{"id":22514,"date":"2018-09-24T07:12:00","date_gmt":"2018-09-24T15:12:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=22514"},"modified":"2018-09-24T07:12:37","modified_gmt":"2018-09-24T15:12:37","slug":"louisiana-heats-up-pilgrimage-to-plains","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/louisiana-heats-up-pilgrimage-to-plains\/","title":{"rendered":"Louisiana heats up; Pilgrimage to Plains"},"content":{"rendered":"

Louisiana<\/strong> gamblers were living large in August, leaving 9% more than last year in the slots and on the tables, some $212 million in total. This was especially good for Caesars Entertainment<\/strong> (+12%) and even more so for Boyd Gaming<\/strong> \"\"(+13%). The loudest “Boom!” came from the Lake Charles<\/strong> market, exploding 18.5% higher. The Golden Nugget<\/strong>, surging 30%, caught and passed L’Auberge du Lac<\/strong> (up 11%). The Nugget grossed $29 million, L’Auberge $27 million. Delta Downs<\/strong> leapt 27.5% to $15 million but Isle Grand Palais<\/strong> lost business, down 2% to $8.5 million. You think Caesars isn’t chagrined that Gary Loveman<\/strong> evacuated the Lake Charles market in order bankroll a failsino in Biloxi<\/strong>?<\/p>\n

The storm-battered Baton Rouge<\/strong> market didn’t share in the statewide prosperity. L’Auberge Baton Rouge<\/strong> did best by coming in flat ($13 million). Far to the rear were Belle of Baton Rouge<\/strong> ($3 million, -27%) and Casino Rouge<\/strong>, 16% lower in the water, grossing $4.5 million. The situation in New Orleans<\/strong> was, need it be said, much better. Harrah’s New Orleans<\/strong> led the market with a 7.5% gain to $23 million. Boomtown New Orleans<\/strong> was a distant second with $10 million, up 7%, and Treasure Chest<\/strong> grossed $9 million, climbing 9%. Fair Grounds<\/strong> racino brought in $3.5 million (up 10%) for owner Churchill Downs<\/strong>, while Amelia Belle<\/strong> rose 12% to $4 million.<\/p>\n

Horseshoe Bossier City<\/strong> (+23%) put some distance between itself and Margaritaville<\/strong> (+4%), grossing $16.5 million against the latter’s $13 million. Eldorado Shreveport<\/strong> finished third with \"\"$10 million, a 6%, Pinnacle Entertainment<\/strong> lost market share at Boomtown Bossier<\/strong>, down 9% to $4.5 million while Sam’s Town Shreveport<\/strong> gained 2.5% to $6 million. Perhaps because it is fixing to leave town, customers fled Diamond Jack’s<\/strong>, down 8% to $3 million.\u00a0Harrah’s Louisiana Downs<\/strong> made a relatively meager contribution to Caesars’ big haul, up a percentage point to $4 million.<\/p>\n

* Inveterate readers may have noticed an absence of S&G<\/em> on Friday. That’s because the S&G<\/em> Mobile was headed to Americus<\/strong>, Georgia<\/strong>, our jumping-off point for the 22nd annual Peanut Festival<\/strong> in Plains<\/strong>. We sampled many a peanut-derived product, doubtless to the detriment of our waistlines. Thanks to a well-placed S&G<\/em> reader, we were able to have dinner (along with roughly a hundred other people) with former President Jimmy Carter<\/strong> — a cherubic 94 years old — and his formidable wife Rosalynn<\/strong>, the original steel magnolia. The affair was under the rubric of the American Political Items Collectors<\/strong>, Carter branch. Although I was too young to vote in 1976 and didn’t vote for Carter in 1980 I was a fan of his environmentalism and renewable-energy advocacy when he was governor of Georgia, and like to think he got the ball rolling on the sustainability movement of today. In any event, it was a memorable weekend and we got to see a lot of back-country Georgia, which is plenty scenic.<\/p>\n

* While on the subject of political history, let it be noted that the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security & Investigations<\/strong> will be butting its \"\"snout into the subject of sports betting on Thursday. Fortunately the American Gaming Association<\/strong>‘s Sara Slane<\/strong> will be there to school solons on why it’s better to have sports betting out in the open — and regulated at the state level — than tinkered with the federal government. Why is that the less-government crowd suddenly discovers the virtues of silence when there’s money to be made?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Louisiana gamblers were living large in August, leaving 9% more than last year in the slots and on the tables, some $212 million in total. This was especially good for Caesars Entertainment (+12%) and even more so for Boyd Gaming … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15468,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[249,60,244,176,199,117,152,190,140,30,33,25,129,21],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22514"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22514"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22514\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22515,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22514\/revisions\/22515"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}