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East Coast Casinos Making Adjustments To Lure Asian-American Customers

Posted on June 4th, 2010

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In the East Coast region, there is a large population of Asian Americans who do not so much go for slot machines, but are generally inclined toward table games. This group of customers is the one being intently pursued by the casinos in Delaware, West Virginia and Pennsylvania, as they expand from slot machine gaming to full-scale Las Vegas- style table games. The casinos in these places have added Asian touches to some details in their facilities as a way of accommodating that valued segment of the gambling market.

Taking a cue from the enterprising ideas of the more sophisticated casinos in Las Vegas, Dover Downs and Delaware Park are also doing their thing in an attempt to cater to the Asian-American gamblers. They have developed their dining areas and widened their menus and hired managers especially for the promotion of the Asian-American market.

They are also thinking of printing advertisements for their products and services in newspapers and billboards using Asian languages. Both Andrew Gentile and Ed Sutor, CEOs of Delaware Park and Dover Downs, respectively, say that the Asian-Americans they are targeting are the kind of gamblers that do not play slot machines, but prefer to play baccarat and Pai Gow, a form of poker derived from an old Chinese tile game.

American Gaming Association president Frank Fahrenkopf Jr. said that many expensive hotels in Las Vegas have gone to lengths to supply the special needs of Asian-Americans. Sutor also cited a case with MGM Grand after it opened in Las Vegas in 1993, wherein casino officials decided to make changes to the facility’s entrance that highlighted the company’s lion logo as soon as they were informed that a lion’s open mouth meant bad luck for some Asians.

Also, some casinos omit the number four on their elevator buttons because of some Asian belief that the number four brings misfortune. The Asian-American gamblers in the East Coast, most of them taking the buses and travelling from the cities of Boston, New York and Washington, have been accustomed to gambling at Atlantic City casinos or at Connecticut tribal casinos.

With casinos in Delaware, Pennsylvania and West Virginia now operating a complete array of table games, those new casinos are likely to take away a large chunk of customers from Atlantic City and Connecticut, especially gamblers from the Baltimore-Washington area. This is particularly bad for the struggling casinos in Atlantic City.

The head of operations for Penn National Gaming, John Finamore, said the company is targeting the nearly half a million Asians that make up the Baltimore-Washington market. Penn National owns the Charles Town race track in West Virginia that is adding table games to its slots and racing track in July.

Penn National has employed an Asian expert who can provide professional advice on its bid to attract the lucrative Asian-American market. Charles Town is offering a noodle bar and other Asian dishes and meals at its dining facilities.

Tim Fong, a psychiatry professor and co-director of the gambling studies program at the University of California, Los Angeles, said gambling has been part of the culture in several Asian countries, like the Philippines, China, Japan and Korea. He said the practice of gambling for some Asians has a meaningful connection to their beliefs of predestination and fate. Fong added that not all Asians love to gamble and he does not see the Asian-Americans as being victims of the gambling industry.

Contrary to Fong’s opinion, Ellen Somekawa, executive director of Asian Americans United, a group in Philadelphia that is opposing a proposed casino near Philadelphia’s Chinatown, said the casinos are ruthlessly stealing from the Asian-Americans for their own profit. She is raising concern over the destruction the casinos would have on the Asian-American communities.

Fong said studies showing the number of gambling addiction cases among Asian-Americans to be higher than in other races may be attributed to the failure of some communities to initiate programs for problem gamblers. He mentioned the Asian community services project called Massachusetts Council on Compulsive Gambling that was started in 2006 as a good example that the East Coast states might want to replicate.