Missouri
St Louis Gambling Fever May Be Cooling Off
By Bob Hudson
Jun 11, 2010 - 2:24:59 PM

Time was, in St Louis, “if you build a casino, they will come.“ But that may not be the case any more for casinos in the St Louis area, if you look at the numbers provided by Missouri and Illinois casino regulators. Those numbers show a lukewarm 3% increase in casino revenue from the month of May, which isn’t much when you consider that a $350 million casino just opened in that month, and the increase in gambling all took place at Pinnacle Entertainment’s River City Casino in Lemay. Pinnacle’s other gaming boat, Lumiere Place, lost 20%. The others saw their revenue fall off by ten percent or more. The soon-to-be-closed President’s Casino has its’ lifeboats in the water, showing a loss of 42.9%. The Casino Queen’s revenue is down 13%, business at the Argosy Alton Belle is off by 9.5%, Ameristar’s business is down 9.9% and Harrah’s is down by 11.7%. To use a baseball reference, if this were the ninth inning, the manager would be yelling for a new pitcher. And if this were a casino, the pit boss would be changing dealers.

These numbers point to a question of whether St Louis needs or can support another casino, as  the Missouri Gaming Commission prepares to award the state's last gaming license, lucky license number 13. Gene McNary is executive director of the Missouri Gaming Commission, and has been hearing a lot of talk about putting the last new casino in scenic Cape Girardeau. At least three casino developers have expressed interest putting the last casino there, and the Gaming Commission is asking casino developers and companies to submit their market studies, so they can determine the best site.