Experts Call Slot Machines a Sure Bet for State’s Tribes

For decades, Nevada’s casino operators have made a science out of gambling, incessantly seeking out new ways to seduce gamblers.

But California’s Indian casino operators won’t need to employ many tricks of the trade, predicted researchers who gathered here last week for a conference on gambling and risk-taking.

The reason, they say: Californians are so anxious to play classic Nevada-style slot machines at nearby Indian casinos, now that they are legal, no frills will be needed to draw them.

“The casinos in California will fill up so fast with drive-in customers, they’re looking at guaranteed profits” without having to employ any subtle marketing tricks, said Bill Thompson, a professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

Conference host William R. Eadington, head of the Institute for the Study of Gambling and Commercial Gaming at the University of Nevada, Reno, agreed. “In California there won’t be the need for much sophisticated marketing,” he said. “They’ll be able to go after the easy money.”

That seemed to be the case Friday, when Nevada-style slot machines were activated at Casino Morongo, a tribal gambling hall off Interstate 10 in the Riverside County desert. Though the casino ordered various types of machines, the most popular at Friday’s debut were “the old-fashion mechanical reels,” said Marcus Prater, spokesman for Bally Gaming and Systems, a slot machine manufacturer.

“People are packing themselves in to play the old slots. It shows that there’s a real pent-up demand in California to play the games that they haven’t been able to until now,” Prater said. “It’s what they’ve been waiting for.”

The story is different in the highly competitive Las Vegas market, though, where fickle gamblers jump from one mega-resort casino to another, in search of the right mix of machines and ambience to feel good about wagering, researchers and industry executives note.

Vegas gamblers are “promiscuous customers” who show little loyalty to a single casino, complained Gary Loveman, chief operating officer at Harrah’s Entertainment and one of the conference’s keynote speakers.

In-house research shows that Harrah’s customers spend 64% of their gambling money elsewhere. If its patrons can be enticed to spend an additional 1% of their money at its casinos, that slight improvement would increase Harrah’s revenue by $20 million a year, Loveman said.

Harrah’s strategy to accomplish that, he said, is to maintain a database on 18 million customers, to better identify and market to their gambling idiosyncrasies.

Researchers say they have their own ideas on how casinos can draw more customers. David Kranes, a design consultant who has written extensively about Las Vegas casinos, said Las Vegas should develop smaller, uncluttered “boutique casinos” with extra-high ceilings and generous use of water to soothe the gamblers’ nerves.

He even advocated that casinos do away with the cacophony of noisy slot machines, replacing them with soft music.

“Subliminally, casinos have to feel ‘right’ so that . . . a player will feel he can win,” he told his audience. “Casinos need to present themselves as theater.”

Other ploys include the use of smells to induce gamblers to linger over slot machines, said another researcher. Dr. Alan Hirsch reported that when he odorized a section of one local casino with the smell of flowers, the amount of money gambled at those slots increased 45%.

Hirsch said he was unsure how to explain the effect, but noted that of all the senses, nothing more quickly changes one’s mood than smell.

“Maybe they felt happier, more optimistic” when under the influence of a floral aroma, he suggested.

Though the idea of employing flower power was new to some casino executives, others winked. “That old trick has been around for a while,” said Bally’s Prater.

Other techniques to entice gamblers are more blatant. University of Nebraska geriatrics psychologist Dennis McNeilly told of a Midwest casino that offered 50% discounts on medical prescriptions to older adults who signed up for the casino’s slot club.

The casino’s objective, he said, was to attract a greater share of the over-65 gambling market--gamblers who, out of loneliness, boredom or grief over the loss of loved ones, turn to casinos for comfort or distraction.

Meanwhile, the gambling industry continues to develop more enticing slot machines--a point of consternation among therapists who treat gambling addicts. Among the newest devices are machines playing off the popular television game show “Family Feud.” The slot machine displays the gambler’s face on a faux television camera screen if he reaches a “bonus round.”

Other machines use interactive video characters. One, called Banana-Rama, features a cartoonish gorilla and monkey that dance and yelp with every win--and yawn if quarters aren’t dropped fast enough into the slot.

“This is far more fun to play,” said Al Ferreira, vacationing here from Aptos, Calif., and playing the Banana-Rama at the MGM Grand casino. “You gotta watch this.”

He reached for the screen and tickled the gorilla’s stomach, and it giggled. He tickled the monkey, and it ate a banana. After a few minutes, Ferreira put in another $20. No researchers from the nearby conference were needed to evaluate the success of this game.

“Normally when I’m home, I’d drive to Reno to gamble,” Ferreira said. “But if the Indian casinos are going to get games like this, I’ll stay in California.”