At 34 St James's Street is a branch of Coral bookmakers, a gigantic corporation based in Barking which owns two of the remaining dog tracks in the UK at Romford and Brighton and Hove, now that High Street betting operations like theirs have succeeded, by some accounts, in driving the local Walthamstow dog track out of business.
This branch in St James's Street is situated with an eye to hoovering up the cash from the surrounding streets (which include the residences of some of the poorest people in the borough). In 2005/6, the group's turnover was £1,309.9 million.
These sorts of figures are achieved by having about 1600 branches in the chain permitted to operate in the UK, depending on which part of their website you read. For a firm which makes its millions out of being good with numbers, its odd that they can vary in their online announcements by as much as 300 branches. In addition to its local activities, which include a shop on Forest Road, the group Gala Coral, is expanding into Italy, owns Eurobet, a major online gaming operation, along with an online poker and online casino business. The bad news is that the smoking ban has adversely affected their bingo clubs, with 8 closing in this financial year.
Coral bookmakers are not the only firm making its money off the backs of the local punters. Within a close distance of Coral's operation is a Ladbrokes a few yards up the road on St James' Street, and on the High Street, another branch of Ladbrokes for those who missed the first one, a Paddy Power (where the smuggled cigarette and dvd sellers tend to hang out), Metrobet and Collins Ltd. Patriotic punters can even have a flutter with Gordon Brown (on behalf of the taxpayers) at the Tote. None are operating at a loss, despite the economic downturn. Punters can also throw their money away on the Lottery and scratch cards at numerous local outlets, as well as at two Quicksilvers and Cairn's Amusements. Having done this, they can become customers of pawnbrokers like Fish Brothers, Chain Reaction, Capital Gold, Harvey and Thompson, Cash Converters or even Oakam to raise further funds to fritter. Or maybe just to live.
I wonder if its just a coincidence that the shop next door is shuttered today.