Bingo operators plan TV blitz as advertising restrictions are lifted

Bingo operators Gala and Top Rank are preparing to launch national TV advertising campaigns, following this week’s announcement by the Home Office that it will lift restrictions on advertising for bingo and betting shops.

The Home Office move also paves the way for bingo operators to move into television and radio sponsorship as they attempt to rid them-selves of their downmarket, “blue rinse” image.

But the operators will be looking closely at the experience of pools company Littlewoods, which won similar concessions from the Govern-ment last year.

Despite investing up to 4m in advertising pools on television, stakes placed on games at Littlewoods substantially declined this year. In the 1995/6 football season, stakes fell to 448m from 663m in the 1994/5 season.

The bingo industry – which, like the pools, has been hit by the launch of the National Lottery as well as structural changes in the UK leisure market – is confident, however, that liberalised advertising will help it to establish a new generation of bingo halls suitable for young players.

Bingo is vacating its high street locations and increasingly heading for out-of-town leisure complexes. It is doing away with the drafty bingo halls of old with uncomfortable chairs and chirpy bingo callers in favour of new centres which offer not only bingo, but also high-class catering, bar facilities and access to a range of other leisure activities.

Here again, the parallel with the pool’s companies’ experience is not particularly comforting. Littlewoods tried simplifying the way the game was played, and came up with the Quick Pix coupon which it thought would be a winner as it mimicked the simplicity of playing the Lottery.

However, Quick Pix failed to grab the public’s imagination and has now been all but phased out (MW October 25).

Yet bingo has something neither the pools nor the National Lottery possesses. It can be positioned as a social leisure activity in its own right, rather than something you do in your own home. As such, it is not merely competing with soft betting, but with cin ema, bowling, a night in the pub or (if plans to target youth are successful) the Saturday night rave party.

Because bingo halls are being developed in out-of-town locations, they need advertising more than ever. The new deregulatory moves mean they will be able to advertise the prizes they offer – crucial when battling against a 15m Lottery jackpot.

Gala’s advertising agency, JWT Manchester, is waiting for a meeting with Home Office Minister Timothy Kirkhope today (Wednesday) before it discusses marketing strategy with the bingo operator.

The Home Office is recommending the complete abolition of restrictions on bingo advertising, which until now has not been permitted to mention prizes, nor to entice people to play.

Kirkhope says: “It is time we allowed betting shops to advertise their locations. For bingo, which is a social, ‘soft’ form of gambling, it makes sense to remove all the advertising restrictions in the gambling legislation, which would mean operators could use broadcast media.”

The effects of the proposed deregulation on betting shops is much more limited. They will, for the first time, be allowed to advertise in print the whereabouts of their outlets. This will help the smaller players most, as Coral, Ladbroke’s or William Hill shops are practically omnipresent in the high street.

What betting shop operators are really pinning their hopes on is the very concession that seems least likely – the ability to take side-bets on the National Lottery. They are furiously lobbying for this and have taken the campaign to the highest level of Government. They argue that the introduction of side-betting in Ireland has had no detrimental effect on the Irish National Lottery. But the UK National Lottery operator Camelot says it could miss its targets for raising funds for the “Good Causes” if side-bets are permitted, as it will take custom from the Lottery and from scratchcards.

The Home Office recommendations will be considered for up to 60 days by deregulation committees in the Houses of Commons and Lords, and could be introduced by April next year. The recommendations seriously increase the stakes in the UK gaming market. But they may not be enough to save the bingo and betting industries from the long-term decline they face.