A Las Vegas gaming entrepreneur has a simple message for casino companies to boost profitability – stop undercutting your gaming customers and find incentives for them to spend more when they visit.
Acres Technology founder and CEO John Acres, who has made a career of developing technology systems to encourage increased and responsible gambling, told the Bob Maheu “First Wednesday” group meeting at the Ahearn Hotel that the gaming industry must pivot from its current pricing trajectory if it wants to return to record profitability.
“Las Vegas needs to change, but also what we need to give our casino managers permission to change,” Acres said in his 30-minute speech.
“Right now most of our casinos are suffering for revenue and without new ideas, without new technology, they are turning to what has been described as price gouging, high prices on bottled water, expensive food, resort fees, parking fees, all the others that you all know. But those are symptoms of our problem. Our real problem is that we have lost our nerve, we have lost our courage.”
Studying player psychology
Acres, who is credited as the inventor of player tracking, progressive jackpots and instant bonuses and has spent 50 years studying player psychology, illustrated executive risk-taking in a description of how he first approached former Wynn Resorts chairman and CEO Steve Wynn to convince his company to buy into a progressive jackpot system when Acres was 27.
“I was in his office and I made a proposal to him, a verbal proposal, nothing written. And he says, ‘I think I like what you’re saying.’ What will it take for that to happen?’ And I said, ‘Yeah, it’s going to cost about $100,000.’ And this would have been in 1981, so it’s about $300,000 now. “And I need about a third of that upfront.”
“He didn’t say, ‘Well, can you make it cheaper?’ He said, ‘How can I make you do better? Whatever you do, I want you to do more. Whatever you think, I want you to think bigger. I want you to think boldly. I want you to think past what is possible to what could possibly become reality. I want you to dream about what will happen.’ And he picked up the phone on the intercom, called his secretary and said, “I need a check for $35,000.” Ten minutes later it’s in his office. Remember, we have zero documentation on this deal, zero.”
Acres said Wynn’s approach to providing a better customer experience is what differentiates corporate ownership of casinos now from when a top executive or family could make a decision quickly.
Wearing a red University of Indiana T-shirt in support of a football program also making a bold run at a college football championship, Acres said casino companies have forgotten how to dream and how to take risks.
“Which is really strange,” he said. “You’d think people who run casinos would be familiar with risk. But it’s really not their fault. It’s ours. Because we expect our publicly traded companies to deliver consistent results.”
Acres said in “the old Vegas way” casino operators didn’t indulge their customers, they created an environment where the customer felt special.
“These things make up for the inevitable losses that you will encounter when playing because the truth is, if players don’t lose, casinos can’t survive,” he said.
Players “gamble to escape the everyday, to be someone beyond what they are for a moment, to take a risk, to feel like a winner. At the end of the day, what we’re selling, that we’ve forgotten we’re selling, is self-esteem. We make players feel better about themselves.”
Acres praised Nevada Gaming Control Board Chairman Mike Dreitzer as an innovator who can bring change to the gaming industry by simplifying, reforming or, in some cases, eliminating existing rules.
Embrace experimentation
He said he expects Dreitzer to embrace experimentation instead of “protecting against something bad happening” after he took office last summer.
Acres also addressed prediction markets making headlines in 2025.
“I think one of the first problems we have is that as an industry we see every new idea as a threat,” he said. “If I was Nevada and I was fighting prediction markets, I would prepare a way to tax the hell out of it if I can’t get rid of it, to make sure that we make our money, that we put it on a level playing field with the casinos. At the end of the day, the prediction market is just another set of odds.”
The state is embroiled in lawsuits by companies that offer prediction markets after trying to ban them with cease-and-desist orders.
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