Sandy McCord, a member of a seniors bowling group that calls itself the “Oldies But Goodies” club, sends it down the lane at Crown Lanes Bowling Center and Sports Bar in Denver on Wednesday, March 13, 2024. Jamie Adams has bowled since she could walk. Raised in a family of avid bowlers, she started in a junior league for toddlers. In high school, she remembers paying $6.99 per game, with shoe rentals costing just $1.99.
At Bowlero Cherry Creek, a bowling center on Leetsdale Drive in southeast Denver that was long-known as Monaco Lanes, four people looking for fun during the weekend will pay nearly $221 for a two-hour reservation. That includes the lane rental fee, which is cheaper on weekdays, plus shoe rentals and an $18 “event fee.”
On the 16th Street Mall, a neon sign shaped like a bowling pin signals to players that they’ve arrived at Lucky Strike Downtown Denver — now a mainstay of the Denver Pavilions. At 5 p.m. on Wednesday, 18 customers chatted at the full-length bar, socializing in front of more than a dozen big-screen TVs.
“The independent centers — there’s less and less of those now,” Mischel said. “Bowlero kind of sets the prices throughout all of their centers, and they dominate the Denver metro area, for sure.”At 6 p.m. on Wednesday, string lights hung from the awnings outside, and bowlers passed a back-lit Coors Beer sign on the wall before entering through the double doors. Colorado and American flags flanked a sign above the 24 lanes that read, “God Bless the USA.” They were empty, but not for long.
Head mechanic Allen Hobbs, 53, has worked at Crown Lanes for about five years. He called the bowling industry “almost a monopoly,” but the alley is surviving. “Bowlero has tried to make bowling more mainstream, and that is good and bad in some ways,” Mischel said. “But it’s been at the expense of traditional bowling.”