Charitable bingo in Indiana: Issues and implications

Abstract

Despite portrayals of gambling as a social vice, charitable gaming is big business in the United States and globally. While many nonprofit organizations sponsor charitable gaming events, such as bingo nights for their members and communities, to raise both friends and funds for their organizations, charitable gaming operations receive little attention from researchers. This article focuses on charitable bingo and contrasts bingo’s often folkloric background with the contemporary realities of charitable gaming. Our exploratory analysis offers reasons that bingo deserves study and calls researchers’ and practitioners’ attention to the scope and some of the implications of bingo operations. We focus on the characteristics of nonprofit organizations reporting bingo revenue in Indiana. Our findings suggest that while some nonprofits may be using bingo to raise much-needed funds or provide a social and recreational outlet for organization or community members, bingo is an uncertain financial pursuit for most organizations. We use a descriptive case study of bingo in Indiana to explore and illustrate the issues and questions raised in the article and to set up an agenda for future research on charitable bingo.