How many have we lost

[mr8ball]

I was just curious to know does anyone know just how many pool rooms we have lost in the US over the smoking band? How many do we have to loose before something is done about it? It seems it has got out of hand. I am not a smoker myself and i do hate the smell of it but it has to be a line drawn somewhere so we can stop loosing all of the pool rooms over this. What are your thought and should the Pool/Bar owners start to protest this in someway?? Thanks in advance, Doug

 

[MikeJanis]

According to the Viking Tour database we have lost around 35% over the last 8 years. These numbers come from all the states that we have tracked East of the Mississippi.

Additionally, this is NOT due entirely to the Smoking Laws.

Mj

 

[Cuebuddy]

Thats a good question and one I have been wondering about for awhile. I also do not smoke but I am well aware of the the fact that is part of the pool room culture. I look at e-bay every day at billiard related items, I see many pool rooms liquidating there businesses nearly every day. I think the game will survive this but I kind of worry. I don't have a pool room with in 100 miles of me so I have built a pool room in my house and have a top notch set up but it is not the same, it is not competing in the atmosphere that pool has evolved from. I guess that this is the next evolution of the game lets hope the game makes it. I think it will.

 

[jasonlaus]

smoking ban is the best thing to happen to pool, if your worried about it move to florida where you cant walk into a room without knocking a couple days off your life from the smoke. there are alot of people who dont go to rooms because of the smoke. cant wait to hear the replies

 

[Bob Jewett]

... I see many pool rooms liquidating there businesses nearly every day. ...

I read that there are about 4000 pool rooms (in someone's list, don't ask me whose). I think an average lifespan of a pool room is about 20 years. Some die in a year; some go on for a century. That means that each year you can expect 200 pool rooms to go belly-up, or one every two days or so. I think it's real hard to say how many were due to a particular cause. Usually the cause seems to be owner disinterest. Around here, there are also a lot of lost leases due to gross appreciation of property prices.

 

[Neil]

................

 

[Harold Smith]

Smoking Ban

What would be good to hear is how many more families come in to shoot now that they don't have to breathe that smoke. I for one will be glad when they all end up smoke free.----Smitty

 

[Stones]

I ran a tourney in South Houston last weekend. I asked the GM how the smoking ban had effected his business. He said within a month of the ban, his business had dropped 30% with no recovery. Said they're still making money but not quite as much.

In Houston, you can't even light a cigarette within 25 feet of the door. Police came by and wrote one guy a ticket for $135 for lighting up just outside the door.

Stones

 

[rossaroni]

What would be good to hear is how many more families come in to shoot now that they don't have to breathe that smoke. I for one will be glad when they all end up smoke free.----Smitty

My state(MN) has been smoke free since October of last year, and I have not noticed any increase of family's at the pool rooms. This may be different in other places across the country, but I have not noticed a change. I have yet to hear of an increase in business because the smoking ban, but have heard of quite a few decreases, some so extreme that they had to close down.

 

[Da Poet]

What would be good to hear is how many more families come in to shoot now that they don't have to breathe that smoke. I for one will be glad when they all end up smoke free.----Smitty

In Chicago here at Chris's, since the smoking ban, the after church business on Sunday has completely skyrocketed. By 11:30am, it's not uncommon to see seven or eight families lined up outside, junior clutching his 2x4 Instroke case, waiting for a table to open up! And the action? Wow! Last Sunday, there was a tweve year old that spotted Cowboy two balls one hole and took him for ten large ones! Unbelievable!

 

[leehayes]

I have to admit....I don't agree with smoking bans...but personally I'd enjoy pool more without the cigarette smoke. It'd be nice to home and not reek of cigarettes. It won't keep me from playing but it'd be nice.

 

[justnum]

Pool is good for two things. Avoiding responsibility unless your paid for it.

 

[BPG24]

I was just curious to know does anyone know just how many pool rooms we have lost in the US over the smoking band? How many do we have to loose before something is done about it? It seems it has got out of hand. I am not a smoker myself and i do hate the smell of it but it has to be a line drawn somewhere so we can stop loosing all of the pool rooms over this. What are your thought and should the Pool/Bar owners start to protest this in someway?? Thanks in advance, Doug

A few years ago, the largest and most frequented pool room in NE Arkansas went no smoking. Within 3 months they had no tournaments due to no one showing up and a few moths later the doors closed for good.

There were a few other factors but the average Joe stopped showing up and then the regulars disappeared as well.

 

[TXsouthpaw]

I ran a tourney in South Houston last weekend. I asked the GM how the smoking ban had effected his business. He said within a month of the ban, his business had dropped 30% with no recovery. Said they're still making money but not quite as much.

In Houston, you can't even light a cigarette within 25 feet of the door. Police came by and wrote one guy a ticket for $135 for lighting up just outside the door.

Stones

I was at that tourney stones, it was the first fast eddies tourney id been at that didnt allow smoking. It was awful. Long sets can be a beootch when u cant smoke. If I have to choose between a smoking and a non smoking tourney im definetlly going to the smoking one. No one can say that smoking bans dont hurt business! No calcuttas and no smoking what the hell are they gonna tell me I cant do next. Drink? U give em an inch and theyll take a mile.

 

[SJDinPHX]

Don't breathe!

smoking ban is the best thing to happen to pool, if your worried about it move to florida where you cant walk into a room without knocking a couple days off your life from the smoke. there are alot of people who dont go to rooms because of the smoke. cant wait to hear the replies

I'm going to say it one more time! If you work downtown,in a big city,
and you walk outside for lunch, you will inhale more harmful carcinogens
(from busses, deisel trucks, cars etc.) than you will by smoking 5 packs
of cigarettes. Sorry but thats a scientific fact....clean air person!
You people need to live in a germ free bubble. No smoking laws have been
the MAIN cause for the demise of bars and poolrooms for quite some time
now. Clean air freaks are winning!!!

 

[cuejoey]

Imo pool halls/business's closing are due to the economy not the non smoking ban..people that love to play pool will still go to the hall if they are a smoker,they can step outside to smoke..but this economy now is really getting bad..

 

[Jimmy M.]

I was just curious to know does anyone know just how many pool rooms we have lost in the US over the smoking band?

If they'd get a new drummer and a better lead singer, they could turn this thing around! (imo)

 

[RunoutalloverU]

This thread kind of caught me off guard. Being from southern California, its just a given that people can't smoke in pool halls or anywhere for that matter. When I go to another state where this isn't the case, its like a culture shock, like going to a third world country where kids run around bare foot. I think to myself wow I guess there are parts of the country where people consider being able to smoke indoors a good thing.

To most in California its like looking back at photos of segregated states, where you see a drinking fountain with a sign above it for "whites only." I wonder if in the south when desegregation was beginning to happen if people sat around and said to themselves, you know ever since they let the blacks in here buisness has dropped 30%!

 

[Da Poet]

This thread kind of caught me off guard. Being from southern California, its just a given that people can't smoke in pool halls or anywhere for that matter. When I go to another state where this isn't the case, its like a culture shock, like going to a third world country where kids run around bare foot. I think to myself wow I guess there are parts of the country where people consider being able to smoke indoors a good thing.

To most in California its like looking back at photos of segregated states, where you see a drinking fountain with a sign above it for "whites only." I wonder if in the south when desegregation was beginning to happen if people sat around and said to themselves, you know ever since they let the blacks in here buisness has dropped 30%!

Smoking=Segregation?


C'mon

 

[SJDinPHX]

No savvy !!!

This thread kind of caught me off guard. Being from southern California, its just a given that people can't smoke in pool halls or anywhere for that matter. When I go to another state where this isn't the case, its like a culture shock, like going to a third world country where kids run around bare foot. I think to myself wow I guess there are parts of the country where people consider being able to smoke indoors a good thing.

To most in California its like looking back at photos of segregated states, where you see a drinking fountain with a sign above it for "whites only." I wonder if in the south when desegregation was beginning to happen if people sat around and said to themselves, you know ever since they let the blacks in here buisness has dropped 30%!

Could you please explain (if possible) the analogy you are alluding to in your last paragraph???