I can only comment from our experience, but there were no leasing plans etc. Fly over to Chicago - pick the titles and wait until they arrive. There was always some "second hand" machines that would fill a container, and sometimes container space was shared with other business' - that was handled by the broker, and you simply drove down to Port Melbourne to pick up your machines as "loose Cargo". From the flyers that I have, some had comments such as "Yes", "Maybe" and "No" - These are mainly on EM flyers.
SS machines were all brought direct from the USA as well. Always as multiples - never just "one" machine. I'm not sure if any Australian Distributors were set up so that you HAD to buy from them. This started more or less with the Viseo Games - You could only buy TMNT Video game from LAI exclusively.
Machines in the 60's, 70's and 80's didn't cost anything near $4000 each. Buying the machines was "up front" and hope the container does not fall off the ship.
