GalaBingo.com To The Rescue?

Part of the Gala Bingo response to the recent Bingo decline is to push the Gala Bingo online bingo product and to develop a Gala Bingo online TV offering in the hope of attracting a younger market less inclined to visit a Bingo club.  "We are seeing growth out of online bingo," said Mr Goulden. "It is fairly new, and only 20 per cent of our online players have ever visited a bingo club. We are probably going to market it more actively."

On the offline front Gala Bingo and others are putting as much pressure as possible on Alistair Darling  to ease the tax burden on Britain's ailing offline bingo industry, amid claims of widespread closures of UK bingoclubs.

The UKbingo industry is on the chancellor's agenda following lobbying from Mecca Bingo and Gala Bingo, the UK Bingo sector's leaders they operate 270 of the country's 600-plus bingo clubs.

Neil Goulden, GalaBingos chief executive, said: "The message we are giving the chancellor and the prime minister is 'if you give us the same tax treatment as other gambling industries, it will be an investment that will drive up admissions'."

GalaBingoclubs were not yet under threat as yet, Mr Goulden said but pointed out this may change. Unlike Gala, which owns the freehold on most of its bingo clubs, Rank, which has a customer base of 1.1m, leases the MeccaBingoclubs for around 15 years. MeccaBingo, admits keeping loss-making clubs open is a better economic option than closing them and absorbing the additional cost of terminating rent agreements early.

"We continue to lobby and make the argument to Treasury," said Ian Burke, Mecca Bingos chief executive.

Some offline bingo operators believe Treasury ministers are increasingly sympathetic to their cause.