Maybe. I’ll be in Vegas tomorrow. I’ll see what I can find out.
We go to AC for a weekend every six or eight weeks and lose about $300-400. Once a year we go to Reno, Vegas etc, spend a week there and probably lose around $1500 most years. My husband plays table games and I play penny slots. But the casinos don’t ( and probably can’t ) keep track of how much you lose - they keep track of how you bet. It’s not at all uncommon for my husband to tell me he was up $1500 and lost it all back.
So let’s say you “lose” $300 in an AC casino or that $1500 in a Vegas one? Did you get a free room and meals? Do you think that equals your losses so you might say you “break even”?
For the $300 or so we lose in AC, we get a room for two nights and generally two comped meals for both of us. We’re even/ahead if you consider the retail cost of the room and meals- but the casino is not looking at the retail price, it’s looking at the cost to the casino which is certainly much lower than the retail price.
And they'd also prefer that I stay at the casino and have my meals at the casino- if I go to restaurant/hotel down the road ( and there *are* cheap non-casino hotels in AC) that's more time away from the casino floor and less time for me to lose money.
Fifteen years ago when I played at Foxwoods a lot you joined the players club and then simply got a percentage of your bets back in “store credit” so to speak. They didn’t specifically comp you meals or rooms, you could spend the money you “earned” any way you liked. For blackjack they’d swipe your card when you started playing and key in how much you were betting. If you decided to up your average bet you’d ask the dealer to punch that in (or the pit boss, I can’t remember anymore).
I seem to remember that after playing $5 blackjack for 6 hours I would have a little over $100 to spend at the restaurant, hotel, gift shop or any of the other stores they had there.
The MGM properties comp system now rewards you not only for gambling but also for money you spend on their shows, in their restaurants and in the spas. We didn’t go last year so I have no status right now but this years trip should set us up nicely for a weekend next year. I have however managed with an investment of 2-3 mins a day in clicking a facebook app (MyVegas) earned enough points for 2 free nights at Mandalay, two tickets to Love and 2 dinner buffets for this years trip.
Caesars group has more free weekends and free tournament entry offers but I can rarely make them work with our schedule.
Casinos give comps based on your “theo,” or theoretical loss (how much you’ve put at risk each day.) It really doesn’t matter to them whether you won or lost - just how much you were *willing *to lose. Your player’s club comps are based on that amount. Separate from that are “teaser” offers from Marketing designed to get people into the casino who might not otherwise stay there, or who can induced to plan a trip on the fly. Teasers can be fun, because if they are from a casino we really don’t go to, we can take the offer and all the goodies, then never give them any play that trip. Free trip for us, they take the hit. Of course, they’ll never send us another offer, but who cares? We stick with 2 properties almost exclusively anyway.
Foxwoods, Mohegan Sun, and all of the Atlantic City casinos that I’ve been to have $12.50 chips. They’re pink. I’ve never seen them in Vegas, however.
Vegas traditionally uses Kennedy halves. But occasionally I’ve seen $2.50 chips there (never on blackjack, though. I think they use them for Pai Gow or something like that.)
Remind me of my favorite gambling quote: “I hope I break even, I could use the money.”
All those lights in Las Vegas weren’t paid for by people breaking even. In the end the house wins; it’s a mathematical fact. What’s odd about that is that if I tallied up how people supposedly fared on gambling; the “I win more than I’ve lost” is far and away in the lead. I guess the people who lost money just aren’t admitting it to me.
It’s against human nature to quite while you’re winning, and it IS human nature to try to (or at least consider) trying to win you’re money back if you’re down.
Do casinos offer anything that is only available via comp, such as specific rooms or seats at a show?