A new gambling arcade has opened on Church Street in Blackpool after a refurbishment costing more than £1.2 million pounds. The renovations for the arcade have opened a basement below the building on Church Street that has previously been closed for 30 years. The basement is now being used to hold a wide range of different retro gambling machines. The new arcade is called The Reel Vegas.
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00:00Hello, my name is Ryan, one of the owners at The Real Vegas in Blackpool, 5 Church Street.
00:15It's over two floors, 168 retro machines downstairs and then on the first floor all the latest
00:23digital machines.
00:28So what encouraged you to start this business and what's your connection to gambling machines?
00:37Well I used to play the retro machines back in the early 2000s and over time I collected
00:45them and eventually I had too many for the house, they went into storage and then I had
00:52that many but I thought it would be nice to bring them back out for people to play again.
00:58So you've got the business here on Church Street in Blackpool, can you tell me about
01:04the process of renovating this place and especially downstairs?
01:09So downstairs has not been open to the public for 30 years so we had to pull everything
01:15out, knock the walls down, redecorate, plastering, air con, we've got three air cons down there
01:24because it is in the basement, it's quite hot.
01:28And then...
01:29So the cost to renovate this building and everything?
01:32So the total cost for buying the machines, doing it all up was I'd say about £1.2 million.
01:44What kind of retro machines are on offer?
01:47So we've got 80s, 90s, 2000s, all different jackpots, some as low as £2.40, some are
01:56£5, some are £6, some are £8, some are £10, some are £15, some are £25 and they
02:01all changed over the years, so if you go back in history they all changed as time changed.
02:07Obviously with gambling, what are some of the limits and safety precautions that this
02:14will be offering?
02:16We are signed up to a safety net called Bacta and we've got a system in the back which is
02:23linked to the machines and it warns us if anyone's gambling for too long it will prompt
02:31us to interact with the customer and have a chat and ask them is everything okay and
02:35if they're about to take a break.
02:37Right, yeah, okay.
02:40Yeah, why specifically Blackpool do you think this was a good place to start?
02:47When I was a kid I used to come all the time, it was great as a kid I used to come and I've
02:53got great memories here and I thought I'd bring it back to where it all began for me.