Managed AWP pub machine takes up by 20%

A number of managed operators are seeing cash takes from AWP machines go up by 15%-20% thanks to good cash-hopper management, Sceptre Leisure chief executive Ken Turner has reported.

The uplifts come in the wake of cash prizes rising to £70 in June 2009.

However, tenanted pubs are still lagging, with an average uplift of 3%-5%, because they are failing to ensure the cash hoppers in the higher-stake machines are re-stocked to contain the optimum sum of £350.

Turner, whose company has provided machines for around 8,000 pubs and services 70% of the Mitchells & Butler estate, said: "Around 60% of play money comes in the form of notes and around £350 is needed in a machine's hopper. It's usually managed estates that have the discipline needed to ensure hoppers are refilled."

Turner said the average uplift in AWP take stands at around 8%-10%.

Sceptre Leisure won new contracts with Whitbread, Greene King and Ladhar Leisure last year. It claims that between 25% and 30% of the profit at individual pubs comes from AWP machines.

Turner said that he thought the closure rate for pubs is now slowing down, although the early part of 2010 saw the usual burst of returned keys.