Electronic Bingo in Ottawa
Wednesday, 31 October 2012 | Written by Rachel Collins
Bingo operators over the pond in Canada have been struggling throughout the years, with their revenues steadily dropping as they are hit by smoking bans and the rise of casino venues. Of course, the countless excellent online bingo sites have also played a part in this profit slump, but operators in Ottawa think that they may just have found a solution to their problem; Electronic Bingo.
Now don’t go confusing this with online bingo – this is not played online. Typically, electronic bingo is like a hybrid between slot machines and bingo. Played on electronic bingo machines built with Random Number Generators, bingo machines still allow players to pit their wits against each other, but they are simply as new and exciting bingo experience! The City Council of Ottawa are currently in discussion as to whether or not these should be integrated in existing bingo halls. AT present, Ottawa have just 3 of their bingo halls left, with 9 of them falling victim to disinterest and being closed down. The Ontario Gaming Corp reports that there has been a steady slump between 8% and 10% in bingo hall revenue over the last year alone, and this that’s this revolutionary modernization is the key to pulling in new fans.
Administrator to one of the 3 existing bingo halls in Ottawa (Bingo Land) Rob Sproule stated, “To get younger people into the halls there needs to be more excitement, more energy.” He firmly believes that the online turnaround for the dwindling halls is this Electronic Bingo. He thinks that casino halls with exceptional slot and gaming machines have severely hurt their bingo economy, and the last 10 years alone have seen the launch of Casino du Lac Leamy, Rideau-Carleton Raceway introducing impressive slot machines and of course the smoking ban of 2001 that saw revenue drop drastically as people were no longer welcome to smoke in a place that they had become accustomed to do so.
The Ontario Gaming Corp stated that they would – if allowed – introduce machines for new and renovated venues and they also propose that they would run the new machines using top notch technology. One would think that these machines would be welcomed by bingo fans who frequent the 3 halls in Ottawa, but surprisingly this proposal has been met with disdain. Players insist that they will “never change the way that they play bingo” and refuse to accept the integration of these new machines.
There was a time when bingo players shunned the new and scary online bingo sites, however these have slowly but surely become one of the most popular ways to play in the world. Online bingo is a multi-billion pound industry and I for one think that if hard-core traditional bingo fans can accept online bingo, they can sure accept electronic bingo. The decline in the revenue of these bingo halls suggest that it could soon become a case of electronic bingo or no bingo at all – so I am sure the fans will come round to this idea eventually.
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