Casinos are a winner.

It's a fine time to be one of Switzerland's 19 casinos. With the numbers of players steadily shooting through the roof, and profits continuing to rise, the casino industry shows no sign of slacking off. And they aren't the only ones winning big. A big chunk of their earnings end up in the coffers of the cantons in which they are located.

2004 was a winning year for gaming establishments: they raked in a total of SFr 769 million, representing an increase of 37 per cent on the previous year. And jackpot winners and the owners of these businesses are not the only ones to have struck it lucky--the coffers of the Swiss pension system also took a share of the earnings or SFr 316 million, something which is enshrined in Swiss gaming law.

Four million gamblers haunted the corridors of Switzerland's gaming establishments in 2004. The leading source of casino revenues was slot machines--earning more than SFr 530 million of SFr 769 million in total revenues.

But casinos in their current shape and form are new kids on the Swiss block, as they were illegal until just over a decade ago.

Switzerland underwent a gambling revolution in 1993, when voters gave a thumbs-up to making traditional casinos with blackjack and roulette tables legal. Eight years later, the government granted the first round of concessions for two categories of establishment--the so-called A and B casinos. The essential difference between the two is that there are no limits placed on bets or winnings in the former, also known as Grand Casinos.

The first of these establishments opened in 2002, among them the Grand Casino in Bern.

People come here to play and to taste the delights of a different world Eyes are steeled on the screens of slot machines or on the roulette cylinders. The level of chatter is low, the sound of tokens spitting out of fruit machines dominant. The people you meet here are people you could meet anywhere, thirty, forty and fifty-somethings dressed in comfortable attire. At one of the American roulette tables or tableaux, a beady-eyed croupier's sleepless eyes flit from the table to the roulette wheel to the faces of gamblers.

"Place your bets, please," she calls. A one-second glance takes in the positioning of the green, pink, orange, black and blue chips placed carefully on numbered squares on the tableau. Her eyes narrow, taking a fractionally longer look at the punters. "No more bets, please," and her right hand spins the ball anti-clockwise in the rotating cylinder. The ball finds a home and the croupier marks the lucky number on the tableau with the dolly, raking away the lost chips into an opening in the table.

If the several hundred visitors to the Bern establishment are anything to go by, casinos are not the domain of the fabulously rich and breathtakingly beautiful. There is no discernable dress code and as little as SFr 2 can be placed as a bet in American roulette. But that's exactly how the management wants it.

Local people

"James Bond has not really helped our image because he goes to casinos and bets a lot of money--in the real world in Switzerland this is just not possible," the casino's managing director Stefan Harra says.

This is a place for local people, which is something that can be heard in the languages spoken--either High German or Bernese dialect, with a smattering of English. Harra confirms that around "ninety per cent of our clients are local."

And he's very happy with business in Bern--last year, it generated a gross gaming-revenue (all bets minus all winnings) of SFr 49 million, marking the third year running in which their income increased. The casino on average pays out nearly 96 per cent of all stakes played within its walls, with around SFr 22 million going towards the state pension system.

"About a billion francs were played here in 2004, of which we paid out SFr 951 million in winnings," Harra added.

Around 75 per cent of the money spent here in 2004 went into 261 slot machines. These include reel machines, more famously known as one-armed bandits, and video poker games. Interested punters can try their luck at a total of 42 games.

This trend was seen across Switzerland last year--slot machines were the most popular pass-time in Switzerland's 19 casinos.

Profit ceiling?

While profits (and guest numbers) have increased every year for the past three years in Bern, Harra recognises that there is unlikely to be an explosion in future figures.

"Every business tries to increase its profits but there is a limit. We are a provider-located industry facing competition from seven other casinos within an hour's journey from here," Harra says.

His modus operandi is to tell people that casinos do not deserve their reputation as houses of disrepute, where only the establishment takes all. With an average of 700 guests a day, things seem to be going well.

"Next to our regular customers, we also want to attract guests, who would visit us once a month or once every two months with the aim of doing something different to have fun," stresses Harra.

To achieve this goal, the casino oilers a number of packages, designed to attract the uninitiated. Special offers include a four-course meal within the Kursaal complex within which the casino is located, with complimentary entry to the gaming joint, chips and a guided tour.

"It's a nice way of opening up access to the casino, for people to have fun and not go beyond their means," adds the managing director.

The card games on offer include blackjack and two types of poker: five-card and seven-card stud.

But what is a casino veteran like Harra doing in Bern? One of the attractions is the so-called "social concept" or responsible gaming programme that all of Switzerland's casinos are required to operate by law. "Operating a casino in this country fits more with my personal values than in some other countries," says Harra.

The social concept is designed to route out gaming addicts. Casino staff are trained to pick up on unusual behaviour on the floor with the help of a checklist. Symptoms include nervousness and excessive sweating.

In most cases, staff try to engage in conversation with the suspected addict; if they admit to having a problem, they are asked to bring in proof that they have enough disposable income to gamble. If the evidence proves that he or she does have the necessary means, they are allowed to continue.

If they do not, they face a life-long ban in all of Switzerland's casinos. After twelve months, the person can apply to the casino's director for the ban to be lifted. This is successful in 50 per cent of cases and occurs in consultation with the local authority specialising in addiction issues and other interested parties, such as the person's partner.

When such a player returns to the tables, casino staff monitor them to make sure they don't run into problems again. In Switzerland, there are about 10,000 persons prohibited from entering casinos. The Grand Casino Bern adds a person to the list of banned players every third day.

"We're proud of the programme, which is the only concept worldwide that works well--even if it hard work and very costly for us," says Harra.

"It gives our industry a very good tool to compensate a little for the unfortunate belief people have about casinos that we take everybody's money and make people addicted; it's not true, people bring their money here because they enjoy what we offer."

Links: Grand Casino Bern www.grandcasino-bern.ch

Casinos in Switzerland

Grand Casinos or A-Casinos, are allowed to offer many different types of game tables with unlimited stakes, jackpots and maximum winnings at all machines. There is a Grand Casino in:

Baden, Basel, Bern, Lucerne, Lugano, Montreux and St. Gallen 

B-Casinos are only allowed to offer three kinds of games with limited stakes, jackpots and maximum winnings at all machines. There is a B or Kursaal Casino in:

Bad Ragaz, Courrendlin (Jura), Crans-Montana, Davos, Fribourg (Granges-Paccot). Interlaken. Locarno, Mendrisio, Meyrin, St Moritz, Schaffhausen and Pfaffikon (Zurichsee)