Irish And English Eyes were Smiling In Dublin This Year

Peter Rubin Reviews Amex 2008

After the misery and disappointment that was the ATEI Show, the British amusement industry needed a real pick me up to lift the doom and gloom surrounding the industry. It fell to the 29th Irish Gaming and Amusement Trade Exhibition held at the Green Isle Hotel in Dublin to try and brighten things up.

As always the Irish show has a very easy-going, relaxing atmosphere and this year was no different. Both exhibitors and visitors dispensed with ties creating a far more informal atmosphere, more conducive to networking. This year not only was the first day very busy but also the second, which was most unusual. A lot of good business was being done by all and there were few if any complaints heard from exhibitors. The whole atmosphere was a pleasant, total contrast to the ATEI show. Not only had visitor attendance increased, but also diversified, with casino and betting shop operators joining the traditional gaming and amusement operators. International visitors were plentiful not only coming from Britain but also USA, Canada, Australia, Argentina, Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Spain, Latvia, Russia, Hungary, Slovenia, the Czech Republic and Poland.

Gary Drage and Liam Barrett from Sam Leisure were their ebullient selves and great interest was shown in their themed air hockey and pool tables.

The ever-smiling and gracious Jonathan Lauder from Electrocoin was also on form showing his latest games.

The beautiful Carla Fleming was not showing their two-seater X-2 simulator ride. This being one of the few exhibitions they don’t actually bring the largest single piece of equipment in the industry due space and size restrictions.

Newcomers to the Irish show included Andrew Mitchel from Towergate Insurance, who mentioned that “they had done tremendous business”. Also new to Dublin were Dora Arany Racz, Sandor Lencz and Judit Verbulecz from Pigalle, exhibiting a range of novelty games which included ‘Kids Box’, ‘Soccer Machine’, ‘Box Club’ and ‘Hammer Jack’. Also making his debut was Simon Carr of Imagetime with their latest CCTV range. Also exhibiting for the first time were Vegas Imports’ Chris Newby and Fiona Bye with their Irish distributor Neil Byrne where their’ Black Horse’ games generated great interest.

Regular exhibitors such as Terry Lambert and Paul Clay from Cummins Allison were very busy showing off their ‘Hi-speed JetSort’ coin sorter and the ‘2-Pocket Universal JetScan’, ably helped by their Irish distributor Gerry Birkhead from Cash Automation.

Ron Vinson from AMS was ably supported by David Morosoli from JCM, as he showed the JCM range of cash and coin counters, as well as the Ainsworth range of games which included ‘Pigs Can Fly’, ‘Golden Treasure’ and ‘Sapphire Eyes’.

As usual Chris Black was extremely busy on Sound Leisure’s stand with their ‘Milestones in Music’ jukebox systems. As was Steve Bryant from the Deith Group showing Evona Electronics’ ‘Octavia Roulette’ game.

Belgium’s Patrick Magendans was his usual charming self exhibiting Elaut’s ‘Cashless Management Systems’ and also the ‘Kate’ cash terminal.

Kimble’s McCann clan were as busy as ever and Seoirse had even more reason to be happy having made Jim a grandfather with the birth of anew baby girl.

Norman Page of Olympic Sales was his jovial self and had reason to be happy in the interest shown in their ‘Olympic Gold’ and ‘Olympic Free Spin’ and ‘ Olympic Roulette’ games.

All in all, everyone in Dublin, English amusement companies as well as Irish were very busy indeed. In fact, it was quite amazing that the English exhibitors here did more business than in the much larger and expensive ATEI show. This just highlights the buoyancy of the Irish amusement market in comparison to the flat state of the UK market. It also proves that large shows are not necessarily the best places in which to do business. By example, the Irish amusement industry is pointing the way to survival for the UK industry.

For years, the Irish amusement industry has done business despite the unhelpful, archaic gaming legislation. Now that the UK amusement industry finds itself in a situation where the gaming laws make it very difficult to do business, perhaps they need to adopt the ‘never-say-die’ attitude of the Irish industry and carry on doing business despite the hindrance caused by the current gaming legislation. After all it has never stopped the Irish doing business and prospering!