Any speculation out there on what the impact of the Barrick sale of the downtown casinos will have on the games? Put another way, is the sky falling?
Though Barrick kicked out anyone who has any clue about how to play, at least it offered decent low-roller games to the masses. The fact that the decent games did not attract enough "good customers" to be profitable does not offer incentive to other operators who may think about improving their games as a marketing strategy.
Barrick saw that these casinos (in which they held a minority interest)were bottomless, money draining pits.
Jack Gaughan, the previous owner, milked these joints to the maximum in order to make payroll & show a profit.
The amount of deferred maintenance which Barrick had to contend with was more of a cash drain than they anticipated. It use to be that every time it rained, there were buckets in the second floor hallway to catch the roof leaks. Recently it rained and I noted that there were no leaks. I was very impressed. I can't imagine what that cost them. Unless they simply patched a few areas. They upgraded the "quality of players" by making $5 the minimum bet. That alone saved them a fortune in air freshener & relocated some of the "low(est)-rollers" to the Western,Gold Spike, and El Cortez.
These acquisitions will be profitable in the years to come but will require a significant infusion of cash for maintenance and upgrading.
