Major casinos in Sparks are reluctant to tout how loose their slots are, a fact that surprises gaming marketers elsewhere.

Spin for spin, slot machines in Sparks are set looser than any other Nevada city ranked by regulators, and experts say the Rail City could leverage its reputation for loose slots to draw more business.

Slot “looseness” inspires myriad false superstitions, but casino directors can change the “hold” percentage of machines (just not while gamblers are playing, or when they don’t like the person). And according to the Nevada Gaming Control Board, the directors at Sparks’ 11 major casinos set their hold percentage lower than any other city in the last fiscal year.

The 4.68 percent hold percentage reported for Sparks means those machines had a “payback” percentage of 95.32 percent for the current fiscal year. Yet unlike many Las Vegas casinos that boldly promote their payback percentages, Sparks casinos don’t advertise their state ranking.

“I would try to capitalize on it if I were a casino,” says Steve Bourie, a gambling expert and author of “American Casino Guide.”

Bourie travels the country evaluating casino promotions to update his annual guide, and estimates visiting 75 percent of the casinos in the country.

Different states require different levels of disclosure from casinos, with some like New Jersey requiring individual casinos to publish hold percentages, and others like some tribal jurisdictions not requiring any payback disclosure. Nevada regulators report aggregate numbers for large cities and rural counties. Some of the rural counties have ranked looser than Sparks in the last two years, but they are not major tourist areas.

“Pretty much every market in the country, you will see a billboard if the slot information is released,” Bourie says, referring to places in Illinois and the Borgata in Atlantic City. “I’m surprised Sparks doesn’t jump on that opportunity.”

Table game players can tell how loose a casino is by the house rules on a game that give the house its edge, but reeled slots don’t belie their hold percentage.

“When it comes to slot machines, there’s not much I can tell people except by basing my suggestions on the returns made public by the state,” Bourie says. “In Atlantic City, you can look at the best return and go there.”

Locals markets and places where several casinos compete tend to be the loosest, Bourie and other experts agree, partially because frequent gamblers prefer video poker. Poker machines, unlike reeled slots, must list the payout for winning hands, and thus reveal how loose they are by their payouts for a flush and full house.

Some experts say the Northern Nevada casinos don’t focus on advertising as much as their Southern Nevada counterparts.

“Las Vegas casinos spend far more on advertising, and are far more aggressive with advertising to their advantage,” Reno gaming analyst Ken Adams says. “They spend more developing their advantage.”

It sounds counter-intuitive, but the way to drive up slot revenue often is to loosen the machines, he says.

That’s what happened when the Sands Regent bought Rail City in Sparks in May 2004, one official says.

For the fiscal year running July 2004 to June 2005, Sparks had the highest payback of any city in the nation at 95.28 percent, American Casino Guide reported that year. They’ve gotten looser since.

“Since the Sands took over Rail City, we’ve been real conscious of it,” Alamo Travel Center Vice President and General Manager Bob Caddel said when that report came out. “Rail City, Baldini’s, Alamo, we’ve all taken notice of that. We’ve loosened ourselves to go after the locals.” 

Officials from other major casinos in Sparks wouldn’t talk about how loose their slots are, or even confirm knowing they were the loosest in the state. But statistics confirm that a heavyweight competitor entering the market loosens up slots. In August 2005, after Sands bought Rail City, the company bought Dayton’s Depot and Red Hawk in Lyon County, which also includes Fernley and Yerington. The 15 casinos with slot machines in Lyon County had a 4.25 win percent for that fiscal year, making the aggregate cities in that county even looser than Sparks.