The Picardy Coast is struggling with a recent increase in the number of casinos that come to carve out of the crouches to each other. The cake of gambling is now shared between 8 casinos, 4 of which are on a 50 km coastal strip. De Dieppe, Le Touquet and now two newcomers with Fort-Mahon and Mers-les Bains. Basic stations have always attracted casinos, but during this period of crisis for the sector their multiplication becomes problematic insofar as they share a declining market.
More establishments and fewer players
The co-manager of the independent and family casino of Cayeux-sur-Mer, Sandra Blacher, draws up a bitter and for good observation.
In 2006, control at the entrances became compulsory, in 2008 it was the ban on tobacco which comes to penalize establishments where it is no longer possible to smoke the player's cigarette firm. The economic crisis finally affects the average basket of the player who plays less and remains shorter. Not to mention the new competition in recent years Online casinos Who continue to cut deales in an already moribund market. Suddenly this casino of the Baie de Somme which celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2012 bet on the family climate of the establishment to retain its customers. 50 slot machines, a ball table, a restaurant. But competition is tough along the coast.
Nothing is going well! Everyone has their chance!
Twenty kilometers away, at Tréport, the Casino "Joa" tried without success to have the opening authorization granted to the new Casino de Mers-les-Bains by the Ministry of the Interior. And for good reason this casino has been expected since 1987. So imagine. For the city the challenges is above all economical: 30 jobs are in games and especially 10% of the revenues of Slot machines Casino, or 300 to 400 thousand euros. This casino hopes for a turnover of 5 million euros for 2014 and would like to go from 1,700 m2 to 3,000 m2 in the long term. It offers its black jack, poker and ... bowling customers.
Faced with this failure, the Casino "Joa" must have resolved to defend itself in the face of this newcomer to the market to keep its customers. He therefore renovated the establishment to offer his customers a real leisure complex: a restaurant, a cinema performance hall with 320 seats, a bar, an entertainment room in more than a hundred slot machines, Black Jack and the game of the ball.
The Viking Group Attack with a new casino in Fort-Mahon
Cap on Fort-Mahon, where the Viking group opened the doors of its new casino to the public last June. It also targets a turnover of 5 million euros in 2014 with its 50 ultra-modern machines without tokens, its restaurant with a hundred cutlery and a piano bar that can accommodate both fifty people. Again, it is the municipality which is delighted since this new arrival allowed the creation of 33 jobs. With this latest arrival of the Viking group we can say that the war on the Picardy coast has just started!
