Seaside family entertainment centres will be the next target for Praesepe, the adult gaming centres operator which is part of the Gauselmann Group.
The company, based at Milton Keynes, just north of London, has over 150 adult gaming centres, containing all gambling devices using the lower payout categories of machines permitted under UK law.
The company, headed by CEO Nick Harding, also has a small number of family-oriented seaside holiday locations, each of which has a separated and controlled gambling machine section.
Harding has pinpointed this sector (there are over 500 of this type of location around the British coasts) as an important area of expansion for the company. “We have eight locations at present,” said Harding, “mainly in smaller British resorts such as Burnham-on-Sea, Weston-super-Mare, Ilfracombe, Hunstanton and Margate, some came as part of packages of locations we acquired as we expanded Praesepe and some, like Hunstanton were acquired specifically.
“Many of these locations are owned by families or individuals, rather than big companies or chains of locations. We have been very pleased with the work we have done with those locations we acquired. We expanded their ticket redemption content considerably and carried out other work on them and they are now very important contributors to Praesepe’s bottom line.”
Harding said that he wanted to acquire more locations around the coast. “I think that this sector is ripe for development,” he said. “The synergies with what we operate at present are undeniable. I would like to see us have a holding of around 25 seaside FECs and I believe that it is achievable in the comparatively near future.”
