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Friday, 27 March 2009

another club closes......

Well, another week, another bingo hall closes........as the recession hits the country big style, a flagship club in Preston has to shut its doors just 2 short years after a big grand opening!!!!!!

What makes it more poignant for me is that one of my bingo buddies and north-west bingo caller of the year Allen is the caller there! (you can read more about him here)

Brownie points to the company involved though as they have tried there best to redeploy the staff to other clubs on it's books, however there are still redundancies for around half of the employees. I know that Allen is going to another club so good luck with that mate.

It just goes to show that no club is safe from this current climate at the moment, lets hope it doesn't happen near you or in your club.

Posted by Brett at 03:27 | Add your comments [1] | Links |

Monday, 23 March 2009

The boy's are back in bingo.

the lads are back in the bingo!!!!.......although in a strictly online sense of the word as this article shows. Apparently there study has found that nearly 1 in 5 players in the online bingo world are now male.....

Now, regular readers of this website will know that we support the bingo playing men of this country; I'm a man myself (last time I checked) and it is pleasing to see that some of the media are beginning to realise that this bingo lark is not 'just for the ladies'. Maybe now, the advertising executives will start aiming there commercials towards a more 'general' audience......and I don't mean getting bleeding Vic Reeves to wear another dress again!!!!!!!!!

Posted by Brett at 12:51 | Add your comments [0] | Links |

Sunday, 15 March 2009

Prize and Party

Was browsing through one of the groups on a well known networking site and stumbled across a topic about Prize and Party and how to generate more income from these ancillary games. It's a topic that is potentially crucial to the survival of the bingo industry; especially when you have to factor into it the governments meddling in the bingo market; increasing taxes and limiting profit making ventures.

For those of you that are unaware, Prize and Party are the games that are played in between sessions of bingo and are faster and quicker than the traditional bingo games. In actual fact, the party bingo style of playing where you are looking for coloured lines/corners/etc is probably most peoples first experience of bingo; as this is the game that is played in almost every seaside resort in the country. You remember? The ones where you played for vouchers and the more you won the bigger the prize that you could claim. (you needed about 1,000 wins for a toaster....etc, etc!!)


Well, Prize and Party bingo is the main source of income for the clubs.......well it was......until the smoking ban came into effect.

Before the ban, it was easy to persuade people to pop a few 10p's into the slot's on there tables and the government had helped out the industry a couple of years prior and made certain P+P games exempt from tax (wow, the government helping us out.......I know!!!) A lot of clubs (especially the smaller independents) were dependent on the profits raised from these games (as the majority of the stakes from the main sessions of bingo would go straight onto the prize board)

When the smoking ban came into effect-first in Scotland, then Wales and finally England the impact was dramatic and immediate. Instead of people popping there coins in for the first full-house game on there boards, there was instead a mass exodus out of the building as 3/4 of the players got there nicotine fix!!!!! Calling Party bingo on that first night was a bit of shock for me I can tell you!!!!! Companies in the first few weeks were throwing money at the prize boards on the party games.....looking to keep the players in and to pop there coins in but with little effect......it seemed the demon weed had beaten the bingo bug for the players!!!!!!

So, any idea's to change the fortunes for Prize and Party bingo? Well some clubs are thinking positively about this to the point that if bingo players are outside then we must bring the games to them. A club in Fenton are one of the latest clubs to provide outdoor P+P gaming for there smoking players. A great idea, but one that can only be limited to certain bigger companies and certain club locations.

One of the great things about working in a club on a holiday camp like I had to do for over 2 years is that we would have to be inventive to persuade the players to part with there holiday cash. We were dealing with BRAND NEW BINGO players every week who would only pop there coins in if they knew what they were playing for and how to win it. So we introduced a spate of free prize games at the start of the night....This would encourage our regular players to come in earlier and the other new players would learn the ropes of the game at no cost to them. We would then award the winners of the free games vouchers to redeem at the bar or off the cost of there books.......clever eh? Also we introduced budget games of Party bingo whereby they would get 6 games for a £1 (5x10p and one 50p game) instead of the usual 2 or 3. The prizes were smaller but getting 6 chances to win a prize instead of just a couple, would tempt the players in.

A lot of clubs now have dual boards on the tables. This means that one player can play on two boards at one unit instead of the usual one. What you are finding now is a lot of clubs offer the 'b' board free, once again giving the player an extra incentive to play along as there chances to win will be 'doubled'. With the spate of new technology coming into the bingo clubs in the 21st century you can also play on high-tec units that offer you the chance to play on 2/4/6/or even 8 electronic boards at a time, which claim automatically for you so you never miss out on your prize.

However I tell you what I would like to see though....and that is the return to simpler times in the P+P world. Back in the 70's and 80's the Party games were huge and the prizes on offer were not just cash prizes but also other goods such as food or teddies or electronic items (just like down the seaside) An old manager of mine in the 70's had an entire department of the bingo club dedicated to this where the players would play for there vouchers and collect them so they could win that teasmade that they were after for there mum for Xmas, for example! It was a system that rewarded not only the regular players, but also the company. Some nights nobody would claim anything so monies earned were pure profit....and also the goods on offer were bought at wholesale rate, so when the time came to give some prizes away, they were usually cost price only. This is a way of playing P+P bingo that has been fading away over the past few years...although some clubs still give away prizes of choccies over Xmas and Easter time (which I have a bugbear about; but save that for another blog!!!!)

Also there is a way where a £1 game of P+P can be played for a premium prize (such as a laptop, or a mountain bike) which is underused in a lot of clubs......infact it is something that I was aware of in my club but never did. The fact of the matter is that if I was a smoker in today's bingo halls, maybe the incentive of spending a quid and winning a PS3 or a new TV would out-way my bodies demands to inflict it with toxic chemicals.........

To cut a long and wondering story short, as an old hand at Prize and Party, you have to think inventively to keep your audiences attention. Whereas as a bingo caller all ears are on you....to be a P+P caller you have to be more of a character and a salesperson to stop these players leaving there tables. A lot of companies are looking to the future to keep the players in the building.....maybe they should look at bingo past to try and find alternatives to keeping the players popping there coins in.................

Posted by Brett at 14:48 | Add your comments [3] | Links |

Monday, 9 March 2009

Bleeding eck!!!!!!

ark at this article about a pensioner being booted out of her local bingo club because she was smoking a 'pretend cigarette'!!!!!! Has the country gone well and truly mad; or is it just the bingo manager at this particular club. Apparently the pensioner was removed because it was 'in the best interests of the club.'

Was there a threat of 'pretend secondary smoke', or were the other players envious that they hadn't thought of doing the same thing and complained to the manager.

What next? Somebody is kicked out for wearing a nicorette patch? Someone tells off a vegetarian because they are eating a quorn sausage and 'cheating the system' Bleeding nora!!!!!!!

ADDITIONAL: trust me for not checking out this sites home page first as i have now found out that this topic has already been mentioned. After reading what has been said about the situation it seems that it is another case of the media 'bending' the truth. Although I still cannot see the difference between someone 'smoking' an electronic cigarette to having a nicorette patch or gum or otherwise. The whole thing about the smoking ban was not about the individual, but more about the secondary smoke that impacts on the surrounding area, especially in public places. These new forms of nicotine consumption do not affect anybody but the person involved: If they want to contaminate there own bodies then it is there choice. maybe these new E-cigarettes can be marketed so it is obvious that the customer is inhaling a 'fake' cigarette.....make them blue, put logo's on them.....I don't know!!!!! As the article stated, most smokers prefer the more natural method of fulfilling there habit anyway and will wait until a suitable time to satisfy there needs.

This example however shows that slowly but surely the act of smoking is fast becoming a negative trait in public behaviour................whether it be a real or fake sneaky drag!!!!!!!

Posted by Brett at 01:37 | Add your comments [1] | Links |

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