Tens of millions of yen spent to “deal with the new banknotes”… Current manager explains why the “rush of pachinko parlor closures” has not stopped.

About a month has passed since the introduction of the new banknotes. Vending machines and restaurant ticket vending machines have taken action. Many people may have actually held the new banknotes in their hands and are gradually becoming accustomed to them.

In the meantime, some pachinko parlors are being forced to pay millions to tens of millions of yen in expenses to deal with the new bills, and some are making the decision to close their doors.

Why is this happening only to pachinko parlors? We spoke with “Master,” the manager of a pachinko parlor in Saitama Prefecture called Uha Uha Kaikan, who distributes videos on a YouTube channel called Pachinko Quest (all statements below are by Master).

Pachinko and pachislot machines have a machine called a “sand” in each machine that holds money. Therefore, we had to switch to new bills for the number of machines in the store, which cost about 25,000 yen per machine at my store. There are about 300 machines in the store, and in addition to the sandwiches, the remodeling of the teller machines cost about 300,000 yen per machine. In total, the total cost is about 7 million yen.

At the master’s store, the cost was only 25,000 yen per machine because the sandwiches were relatively new, but if older machines were used, the cost could be more than 150,000 yen per machine. In that case, they would need to spend more than 40 million yen.

Recently, smart slot machines and smart pachinko machines, which do not use balls or medals, have become very popular,” he said. So I was thinking of purchasing more and more such machines at my store, but it has become much tougher to deal with the new currency. Frankly speaking, we are suffering quite a bit from a managerial standpoint as well.”

These days, dozens of new machines are released each month, and many customers head to pachinko parlors for them. Therefore, a slowdown in the pace at which new machines are purchased is also a cause of customer turnover.

In addition to having to purchase new machines, pachinko parlors are having a rather difficult time dealing with the new paper money. Making the situation even worse, he says, is the rising cost of electricity.

Until a few years ago, our annual electricity bill was about 8 million yen, but in ’22 it was 11 million yen. It’s tough because pachinko parlors use electricity to operate their tables and manage data, and there are few places to save money.

The news says that salaried workers’ salaries are rising, but it seems that more and more people are spending their money on horse and boat racing, which can be played online, compared to pachinko, for example, where you actually have to go to the store. I don’t feel that the number of customers is increasing. I think that major pachinko parlors are also in a very difficult situation.

Due to the nature of pachinko parlors, if they do not create a situation in which customers can win to some extent, they will lose customers to other parlors. However, now that this situation is continuing, more and more stores are closing their doors because they are unable to create such a situation and are losing customers.

The day may be approaching when the sight of a pachinko parlor near a train station will no longer be the norm.