You can look back to a recently as a mere five years and find stories detailing the imminent demise of Great Britain’s institutions: bingo. Bingo was huge before the turn of the millennium, with people of all different backgrounds and ages attending their local clubs.
But then, the game went into a huge decline, with halls shutting up and down the UK, businesses closing their doors, and the remaining bingo fans seemingly fading away. The first big hit against the bingo was the smoking ban, with a huge portion of bingo regulars being middle-aged smokers. Then came another gut punch in the form of the lofty bingo tax which the industry deemed to be unfair and punitive. These factors and the changing habits of potential customers helped bingo continue to decline across the company.
In one of the comeback stories of the decade, however, bingo is back to being a much-loved British pastime. To stop the rot, bingo had to be rid of its stubbornness and evolve to become appealing to the modern audience. Now, in 2019, it’s safe to say that bingo has achieved this feat.
Finding the new audience
Source: Pixabay
For decades, bingo held the stigma of being a game for the elderly. It makes sense as the audience of the traditional British pastime in its prime continued to play through its decline – having more time to do so in their later years. An inability to adapt the game to be more exciting and enticing to the younger audience was certainly a factor in bingo being unable to stay relevant.
Some entrepreneurs noted this error in the ways of traditional bingo providers and decided to up the ante and deliver a brand new bingo experience. There has been a stark rise in the number of bingo clubs nights and events popping up around the UK, with each of them trying to add new ways to inject some action into the game.
One of these is Dabbers, which has reinvented bingo to cater to hipsters who want unique snacks like spinach falafels as well as craft beers and cocktails as a part of their bingo night out. Events like this have introduced a new audience to bingo. Of course, the reintroduction is in the new, crazy format, but the game’s fundamentals are still present and will encourage some people to pick up the game in the traditional sense.
Finally embracing the digital space
Source: Pixabay
Compared to fellow gambling providers like casino and sportsbooks, bingo was incredibly slow to move to the digital space, trying to fight off the increasing adoption of the internet for as long as possible to the game’s detriment. Land-based firms figured that the game was so popular that players would ignore other more convenient online games and continue to frequent their halls: they were wrong.
Realising the error of their ways, bingo finally made a move online and in tremendous fashion. Not only are regular bingo games available via the internet, but online bingo has fully embraced the capabilities of going digital by offering a wide range of regular games, themed games like Deal or No Deal Bingo, and varied jackpot games, from a couple hundred quid to several thousands of pounds.
Bingo transformed itself in its live form and online to become a relevant and convenient pastime for players in Great Britain once again. With exciting online and live games, the two forms of bingo complement each other, with players of one form likely to try the other after finding that they enjoy bingo.