Turns out a slot parlor is a slot parlor, and without amazing Las Vegas style amenities, a nearby airport offering flights from major carriers and a vibrant convention business, the second these customers had a better choice, they fled. Players were loyal and true, but only because these gamblers had no other option. The Achilles heel for the market was a continued reliance on day-tripping slot machine players. Since then, Atlantic City gaming revenue has dropped by more than 50 percent while Pennsylvania once again saw record gaming revenue in 2015, topping $3.17 billion, a 3.41-percent increase from 2014. But then nearby Pennsylvania legalized gambling and everything changed, siphoning off Atlantic City’s main business driver: Philadelphia. The market for Atlantic City peaked in 2006 with $5.2 billion in 2006. But that and Harrah’s have been notable exceptions. A couple of notable exceptions are Tropicana, which added many more retail, music and dining options at the end of the 1990s Borgata, which opened in 2004 as a true Las Vegas destination style casino and Harrah’s which added an amazing indoor pool mimicking the outdoor Las Vegas mega-pools. In fact, Borgata has been seeing gaming gains since so much of the competition has abandoned the market.

Yet most operators in Atlantic City did nothing. And that every new casino opening meant splitting that pie into ever smaller shares. For a while it seemed casinos were the definitive magical bullet that could fix any funding gap. Now they’re seemingly everywhere.Īll the money made Atlantic City casino operators flush with cash, obfuscating reality: There is only so much gambling money to go around. First on Indian reservations in Florida and Connecticut, then in places such as Biloxi and Tunica, Miss. Then casino gambling started its slow march across the country. For a couple of decades the boardwalk big shots had nothing to worry about. And that was good for a while it turned out to be a massive mistake.

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