The first Playboy Club opened in Chicago, Illinois in 1960. The last American location was Lansing, Michigan, which closed in 1988. International Clubs existed until the 1991 closing of the location in Manila, Philippines. During the last three months of 1961, more than 132,000 people visited the Chicago club, making it the busiest night club in the world.
In 1965 Hefner sent Victor Lownes to London to open Playboy's British casinos following legalisation of gambling in the UK. These soon became the tail that wagged the rabbit. Gaming income from these casinos enabled Playboy to continue throwing money at financially disastrous clubs, theatres, resorts, record companies and film investments. The magazine's income was modest compared to that from these casinos. In 1981 the casino at 45 Park Lane was the most profitable casino in the world and the British casinos contributed $32 million dollars to the corporation. That year Playboy showed a total profit of $31 million meaning the rest of the empire made a net loss of $1 million. However in that year Victor Lownes was fired and gambling licenses were not renewed thereby cutting off Playboy's biggest source of income and creating a financial crisis that would only be solved by enormous changes within the empire.
