Managing the Slot Operations of a Hotel Casino in the Las Vegas Locals’ Market

Abstract

This exploratory study was designed to identify and explain the sources of variation in the daily slot handle of a locals' market hotel casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. A regression model was used to analyze the effects of temporal, operational, and marketing variables hypothesized to influence slot handle. A simultaneous regression analysis was conducted with audited, secondary data using variables adapted from prior research. Significance tests were conducted at the .05 alpha level. The model failed to produce a significant effect for the food covers variable. The buy-in incentives (direct mail) and bingo headcount variables were significantly and positively related to slot handle. The temporal variables emerged as powerful predictors of slot handle. Finally, the results demonstrate the questionable economic significance of the buy-in incentives program and the bingo operation.This exploratory study was designed to identify and explain the sources of variation in the daily slot handle (i.e., the amount of money wagered in all the slot machines) of a locals' market hotel casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. A regression model was created to analyze the effects of variables hypothesized to influence slot handle. The results produced by the model were examined to determine the significance of each variable's effect as well as the overall explanatory power of the model. The findings could have a profound influence on the future operations and marketing strategy of the hotel casino examined in this research. Although prior literature has addressed aspects of the variables used in our model, their combined effects on slot handle have not been determined. Our model was designed to analyze the effects of temporal, operational, and marketing variables on slot handle.Slot revenues constitute the largest portion of the total revenues of hotel casinos outside the Las Vegas strip and downtown markets (Nevada Gaming Control Board, 1998). The majority of the remaining hotel casinos within the Las Vegas metropolitan area are informally classified as locals' market properties. The Las Vegas locals' market is composed of hotel casinos that derive a substantial portion of their revenues from local clienteles. These properties also operate hotels. State

Estimating the impact of showroom entertainment on the gaming volumes of Las Vegas hotel–casinos

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Evaluating slot machine performance: A performance-potential model

“…Most of the work related to the discovery of influences on slot machine business volume has been performed at the aggregate level (Lucas and Brewer, 2001;Lucas and Bowen, 2002;Lucas and Santos, 2003). These studies all featured a dependent variable measured in terms of daily coin-in, which represented the total amount of wagers accepted in all slot machines.…”

An examination of factors that discourage slot play in Macau casinos

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