Pete Talbot and Ben Matchstick are the two-person tornado of creativity behind The Cardboard Teck Instantute. Together—with the help of lasers (yes, LASERS!)—they are bringing pinball to the masses with the PinBox 3000, a tabletop pinball system made of precision-cut cardboard with interchangeable and fully customizable play boards. Grab the kids and a hot glue gun, raid the junk drawer or the bottom of the toy box, and make any version of the classic game you can imagine: Dinosaurs vs. Aliens? Life on Mars? Breaking Bad? You know, whatever the kids are into.
Last month, they introduced their creation at the National Maker Faire in Washington, DC, then came home to crush a Kickstarter goal.
Sara: What did you feel was the overall impression from parents? Did they have to explain what pinball is to their kids?
Pete: The parents are totally familiar with pinball. They're like, “Oh my gosh. This is really cool.” A lot of the kids, especially the younger ones, had no idea what pinball was. They’d be like, “What is this thing?” Then the parents would jump in and say, “Do this. This is how you interact with it.” It became a nostalgic bridge—a way for them to connect with their kids. They’d say, “This is what I used to do when I was a kid. We can take all your broken toys and integrate them onto the playfield.” And just like that—boom—it becomes this awesome thing. The kid’s like, “Wow. Cool.”
That was really fun. It was cool to see the parents battling the kids on the PinBox. Sometimes, with tech stuff, kids are like, “Ahhh, don’t help me do the Minecraft stuff,” or whatever. But with the PinBox, younger kids can’t always assemble it easily, so parents get to help. It comes flat-packed and then you build it together. We’re going to provide an idea book so that people creating their own playfields won’t be frozen. It’ll include suggestions for using recycled materials—how to create ramps out of cereal boxes, or cut a sponge in a certain way, or hot glue broken toys onto the playfield.
If kids build playfields from recycled materials, they’ll gain a whole new appreciation for the waste stream. They’ll be like, “Oh my God, we were just tossing this stuff out—and now it’s my favorite toy.” We’ve got more of that kind of junk around our house than I’d care to admit—so many birthday party favors and random bits that break and can’t be fixed.
Pete: Exactly. That’s the benefit of building with cardboard. It’s a simple system. Very easy to fix yourself. You can’t exactly repair the inside of your Game Boy when it breaks. I wouldn’t even try. But with the PinBox, if something tears, you just trace it onto a new piece of cardboard, cut it out, and boom—it’s working again.
There’s also a gamer aspect to the PinBox that isn’t screen-based. Kids are working with real, tangible things. And there’s a strong educational side. Ben wrote a curriculum showing how to integrate STEAM and STEM learning into the PinBox. It’s got everything a diorama has, but you also get to play it.
Sara: I love the learning integration. These days, kids are forced to sit and memorize facts, but what they really respond to is exploring and figuring things out.
Pete: Yes! You solve a problem—like getting the ball up a ramp. Then three new problems show up. The ball gets stuck behind the ramp. You have to fix that. You're building a whole little ecosystem. It’s a journey.
How It All Got Started
Ben: In 2004, I lived in the Northeast Kingdom. We had this event called the Hand and Foot Powered Carnival. I built a cardboard arcade and wanted to make a pinball machine. I made a really junky one from scrap wood and cardboard. A bunch of us painted it and I called it Oh What a Civilization. It was just tons of garbage you had to navigate around. The next year, I made one called On Top of Spaghetti. We toured with one in a bike circus—it rode in the back of a bike trailer.
Eventually, we started doing interactive puppet shows called Grottoblaster, and we’d kick things off with a cardboard arcade. People would hang out and play. That’s when we started making pinball machines again.
A girl named Erin Rodell made a whole exhibit of cardboard pinball machines you could take off the wall and play. She collaborated with a bunch of artists. That was a big inspiration. Once we had the laser to cut out the parts—so we didn’t have to hand-cut all the tiny and funky pieces—that’s when the project really took off. Pete took the lead from there.
Sara: I read that you're using recycled materials for everything. Is that right?
Pete: Yeah. The cardboard is totally recycled. And it's not like there's a shortage of cardboard in the world.
Pete: The only things we buy are the little plastic rivets—from this guy in California with a garage full of them—and rubber bands. But because we use common stuff like rubber bands, people can fix their PinBox. If something breaks, trace it on a new piece of cardboard, cut it, and replace it.
Ben: And we're not protective about it. If someone wants to copy a part or make a new version, go for it. We’re not going to say, “Don’t do that or we’ll sue you.” If someone has the energy to trace and recreate parts, they should do it.
Recently, we met a guy traveling to South Africa. He saw the PinBox at an event and now wants to bring them to orphanages he’s visiting.
Ben: He was just staring at it. Then he turned to me and said, “This is what I want to do. How do we make this happen?” I’m meeting with him tomorrow. We're hoping to create a connection—maybe mail them some kits, Skype with them. It would be amazing.
Sara: That’s so awesome.
Ben: Yeah. These are kids who will cut up a can and turn it into a pinwheel. Just imagine what they could do with a cardboard pinball machine. Connecting all those pieces and people from around the world—that’s the power of this tool. And we love that someone’s taking it all the way across the world to share with other kids. That’s what it’s all about.
