June 2020 - 12

Survival Mode

Virtual clubs initiative offers bridge clubs a way to weather the pandemic

B

ridge clubs across the country
found themselves in dire straits in
mid-March when the coronavirus
pandemic forced them to close their
doors indefinitely. The situation was
especially bleak for many of the ACBL's
largest clubs - those in big cities with
high overhead costs. It was crucial for
them to find a way to generate revenue
during the shutdown.
The wave of club closings began
around the time the Columbus NABC
was canceled on March 12. Four days
later, the ACBL recommended all
clubs shut down. It was less than two
weeks from then that the virtual clubs
program launched. Clubs run games
on BBO, with registration limited to
people who have played at that club in
the past year.
It began on March 25 with 19 tables
of players from the Bridge Club of
Atlanta and quickly grew. Within five
days, there were 25 clubs hosting 354
virtual tables. A week later, there were
over a thousand tables per day with 83
clubs participating. A week after that,
154 clubs generated over 2000 tables.

The following week, it was 204 clubs
and 3000 tables. By the end of the first
month, there were 3487 tables hosted
by 244 clubs.
These numbers represent the singleday performance on Monday, the
busiest day of the week for ACBL clubs.
The total number of clubs participating in the program was greater at each
stage because not all play on Monday.
As of the end of April, 435 clubs have
run at least one virtual club game.
There are about 20,000 tables a week.
Greg Coles, the ACBL's director of
bridge services, is extremely proud of
the progress virtual clubs have made.
"This project is the coolest thing the
ACBL has ever done," he said. "This
project has saved many clubs from
going under. It's given our players an
activity to do while they are stuck at
home. Many would have left bridge and
done something else without it."
A key element of the virtual clubs
program is that clubs set their own
prices. The same $1 per table clubs
would normally pay goes to the ACBL
for sanction fees. BBO takes 20%. The

Silvana Morici shows club directors how to use BBO directing tools in a video tutorial.

12 Bridge Bulletin June 2020

BY CHIP DOMBROWSKI

rest goes to the club. For example, with
an entry fee of $6, a club would get
$4.55 after paying $1.20 to BBO and 25
cents to the ACBL.
There's a big difference between a
small-town club that is able to rent
space cheaply from a church or senior center and charge as little as $3
per person, and Honors Bridge Club
in New York, where rent is sky-high
and the entry fee is $30. When both of
those clubs go virtual, they bring their
real-world issues with them.
That's why membership in virtual
clubs is restricted. Coles didn't want
to create a marketplace where the
low-cost clubs drive down the price
for everyone. The goal is to help clubs
stay in business, not put them out of
it. Another reason for the restriction
is social: "We want to create an atmosphere where you're playing with your
friends," Coles said. "If you want to
play in a big game with lots of strangers, there are plenty of other games on
BBO like that."
Some large clubs are finding that in
the virtual world, their limited games
have become much more popular,
while their open games have gone
down. This has been the experience
of both Sam Marks at the Bridge Club
of Atlanta and Dave Brower at the Portland (OR) Bridge Club, who joined the
program April 1.
Brower speculates that the opengame players not playing in the virtual
club games fall into two groups: those
already comfortable with BBO who
don't need the comfort zone of playing against familiar people, preferring
to compete in larger fields; and those
who have deeper resistance to playing
online at all. After several weeks in the
program, he noted an uptick in open
game attendance in late April. "I think
open-game players are getting bored
June 2020

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of June 2020
