Perth Premier Bingo – South Methven Street

Premier Bingo Perth occupied a building with a far longer bingo history than its final operator’s name might suggest. It began life as the King’s Picture House, dated by Cinema Treasures to 1922, though earlier local histories suggest a King’s Cinema may have existed on the site as far back as 1913. The cinema had a 27-foot proscenium and originally seated around 1,062, reduced slightly when CinemaScope was installed in the 1950s. It survived as a cinema until 1966, when it closed and converted to bingo, becoming known as King’s Bingo, a name that stuck for decades, with records confirming it was still trading under that identity as late as 2009. By 2020, valuation records show New Empire Bingo Ltd associated with the premises, before Premier Bingo, a small independent operator running just three clubs across Perth, Cowdenbeath and Alloa, eventually took over.

Despite its modest size, the club remained genuinely significant locally, with a Perth & Kinross Council retail study finding it held a 42% market share of bingo trips in its catchment area shortly before it closed. That closure came abruptly in August 2023, when Premier Bingo went into administration and all three of its clubs shut with immediate effect, leaving Perth without a bingo hall entirely. The roughly 13,000 square foot building, complete with its old bingo fixtures still in place, sat empty for about a year before going up for sale in November 2024 with offers over £225,000 sought. Rather than facing demolition or conversion into flats, the former hall has since been approved for a genuinely community-minded second life, with plans passed in 2025 to turn it into a community centre and public hall, hosting things like a lunch club and children’s activities. So the building’s story runs from an early 20th century cinema, through nearly six decades of bingo under three different names, to its current chapter serving the people of Perth in a very different way.

Other Lost Halls In The Area

• Dundee Mecca Bingo – The Playhouse
• Dundee County Bingo – Cowgate
• Glenrothes Buzz Bingo – Flemington Road
• Kirkcaldy Carlton Bingo – Park Road
• Kirkcaldy Rio Bingo – St Clair Street

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