British Bingo Players Are Glad to Be Back!
May 17th may not seem particularly special to some, nor will it stand out as being a monumental occasion, but for millions of Brits, it was the day the chains were able to come off as they returned to some sort of normality. Indoor hospitality was given the go ahead to run once again and this included being able to play bingo too, something a lot of us have been looking forward to for a very long time.
Fed up with being cooped up like chickens for what seems an eternity, saw record numbers of fun-time Charlies heading out for an evening of drinking, socialising and playing bingo and as we suspected, a massive amount of cash was spent in the process. With indoor drinking and eating returning, tables were booked from opening until closing, same can be said for bingo halls who had to turn many away at the door. It’s estimated some £2billion was spent on Monday – and that was in England alone!
Mecca Bingo celebrated by boosting prize money to a guaranteed £1million each weekend in May, they have even reduced tickets to 1960’s prizes to coincide with their 60th anniversary. Buzz bingo welcomed the bingo dabbing community back with free drinks and breakfast rolls and when you add all of that up, it comes to a staggering spend of £2.8million-a-minute, according to a Voucher Codes study.
Sad Times for Some
But it’s not all good news; just a few days before bingo halls were due to re-open their doors, two bingo clubs in Yorkshire decided to call time on the much-loved numbers game. York and Rotherham will remain closed permanently in a shock move, blaming the past year for the reason behind their news. When locals were getting ready to meet friends and play bingo again, the staff were being handed redundancy notices.
John Dyson, National Operations Director at Mecca Bingo, said: "On behalf of everyone at Mecca Bingo in York and Rotherham, we are very sad to confirm that we will not be reopening our club in May and will be closing permanently. We want to say a huge thank you to every single one of our incredible customers for their loyalty and support – we will miss you very much. Mecca plays a very special part in the community and has done for 60 years, bringing people together in our clubs and online. We wish all of our colleagues and customers well for the future."
And in other bingo news, police in Yorkshire landed the catch of a lifetime at a disused Empire Bingo Hall, when stumbling upon a cannabis farm estimated to be worth more than £2.18million! The massive cannabis set up led detectives to two men, one in his 20’s and the other in his 30’s, who were later arrested for a ‘full house’ of drugs!
Source: “Boozy Brits Let Their Hair Down as Indoor Boozing Finally Returns – and There’ll be Some Sore Heads Today”. The Sun. May 18, 2021.
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Comments (1)
bridgetjones
05/20/21, 08:05:48 AM
That’s a lot of cash being spent in a minute! My local bingo hall was full to social distance capacity with many moaning at being turned away. They’ve been telling people to book for a month now, so it’s not as if they didn’t know.
