The greatest detriment to lan tournaments is byoc. If you replaced the byoc area with arcade games, lan tournaments would immediately gain in profit.

A lan tournament should consist of three to four things: the tournament (which includes seating), arcade machines (if people are at a gaming tournament for four days, they will inevitably play those games - which means money), and food. The fourth thing could be merchandise/hardware/software.

BYOC achieves no profit, as the people bring their own computers (as opposed to renting them at the event), and the games on their computers they already own. Instead of that crap, people would be forced to either watch the tournament, or play arcade games (which, of course, they pay to play).

By exchanging the byoc for arcade machines, the tournament becomes more interesting (as people can't simply play minecraft the whole time), and when they're not watching the tournament, they're likely either eating or playing arcade games (both of which are earning the event money).

I haven't played arcade games in a while, but i'm sure they're still good. Since consoles, portables, cell-phones, computers and the internet came around, arcades have taken a business hit. It would, in every possible way, be in their best interests to partner with lan tournaments. If the money from the machines is split between the lan organization and the arcade providing the machines, the arcade may even be willing to provide the machines at 'no cost'. Meaning, you don't have to rent the machines, you just have to split their profits.

I suppose, you could compromise and keep half the byoc area, and use the other half for arcade games. That could be more profitable than going all or nothing, and might keep people at the event longer (doing nothing but playing arcade games and watching the tournament could get a bit boring after 4 days). If they can go back and forth between the tournament, the byoc, and the arcade games, they will probably stick around longer and ultimately put more money into the arcade machines. I still think the byoc takes away from the tournament, as people would rather play a game than watch one. Arcade games are different though, because you do not play them for extended periods of time. However the case, the byoc should be greatly scaled back, if not eliminated, in favor of arcade machines.