Attendance at what had been a surefire fund-raiser for area nonprofits has been falling off in recent years.
Whether that's due to the economy, smoking bans, other gambling options, aging players or a combination of factors is a matter of opinion.
But fewer people appear to be playing bingo.
Some games - like the one run by the Knights of Columbus at St. Catherine of Siena in Horsham - have shut down. Others keep running but with the concern that the introduction of slot machines at Pennsylvania racetracks will further erode their ability to make bingo profitable.
"I'm very concerned that will cut into our somewhat limited attendance," said Jim Jubinski, who is in charge of bingo at St. Anne's Ukrainian Catholic Church in Warrington. "I would say that slots are probably going to put the nail in the coffin for some."
Back in the late 1970s, when Jubinski first ran bingo, there were two weekly games averaging 175 people each, he said. Attendance at the once-a-week games has gone from an average of 121 in 1999 to 100 last year. This year, the average is up to 104.
At Lu Lu Shriners in Plymouth Meeting, attendance has been down since Sept. 11, 2001, according to Jack Richards, the co-manager of bingo, and the introduction of slot machines in Pennsylvania could further hurt attendance. Richards said the installation of slots in Delaware already has taken its toll.
Daniel McCaffrey, president of the bingo association for the Father Joseph P. Keeney Council of the Knights of Columbus, which ran bingo at St. Catherine's for 23 years, said they gave up on bingo in late September after a smoking ban instituted in August caused attendance and profits to drop.
McCaffrey said attendance fell from between 100 and 110 players a night to 80. Gross profits fell from an average of between $1,200 and $1,400 per night to a maximum of $180 per night, he said. That's because "the hard core smokers were the heavier gamblers," McCaffrey said, adding, the remaining players simply wanted a night out.
He said it was the ancillary small games of chance played by those smokers that resulted in profits. Bingo on its own, he said, is not a money-maker.
Together with those games of chance, bingo nights had raised between $25,000 and $50,000 per year in profits, McCaffrey said, half for the parish and half for the Knights of Columbus.
Several smokers playing at St. Anne's on Tuesday night said they likely would not attend a game where they can't smoke. "I smoke a lot," said Margie Radick of Warwick, an ashtray with cigarette butts on the table beside her bingo cards. "I would have to take a lot of breaks."
Some of the smokers who played at the Benjamin Wilson Senior Citizen's Center in Warminster have been willing to smoke outside during breaks, but others left when smoking was banned. Bingo night attendance has been down by about 20 percent to 25 percent since that time, according to center director Neil Fisher, but he said it's starting to pick up again. Fisher said the center has benefited from the closing of St. Catherine's.
At Corpus Christi Church in Upper Gwynedd, where smoking has been banned for at least a decade, attendance also has declined, from an average of 170 a night last year to 150 a night this year. Laurie Ponticello, who runs bingo for the parish, blames the economy, the demands of busy lives and players' luck. She said those who are not doing well at one bingo hall tend to leave for a while to try their luck elsewhere.
Bob Pier of Warminster, who was playing at St. Anne's on Tuesday for the first time in a long time, said the economy had kept him away. "Times are bad," he said.
Ponticello said she doesn't believe gambling in Atlantic City or the opportunity to play the lottery have had an effect on bingo attendance. She said she doesn't believe slot machines in Pennsylvania will deter players either.
"I think people that want to play bingo will play bingo," she said, "and they'll go to the slots too."
