Is Snooker Dying as a sport ? and speed fitters is the job upto it ?

[Geoff Large]

Is snooker the game dying as an activity that the normal person would take up or playnow and again say on holiday or in a snooker club ?

I say this because more and more of my fitting time is spent on recovering american and normal uk pool tables , we do about 1 day in 5 on snooker thats how bad things have got on the snooker side , I have just been to Butlins atBognor Regis to recover 9 american Pool tables that where only recovered 6 months ago the last firm left them in a right state no bolts etc , the cutomers had worn the cloth out and the good news for us is they have allready booked us to go back in January to recover them all again , there is now only one snooker Table at Butlins Bognor Regis , and during the time I was there in 4 days it was played twice , the american pool tables though where being played all the time by young old and Females , the snooker was only played by males .

I am afraid to say socialy that american Pool is now becomeing more popular than snooker , the UK pub pool is also very popular we recover these by the Hundred , the snooker clubs are dying , we often have clubs who's tables are ready for work ask for more and more discount because they are just not getting enough punters through the doors .
the smoking ban has affected the trade big time , almost all upstairs snooker clubs are closed because Customers are just not going to leave their table and go all the way downstairs for a smoke .
the Reccession is another thing that is biting the trade .

We are getting more of our customers compare the price we charge for a recover with a quickfit fitter , saving anything upto £60 per table , we always ask is the cloth you are getting 100% the same as we use and is the Fitter going to do the job correct glueing rubber back on replaceing broken slips etc checking level , I overheard a telephone conversation that one fitter had been asked to complete 3 recovers on his own in one day , and that included around 3 hours of traveling around south london from the south coast and back , what sort of job are people expecting from such work ? I would point out that the large organisation he was doing the work for is prob the largest club network in the country , just to give you an idea of what the tables are like in these establishments useing speed fitters . I would also like to point out that the Fitter in question did not take on the three recovers becuase he was like me and refused to be pushed into it , he split it with another job to make two recovers in a day , and a recover plus a pool table recover the next day with an overnight stop over . and charged the going rate .

Believe me I have had to work on tables some of these undercutting fitters have worked on , all the slips nailed or stapled in along their entire lenth rubber hanging off or have just had tape put on them not glued back into position etc , club cloth or substandard cloth fitted when the quote was for tournament even no brand cloth fitted ? they Bodge it then they scarper leaving us to sort the table out .

[hotpot]

It is sad to see the game so quiete in the clubs . Like you said the clubs just aint got the people comong throigh the doors and where as people would go out a few times a week now they usually pick a night and thats it .

The smoking ban has had a knock on affect but so as the price of a pint , its just gone too expensive , then you have the price of living , gas , electric etc . People just aint got the cash to spare .

[Deepscrew]

Rileys Bristol had the match table recovered by 'South West Pool and Snooker'. All the pockets are different sizes (by quite some way) and its not level. Great job. :/

[cueman]

I think the problem is many clubs just aren't getting people through the doors, largely down to the quality of the tables they have and the prices they charge. Its a difficult balancing act, snooker isn't really a cheap game, apart from social clubs that charge usually for 15-20 mins on a meter, most Rileys or bigger clubs tend to charge anything from around £4-£9 an hour. Some clubs do deals where you pay say £12 for an all days play but not many people want to play beyond 2-3 hours but if the tables have dead rubbers on the cushions, worn cloth or badly fitted etc, they are going to be questioning the value of what they are getting for their money.

The trouble for the clubs is a recloth is roughly £300 a table, if you have 4 or 5 tables need doing there is the best part of £2k and they will want to get back that money a.s.a.p. I know my club needs at least 6 tables reclothed and probably 3 of those need new rubbers. That is less than half the tables as it has 15. Like many clubs they aren't full or even half full, usually about 2-3 tables on at most. Bottom line is the clubs aren't generating enough money to put back into the club, the customers won't spend because the club needs to improve the conditions. Its a catch 22 situation which often leads to many clubs shutting down, and thats before you even mention the cost of living, smoking ban, and everything else that has hit the clubs over the past decade.

[cueman]

Rileys Bristol had the match table recovered by 'South West Pool and Snooker'. All the pockets are different sizes (by quite some way) and its not level. Great job. :/

You know what they used to do our club when it was a Rileys a few years back. I mentioned to him that there was a problem with the roll on the one side of the table, the comedian said ham roll or cheese roll, I wasn't in the mood for jokes, I said could you fix it. Said to me who do you think I am superman! Says it all really, not even capable of sorting getting a table levelled, its no wonder clubs aren't happy with some of the quality of fitters around!

[Geoff Large]

Getting the pockets the correct size is as simple as sliding the end cushions back and forth until they are identical , some think this is only for steel block cushions , but normal cushions bolt holes have a 1/8th movement from side to side around the bolt clearence , so all tables should be set up and measured so that the corner pockets all comply as identical to each other .

Because some of these large organisations have multi table ownership , they think they can get a much undercutt quote for the job , but they do it far too extreme to the point that only speed Fitters will do the work as fast as possible and by cutting corners , I blame the organisation as much as the fitter , the Fitter will try and earn as much as he can in one day covering multi tables in a day , some use cheap labour to strip and put back together , the fitter will fit the cloth and thats all , so in theory some unemployed cash in pocket person who is not time served will have put the cushions back on , useing a speed drill and not even braceing the bolts up , Iv'e experienced it all , loose cushions , pockets wrong size , tables with filler missing out of the joints , unlevel , rubber hanging off , nets tied up not replaced , nuts missing of ball rails and cellotaped up , leathers split or they are not sewn on , loose slips , stapled in slips , nailed in slips , loose blocks , loose bolts on frame and cushions , STAPLED on bed cloths in place of tacks , worn out bed cloth linings , a Rerubber where they have just cutt the pockets and not rasped and hand finnished them , the thing is the Fitter knows he is doing wrong but he has lost the profesionalism and pride by being paid too low a rate for the job , I have said this in the past I would rather stack shelves at B & Q rather than become a speed fitter . if my boss tommorow said I had to work like this I would tell him where to get off , get a part time job then use my experience in getting work for the right people who wanted a good job doing and could be trusted to do it .
there are many things in life that you can stack em high and sell em cheap , but being a Billiard fitter is just not one of them .

[Geoff Large]

Cue man the average price for a recover in 6811 Tournament which is the industry standard is £365/£385 + vat depending on the amount of tables being covered and this is plus vat , 10 years ago it was around £300 + vat . a rerubber is £300 + vat in Northern Rubber , in chinese rubber £180/ £200 but we would never use it .
If you take an average firm who has to pay national insurance , and all the other taxes they inccur on the employee fitter ,the cloth price , plus other materials , Fuel and traveling costs van depreciation and maintenence etc , believe me at £365 there is hardly any profit , its just above the break even point , how some can do it for around £325 amazes me . even a Self employed fitter staying under the vat limit is going to require £365 per recover , he cannot claim vat back on his cloth purchase from the wholsaler so his expenses are 20% higher than a vat registerd firm

[Deepscrew]

Oh i forgot to say they end cushions now sound like someone is playing a bass drum under the table whenever the ball hits it as pace. Loose bolts, Geoff?

All of the tables are shocking, Rileys is a student place, its not for the player that expects anything or is any good so i doubt they get many moans. Putting up big bingo screens right next to the tables says it all. Its a place to play snooker rather than a snooker club.

[NorthWestJunior]

The club I used to visit was great. It had 24 tables and a brand new match table. The club was once the practicing club of Dennis Taylor and Alex Higgins when they used to be here in Lancashire. Then in the space of around 4 years the club went from having to book a table wether it was a match table or just the standard ones to being completely shut down and demolished. The working mens' clubs are no good for practice so I have to drive 30mins for my nearest club that isn't Rileys. It's hardly an ideal sport for most, especially kids who can't get around much or afford the high rates they charge these days.

[vid]

Hi Geoff, I wish I had seen this thread sooner. The Bognor Butlins is just 2 miles down the road from us, you may have liked to pop in and have a look at the thurston we were selling. Having tried through several sources to sell this we endede up with a bid of just £56 and he didnt turn up to pick it up so now the builder is going to take it for the slates. It would seem that noone is looking to house tables like this even for virtually nothing, so I would definitely say its dying out - it needs too much room for such a limited return, has a relatively low turn over of people compared to pool, lasts too long to be interesting to other drinkers and is not generally watched by others - therfore not attracting people to put money behind the bar. Like all modern sports its only hope was another use of the table where the game is more attractive and more stimulating to the non regular player, in order for the sport to survive at small club level it has to be able to generate the sort of income that will support the amount of space it requires. I dont have the solution, its just rather been brought home to me. If nobody is interested in a table like ours made during the 1800s in good nick (after all wouldnt you prefer to own a table with age and patina than something straight out of the show room at 10x the price), then one would rather suspect the sport is not in particularly good health

[bricktip]

If i were you I would hold back a bit and see if one of the guys on here will take the whole thing. Seems a shame for a builder just to take it for the slates.

[philip in china]

Just rereading the original question on this thread I think it probably means "is snooker dying as a sport in UK?" The answer to that might be yes but certainly elsewhere in the world it seems to be growing. I split most of my time between China and Bulgaria. Certainly in China the interest is huge. There seem also to be more competitions in Bulgaria and doubtless in other European countries as well. So maybe it is dying off a bit in UK but becoming more truly international.

[vmax4steve]

Of course it's dying in the UK, has been for about twenty years now. I blame the BBC for making the playing conditions far too easy for professional players. The UK public has seen it all to saturation point and us normal joe's can't get close to doing under normal playing conditions what the pros do. The pro game is totally alien to me and I have been playing for nearly thirty years so what chance does a complete beginner have when trying to emulate what is seen on tv.
Me and my mate played the other night on our club match table that has tight pockets, a heavy napped cloth on it using Aramith TC balls and neither of us could control the cue ball. The poor summer means a lot of moisture in the air and we had to bash anything that required a bit of pace, pockets then wouldn't take the balls unless absolutely spot on and we were getting kicks every four or five shots. Both of us are regular 50 break makers but we couldn't get a 20 break between us all night.
To have had the chance of a game of 9 ball pool on an american style table would have been an attractive proposition, at least it would have given us the satisfaction of being able to pot a few balls and make some good runs.

Blaming the smoking ban is a poor excuse for the decline in snooker. Nobody is so addicted to nicotine that they cannot do without a fag for a couple of hours in an evening, after all they have to do so when at work. The real crux of the matter comes down to personal finance as a result of the decline in wages for the last thirty years with the gap between rich and poor getting ever wider, snooker is a working class game after all, and the working class have been getting lower wage rises and having to take worse working conditions ever since Thatcher came to power. The ease of credit pre 2008 made up for the shortfall but that bubble has now burst and the resulting financial tsunami has washed away most peoples spare cash and a lot of peoples jobs.

What also has to be taken into account is the result of the minmum wage and the entry of eastern euorpean countries into the EU. These countries were allowed into the EU when their own economies were/are at a far lower standard than western europe and their skilled workers can now live and work in the UK for the minimum wage of 6.08 per hour which is more than double what they get in their own countries for skilled work. They even let a low economy country like Greece into the Eurozone which doubled their workers wages along with prices without any increase in production, exports and investment and look at the sh*t they're in now.

As for snooker booming in China, well I watched some of the recent Wuxi Classic and the attendances were very poor. China may have the money but I really can't see that much public interest, unless of course they only root for their own and for Ronnie. Which brings us to another reason for snookers decline, lack of entertainment. It's all well and good watching the likes of Ebdon and Selby going about their work and toeing the Hearn Corporation line in interviews but the public need more than that. We like to see a bit of needle now and again, a fierce rivalry, a bit of controversy, the odd tantrum, and rather than mounting up the century breaks lets see a few exhibition shots once the frame is won, or even before the frame is won, but make the playing conditions a little harder so that when we see a great shot we know it really is a great shot.

[Particle Physics]

People don't play snooker for lots of reasons; lack of time to practice, wanting a quick fix of pool (American and English) instead of practising for years to become good at snooker, lack of money, lack of dedication, lack of application. I just can't take pub pool seriously at all, but some folk think it's the real deal. Drago proved it wasn't by easily winning the tournaments no bother at all. There are some folk who play it really well and make it a good game, a friend who played many years for England for example, but even he says snooker is the real deal.

It's the dumbing down/lowest common denominator at work again, this is what Americanisation and capitalism breed I'm afraid. It's why folk read the Sun, or think X factor is music at work, or why folk would rather bake on a Spanish beach than take a trip to Florence to view some artworks. And it's getting worse all the time.

It's not just about the recession though, or the costs and time of playing snooker, it's Mr Joe Bloggs. The game is exploding in China and Europe and this is because these people are brought up to apply themselves to worthy tasks, for the love of it. To achieve something real, and to be proud of that achievement; the quality of the person if you like, the pursuit is secondary. The path to bettering yourself is what counts but folk in this country don't understand. It's why so much we do is shoddy. It's the can't be boverred attitude.

The state of Riley's tables is shocking and now I know why; thankyou for the information. I've found felt like cloths on their tables, not at all a wool feel if you understand me. And their match tables roll. I repeat, their MATCH tables roll!

[philip in china]

Maybe the audiences were low at therecent classics in China. How I view the success of a sport is the number of clubs and the number of people playing the game. On that basis snooker is huge in China and getting bigger all the time.

I am not sure what is meant by the term a "working class sport". I think snooker is enjoyed by people from many different backgrounds. As to how many of them would be described as "working class" I wouldn't care to speculate.