Ritz Club Casino to Remain Permanently Closed After COVID-19 Lockdown

The casino industry is slowly getting back to live in the USA.

11:20 16 June 2020

U.S. Casinos, such as Tribal casinos in New York are re-opening (online casinos are only legal in NJ and Pennsylvania at the moment).

However, the Ritz Club casino in London’s Mayfair has confirmed it will not reopen even after lockdown measures are eased in England following the coronavirus pandemic.

A renowned venue for the capital’s elite, the Ritz Club was part of the deal that saw the Ritz Hotel sold to an unnamed Qatari investor by Frederick and David Barclay in March 2020, per Forbes. The Barclays brothers’ decision to sell when they did looks an apt one after the COVID-19 pandemic took hold of the world economy the same month, leading to a standstill in business.

An email sent to its members on Wednesday announced the Ritz Club—located in the hotel’s basement and in operation since 1978—would not reopen as hoped (h/t Sebastian Murphy-Bates of MailOnline): “Regrettably, we now write to inform you that The Ritz Club is permanently closed and will not be re-opening.”

The report detailed that the Ritz Club has not turned a profit since 2016 despite counting numerous billionaires among its regular clientele. Previous owners the Barclays had injected considerable amounts—£10 million in 2017 and another £8 million in 2018—to help offset the losses made by the casino in those respective years.

Business in the United Kingdom have gradually begun to resume practices after being hit by COVID-19, though Scotland and Wales are relaxing measures at different rates compared to England.

The UK has recorded the second-highest total of coronavirus-related casualties after passing 41,000 deaths earlier this week, second only to the United States, per the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University.

It was reported earlier this week by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) that the UK is likely to be the hardest hit of any developed country by the coronavirus, per Metro’s Holly Williams.

The nation’s gross domestic product (GDP) has been forecast to slump by as much as 11.5 per cent having endured a lockdown of more than three months and receiving steep criticism for the government’s response to the pandemic.