Harrah’s Clipped By Coupons
READ MORE: Casino, Coupon, Gambling
Harrah’s Joliet Casino in Illinois wants to keep their Players’ Club patrons happy. So how’s $525 in free cash sound? From the Chicago Sun-Times:
“The casino said a mailing error by a third-party vendor resulted in approximately 11,000 coupons being sent out earlier this week. The coupons were good for $525 in cash, a sum much higher than intended. If all the coupons are redeemed, the payout would by nearly $5.8 million.”
And all at once 11,000 people descended on Harrah’s Joliet to redeem the vouchers. Problem was, the casino tried to play the “Oops, our bad” card, but the Illinois Gaming Board forced them to honor the coupons. We got one of those in the mail late last week, but it’ll take a hell of a lot more than $500 to get us anywhere near Joliet, IL.
Harrah’s could lose $5.8 mil. in botched promotion [Chicago Sun-Times]
Mon nom est Pierre, le singe de reddition (I am Pierre, the Surrender Monkey)
READ MORE: Casino, Gambling
Frivolous lawsuits aren’t just the domain of idiot Americans anymore. The baguette-eating Bordeaux-swilling tourist haters from France are starting to join in the fun, including a guy who’s suing the casino that let him lose a bundle. The Guardian reports:
“Mr Bryk won some £11,000 on his first two visits in 1995, but lost nearly £500,000 over the next eight years. “The staff watched him get addicted, watched him lose control, and kept inviting him back with free dinners,” said his lawyer, Gilles-Jean Portejoie.”
Unusual that a Frenchman’s urges would cause him to just roll over and give in to his vices. You’d think surrendering to gambling would be completely out of character for these people. Such a strong moral backbone the French. This is Gaulling (how bad exactly is that pun?).
Wynn’s Alright, Don’t Nobody Worry About Steve
READ MORE: Casino, Gambling, Las Vegas, Wynn
Between the rumors of layoffs and bankruptcy, not to mention the tanking of Broadway transplant Avenue Q, the press has been claiming the Wynn in Vegas is in trouble. In Business Las Vegas says numbers don’t lie:
“Wynn Las Vegas reported a whopping $7,321 in gambling revenue per table per day in the third quarter and $251 in slot revenue per machine per day. By comparison, Venetian reported $5,691 in gambling revenue per table per day and $190 in slot revenue per machine per day. Wynn’s results are closer to what Las Vegas Sands is earning in Macau, arguably the world’s most lucrative market. At Sands Macau, win per table was $7,444, and slot win was $218 per machine in the third quarter.”
How embarrassing is it that a nickel slot makes more money in a week than we do? The moral to the story is not to write off the Wynn too soon, seems like they’re doing pretty damn good in spite of the rumors.
Wynn Las Vegas numbers dispel rumors of problems [In Business Las vegas]
Have You Met My Friend Andrew Jackson?
READ MORE: Casino, Las Vegas
Money will get you everywhere in Vegas, especially with people capable of offering you a decent upgrade. Not only will bribery make you feel like a bigshot, it can also get you a better room when you check in to your hotel. Poker blogger Bobby Bracelet knows this first hand:
As she was on the phone waiting to get the authorization from her manager to switch the dates and rates, I tossed the $40 down near her hand and simply asked,”Is there anything you could do for us to put a positive spin on our vacation? Cause this is a gambling vacation and we’ve had some pretty bad luck already.”
So she gets off the phone and goes into that 80mph keyboard attack mode, and tells us she can give us a slight upgrade right now if we need to get in a room, but if we can wait, she can give us a Player’s Suite.
700 square feet. 4 person jacuzzi tub. 2 TV’s. Bose stereo system. FOR A $40 TIP!!!
We tipped $20 once upon checking in at the Las Vegas Club hotel on Fremont Street, and got an upgrade to a room with a refrigerator and 50% less stink. Sadly, that’s a true story.
Based on Years of Experience [Bobby Bracelet]
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Vegas Strip: A Realtor’s Wet Dream Come True
READ MORE: Casino, Las Vegas
You know what Las Vegas really needs? More monstrously gargantuan hotel properties. At least this one isn’t going to be Turn-Of-The-Century-London-Themed, or anything remotely stupider. Instead? The biggest goddamn hotel/casino/shopping complex y’all ever did see:
On Thursday morning, the company (MGM Mirage) released more detailed plans for its Project CityCenter, a $5 billion mixed-use monster on the Las Vegas Strip that will boast 18 million square feet of casino, hotel, condominium and retail space — roughly six times the size of the company’s flagship Bellagio resort.
“This is the most expensive privately-funded project in U.S. history,” said MGM Mirage (MGM) CEO Terry Lanni. “You could take Rockefeller Center and throw in Soho and Times Square and this is bigger.”To be constructed on 66 acres between the company’s Bellagio and Monte Carlo casinos, the project will be anchored by a 4,000 room, 60-strory hotel tower with a “sophisticated, contemporary design [that] will be demonstrably different from any building that has preceded it,” the company. Also on site will be two 400-room high-end boutique-style hotels, 1,640 condominium units and 500,000 square feet of retail, restaurant and entertainment space.
We’re just hoping they post a sign out front when they’re done trumpeting “The Loosest Craps In Town.”
MGM Mirage Best Big on Las Vegas Strip [The Business Online]
Hottest Casino Robber of All Time Is Nabbed
READ MORE: Casino, Las Vegas
Ever look at a Brinks truck and think, “You know, I bet I could drive off in one of those and elude law enforcement for up to twelve years?” Heather Tallchief did, went on the lam, and just yesterday turned herself into Federal custody.
Tallchief was wanted for stealing an armored truck from the Circus Circus casino. Twenty-one year old Heather Tallchief drove off with a Loomis armored truck carrying more than $3 million inside. Now 12 years later, she’s admitting to her part in the robbery.
Big balls. Our favorite part though? Idiot lawyers. Check the following quote from her legal representation: “We hope that we can convince a court or a jury or both of the wisdom of mitigation is the best word because there’s no doubt of what she did. I’m not convinced a jury would find her guilty and neither is she.” Hubris my friends, hubris… By the way, anyone willing to give us 3-1 Eva Longoria plays her in the TV movie?
Fugitive Surrenders Admitting to Las Vegas Casino Heist [KLAS]
Stay Here While Mommy Plays The Slots
READ MORE: Casino, Morons
We’re not making fun of Okies here, we promise - just idiot slot players. That being said, let’s quote from the Muskogee Phoenix:
Sunday, according to police, Loretta Lynn Webb, 43, went to the Creek Nation Travel Plaza in Muskogee and left her 23-month-old granddaughter locked in a pickup with outside temperatures reaching 88 degrees.
Luckily for Webb, who spent 45 minutes inside gambling, Creek Nation security officers and Muskogee County deputies found the toddler in the truck, tracked down Webb in the plaza and got the child out before she suffered any injuries from the heat.
Police said Webb won $265 while in the plaza
That should probably pay for bail.
Gambling grandma should know better [Muskogee Phoenix]
Mega Mergeropoly on the Strip
READ MORE: Casino, Las Vegas
Confused by who owns which Vegas casinos from Palace Station south to the Mandalay Bay? Vegas Today and Tomorrow has a pretty nifty map put together that shows you where to go if you don’t want to drop all your money into the Harrah’s corporate coffers. Conspicuously independent from the major property owners on the strip? The Frontier, where bikini bull rides and cowboys willing to kick your ass for no reason at all are integral parts of the atmosphere. We peed in that place once, and immediately got the hell out of there.
Who Owns What Map [Vegas Today and Tomorrow]
As Long As The Cocktail Waitresses All Look Like Ellie Mae…
READ MORE: Casino, Las Vegas
There once was a pretty darn good boxer by the name of Max Baer. Baer kicked Max Schmeling’s ass in Yankee Stadium in 1933, and became a hero to the Jewish community from that big win. He also killed a man in the ring once, but that’s neither here nor there.
Of course, he’s not remembered as “Max Baer: Kickass Boxer, Hero To The Jewish Community.” No, he is the “senior” to Max Baer, Jr., television’s “Jethro Bodine.”
Would it surprise you to know MBJ is trying to get a Beverly Hillbillies-themed casino opened up in Las Vegas? Would it also surprise you to know that at this very moment Max Baer, Sr., Hank Greenberg, Moe Green, Meyer Lansky, and every other tough guy of Jewish heritage happen to be rolling over in their graves?
Shilling For Bucks: Lobos Running Wild
READ MORE: Casino, College Football, Gambling
The University of New Mexico Lobos (no, not named after an antelope-faced marfan-girl with a hook shot) have apparently gained the NCAA’s permission to put advertising on the nets raised behind the field goal bars at home football games this season. Partner-in-shill Route 66 Casino is thrilled to be one of the two sponsors to have their logo in view for every extra point or three point try from the field.
Dan Ihm, marketing director for Route 66 Casino says the casino couldn’t have received better brand exposure and expects a number of businesses to compete for the advertising slot in two years when the contract is up.
“This is a big score for us because when the Lobo’s (sic) score everybody’s eyes are going to be on our name and we are also going to get national publicity and exposure,” Ihm says.
Assuming, of course, anyone outside of Albuquerque could sit through an entire Lobo game without finding something more entertaining on the tube - like maybe the Little Giant Ladder show, or a replay of Thursday’s Congressional vote on C-Span.
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