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Executive summary British retail betting report
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
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LIFE AFTER B2s
The effect of the £ 2 stake limit imposed on B2 gaming machines at the start of April 2019 was immediate and dramatic . Gaming machine revenue for the year to March 2020 , as tracked by the UK Gambling Commission , tumbled by 41 % to £ 1.075bn , while betting revenue fell in sympathy , dropping to £ 1.28bn or 5.2 % down on the previous year . Combined , retail shop GGY fell to a new low of £ 2.36bn , or 26 % down on the B2-driven high of £ 3.22bn in 2017 .
For the public , the most visible sign of the downturn was in shop visibility . From a peak in 2014 of more than 9,100 shops , by March 2020 that number had fallen by almost 16 % to 7,861 and will shrink further once the data is collected for the year to this March following the effect of the pandemic lockdowns .
The latest data from the listed operators shows the extent of the impact , with the retail operations of both William Hill and Entain tipping into operational losses for 2020 . Net revenue at William Hill plunged 50 %, Entain suffered a 4 % decline and the Flutter-owned Paddy Power was down 28 %.
The future is unsurprisingly less than obvious . The complicating factor of the sale of William Hill to Caesars Entertainment confuses matters even more , with the future of its retail estate yet to be decided . Still , sector watchers are confident that once the UK betting shop estate reopens for business in the spring / summer , consumers will return . However , long-standing trends towards different products – football