends.

The remodeled center has a more modern feel and a better layout, but Chuck E. Cheese has remained an iconic attraction for kids for decades because it carves out a niche for youngsters, said Brooke, 41, of Farmingville.

“It’s a really fun atmosphere. All of the games are really attractive to them and they can just be a kid,” she said.

The Chuck E. Cheese that will open in Valley Stream will have the new format. The venue will occupy a 12,889-square-foot unit at 750 Sunrise Hwy. at Green Acres Commons, the shopping center adjacent to Green Acres Mall.

Chuck E. Cheese was founded in 1977 in San Jose, California, by Nolan Bushnell, a co-founder of the video game company Atari Inc. 

While Chuck E. Cheese was a pioneering business, bigger players have taken a growing market share in the arcade, food and entertainment complexes industry.  Dave & Buster's accounts for 50.3% of the industry and draws more adult customers, according to IBISWorld Inc., a market research firm based in Manhattan.

But Chuck E. Cheese's changes, including adding a Grown-Up Menu with spicier food in December, are not attempts to be a more adult-focused chain, Chouinard said.

“I don’t think we’re trying to compete with that at all. We’re just trying to take care of our guests — small and the adults,” she said.

Reuters reported in December that CEC was exploring a sale of Chuck E. Cheese “amid acquisition interest, according to people familiar with the matter.”

CEC didn't "have any information to share" regarding a potential sale, Chouinard said Monday.

By Tory N. Parrish

tory.parrish@newsday.com@ToryParrish1

Tory N. Parrish covers retail and small business for Newsday. She has worked at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and Observer-Dispatch in Utica, N.Y.