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Woolworths Pokies

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Shares in Woolworths rose by as much as 3.7 per cent after Wednesday's announcement to a more than five-week high of $34.17, and were still 3.22 per cent higher at $33.99 at 1440 AEST. In 2018 alone, Woolworths collected $56.7 billion in revenue. But it is the ALH Group, of which Woolworths owns 75%, that operates more than 12,650 pokies around the country that generate more than $1 billion in net revenue each year. The allegations about pokies and unethical – some illegal – behaviours came from a whistleblower in 2018. Woolworths has decided to step away from the gambling industry by giving up its majority stake in Australia’s largest pokies operator. The supermarket giant announced on Wednesday that it plans to merge the Australian Leisure and Hospitality Group (ALH) and Endeavour Drinks, which owns BWS, Dan Murphy’s and several other alcohol retailers.

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Woolworths and pokies

Following the speech by Senator Nick Xenophon about the pokies crisis, it is timely to consider whether corporate responsibility to the community or to shareholders can be achieved simultaneously by Woolworths Limited.
The first article below is by Stephen Mayne, Crikey founder
Stephen highlights in his article that Woolworths Limited is Australia's biggest poker machine operator. The article does not itself clearly explain how Woolworths can directly benefit from the level of player addiction in the community, so to help the community to understand this phenomenon better, the following links and explanations are provided directly to Woolworths Limited own disclosures (which as the Crikey article points out, are quite scarce)
The first link is to the disclosure of the number of Hotels and clubs owned via ALH Group. In 2007, it was 263.
The next link is to the disclosure of Earnings. The Hotels division is a billion dollar business with earnings to sales ratio of 17.79%
The next link is to the homepage of the Australian Leisure & Hospitality Group (ALH Group) which provides more details of the 270 venues operated. They claim to be a market leader in electronic gaming ... and wagering.
The ALH site discusses responsible gambling and introduces David Schwartz, the companies Responsible Gambling Ambassador, and provides details of the Responsible Gambling Awareness Week in Victoria.
On the page below that provides the background of David Schwartz, the company makes the following statement (bold and underline added by daviidv)

The ALH Group is committed to providing responsible gambling in our venues. Whilst gambling is enjoyed by the majority of people responsibly, ALH acknowledges that problem gambling is a serious community issue and that a small proportion of customers are harmed by their gambling activities.

The ALH Group has engaged David Schwarz, a well known ex AFL footballer and media identity as its Responsible Gambling Ambassador to provide employee education and customer awareness about the importance of “being honest with yourself about your gambling.”

ALH will continue to develop balanced businesses, offering patrons an overall entertainment experience including where appropriate, dining, drinking and gaming activities. Our goal is to ensure our hotels provide a safe and supportive environment where our customers make informed decisions about gambling and timely appropriate assistance and information is provided.

With Woolworths apparent altruistic view of responsible gambling, the community may well ask how to benchmark this in practice. The following link is to Pokie Watch with self explantory comment and references to Woolworths statements on their approaches.
Within a few minutes on the pokies watch site, you will be able to judge for yourself, by venue, how this responsible gambling benchmark is observed in practice. The pokies watch website shows that the community is well positioned to use the power of the internet to share information that will ultimately force the pokies industry to make their product less addictive and less harmful.
The community deserves to be protected from unsafe and harmful addictive products. Corporate statements, reviews and surveys and ambassadors serve no purpose at the 'stool level' .. addicted players would not generally be aware that 'being honest with yourself about your gambling' is the answer to the addiction ... clearly, this education is not reaching the growing number of problem pokie players ..
Daviidv says 'Senator Nick Xenophon and Senator Steve Fielding .. the time has come to transform the industry via new legislation that will make the design of the machines, jackpots and location of ATMs to pokies a less addictive and more community safe gambling product'.
And does Coles Myer share this 'side bet' on where easy pokies profits can be made .. yes, they do. See the news item below
PokieAct is run by the PokieWatch people. There are several stories, but this one seems a good place to start your further reading
One of the main themes of PokieAct is that children should not be groomed to become the next round of victims every time they go with parents for dinner at a venue with pokies. I absolutely agree. Although I have had conversations with the public when I speak at Sydney's Domain Speakers Corner that pokies rooms are now separated and more discreet, this is not the case at all. For example, and I do not know when, or why, but Blacktown RSL permanently closed the entry doors to 'Best Choice Buffett Restaurant' at the top of the entrance stairs, which on my last visit forced me to take my children past a room full of pokies and drinking areas to get access to the restaurant. This makes me sick that any business would deliberately choose to expose children to the lights and sounds of pokies. As with Woolworths, thankfully, when a business chooses to act in a manner which is so offensive, as a consumer, we have the freedom to choose where to spend money. Fair to say, I have personally chosen to shop with Woolworths competitors whenever possible, and not to expose my children to the pokies, which means we can no longer choose the buffett restaurant for dinner. When did a RSL lose its way to be able to justify making families take children through the pokies playing area. Disgusting !

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Jul 03, 2019 Anti-pokies protestors outside a Woolworths AGM in 2015. Photo: AAP/David Moir. Woolies is currently Australia’s biggest pokies machine owner through its majority stake in ALH Group, but will merge the hotels, pubs and pokies company with its Endeavour Drinks business by the end of 2019. Woolworths Group has been under serious scrutiny in the public eye and behind the door of shareholder meetings for more than a few months. The company and its pokies have been the target of much consternation, most notably Woolworths’s ties to the Australian Leisure and Hospitality Group (ALH).