Missouri lottery officials say keno popularity grows

After more than six months in operation, Missouri's Club Keno lottery game has generated more than $21 million in sales with $5.6 million of that going for education, lottery officials said Friday.

Keno, which was started May 28, was designed to generate new money for the state's tight budget.

"So far it has been doing very well," said lottery spokeswoman Susan Goedde. "For the locations we have recruited, they have done better than we expected them to do."

Through Dec. 14, the average weekly sales for keno was $780,000 with average weekly sales per retailer hovering around $1,500.

Currently, there are 550 retailers statewide who have keno with another 80 applications currently being processed, Goedde said. Club Keno initially began at about 320 bars, restaurants and other sites licensed to sell alcohol.

Keno players can work the numbers locally at three businesses in Cape Girardeau and at the Jackson Elks Lodge.

Justin Barnes, general manager of Show-Me's Restaurant in Cape Girardeau, said Keno has been a big hit with his customers. His biggest winner took home $460.

"We're doing great with it," he said. "A lot of the customers come in just to play it. They may sit around and play $20 to $40 worth of Keno. It's actually attracting a lot of new customers to us."

Sharon Hicks, lounge manager at Pagoda Gardens restaurant in Cape Girardeau, said most of the players she knows were already familiar with the game because they had played it in other states.

"It's been pretty popular, but I have to say it started off better than it is now," she said. "It has sort of leveled off."

Hicks said players typically buy two to three games at a time, but sometimes as many as five.

Dale Pruett, manager of Port Cape Girardeau restaurant and lounge, said his customers were at first a little slow to catch on, but they now buy up a good number of games.

"I don't know if it keeps them here any longer, but when they eat, they like to watch and play," he said. "Even at lunch, it's something for them to do. I did advertise it when I got it here, but several people knew we had it right from the get-go."

Port Cape has had about three winners collect $350 each. Pruett moved the game from the upstairs portion of the business to the downstairs bar area about a month ago, and players have been participating on a daily basis.

"It's something kind of fun to do, because you don't lose a lot," he said. "What else can you do to have a whole lot of fun on just $12 an hour?"

Judging the competition

There was some concern among lottery officials that pull tabs games would suffer because of the introduction of keno, but Goedde said so far pull tab sales are down only 4.7 percent. Sales of pull tabs currently total $11.7 million.

"We've retained some sales that we expected to lose," Goedde said.

The keno game features computer-generated drawings every five minutes, 20 hours a day. Players can select up to 10 numbers from a field of 80. A computer then selects 20 winning numbers for display on special video monitors.

Wagers from $1 to $20 are accepted, with jackpots ranging from $1 to $100,000. Players are paid based on the number of correct guesses.

The game is expected to generate $79 million in sales annually, of which nearly $21 million would go to public schools under the budget for the state fiscal year that began last July 1.

The top keno prize so far went to Geneva White of Kennett, who won $30,000 in July.

Shirley Hush, the owner of Crickets in Sunrise Beach, also has done well on keno. So far, she has won $5,000 twice and her husband has won once.

Hush said her own success aside, the game seems to be catching on with customers.

"It's growing." Hush said. "It's helped with business a little bit but it doesn't help with cash flow when everybody wins."

Staff writer Mike Wells contributed to this report.