A sobriety club that dates back 60 years and hosts about 20 Alcoholics Anonymous meetings each week closed its doors Friday because of “poor economic performance.”The Akron Arid Club, at 787 Brown St., which sold no alcoholic beverages as a “dry” club, suspended all business operations, club officials announced in a letter taped to the front door.The club had been open seven days a week.Financial secretary Shane Wagoner said the club hopes to reorganize and reopen somewhere else. He said six people were laid off with the closing.Changing ways of socializing might have contributed to the decline of the club, which was a destination point every year during Founders Day weekend in June, when thousands of people converge on Akron to remember the founding of A.A. here in 1935.Because of social media like Facebook, Wagoner said, and easy access to people via cell phones, there is simply not as great a need for groups of people to gather in large settings anymore, he said.“Once upon a time, this is where you went to socially connect,” Wagoner said. “Today, we don’t have to go to those places to socially connect.”The parking lot of the club was roped off Friday, preventing cars from entering.“The suspension of the club business and club services is in an effort to reorganize and relocate,” club officials said in the letter.In addition, all bingo operations at the club have been suspended, Wagoner and club manager Michele Egli said.According to 2010 data from Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine’s office, which regulates charitable bingo in the state, the Akron Arid Club bingo game had gross receipts of $1,231,650 and expenses of $1,105,708 for its 2010 reporting period for a profit of $125,942. Net profits from bingo are expected to be lower this year, Wagoner said.“Please keep in mind that the Akron Arid Club is no different than any other business and that the poor economic conditions of the community have brought us to this point,” Egli and Wagoner said in the letter.“We are saddened to be at this point. However, in an effort to restructure and serve as a community organization, these decisions were necessary,” club officials said.The club opened just before Christmas 1951, meeting at a location on Locust Street.In 1965, the club, then on East Market Street between Broad and Case avenues, was destroyed by fire, but it reopened in 1966. Wagoner said that after the fire, the club split into the Paradise Club, now in Cuyahoga Falls, and the Arid Club.Brown Street moveThe Arid Club has been on Brown Street since the 1970s.Wagoner said the club had been spending down money in a trust over several years to pay operating expenses and had been losing thousands of dollars each year. It got to the point that it could not continue.“This is a difficult time for the Arid Club,” he said.The club plans to liquidate what it owns and try to sell the building. It then would consider renting a smaller space.According to Summit County records, the 8,700-square-foot building and land are valued at about $333,000.The business model was no longer working, Wagoner said. For example, when people attending the A.A. meetings held at the club leave $5 to $10 total per meeting to help operate the club, the donations were not enough to pay mounting utility bills.And while membership “was in the hundreds,” lately there were only about 35 dues-paying members, he said.Last September, the Today Club II in North Akron, also a sobriety club, closed because of financial problems.Wagoner said the club is working “diligently to reopen and to fulfill moral obligations to the bingo players that have supported our operation for many years.”“As far as bingo players are concerned, the club will work to reschedule a ‘Mega Session’ at a later date,” Wagoner said. “Also, all entry monies paid to the club will be refunded to the individuals.”Storefront gambling parlors that are not regulated by the state (but can be regulated by cities or counties) are taking away money from charitable bingo games, Wagoner said.He said the club will “step back, figure out what we can do, liquidate and do something healthy.”Jim Carney can be reached at 330-996-3576 or at jcarney@thebeaconjournal.com.