2021 Press Mentions
8/5/2021
Las Vegas Review-Journal: Wheel of Fortune still top slot 25 years later
6/22/2021
CDC Gaming Reports Inc: NIGA Tradeshow: Influencers can generate buzzworthy events for casinos
4/28/2021
CDC Gaming Reports Inc: Nonsmoking advocates insist smoking bans are good for casinos
4/12/2021
CDC Gaming Reports Inc: Smoking at casinos declines as COVID-19 and health concerns force casinos to re-evaluate policies
4/8/2021
Small Screen Staff: Top YouTube Channels for Casino Lovers
3/26/2021
7 Minute Miles: Brian Christopher Slots
3/16/2021
CDC Gaming Reports: Frank Floor Talk: What's a slot influencer?
2/27/2021
Best US Casinos: YouTube social media influencer designs casino's slots floor
2/26/2021
The Vegas Bash: YouTube slot room opens in downtown Las Vegas
2/19/2021
The Press-Enterprise: 5 construction and opening updates for Las Vegas
1/29/2021
Las Vegas Review-Journal: YouTube influencer Brian Christopher's slot area already a hit at Plaza
1/29/2021
Casino.org: Plaza Casino to open slot area with Brian Christopher, targets younger players
1/27/2021
Las Vegas Review-Journal: Slot machine influencer teaming up with Plaza on new gaming area
Las Vegas Review-Journal: Wheel of Fortune still top slot 25 years later
6/22/2021
CDC Gaming Reports Inc: NIGA Tradeshow: Influencers can generate buzzworthy events for casinos
4/28/2021
CDC Gaming Reports Inc: Nonsmoking advocates insist smoking bans are good for casinos
4/12/2021
CDC Gaming Reports Inc: Smoking at casinos declines as COVID-19 and health concerns force casinos to re-evaluate policies
4/8/2021
Small Screen Staff: Top YouTube Channels for Casino Lovers
3/26/2021
7 Minute Miles: Brian Christopher Slots
3/16/2021
CDC Gaming Reports: Frank Floor Talk: What's a slot influencer?
2/27/2021
Best US Casinos: YouTube social media influencer designs casino's slots floor
2/26/2021
The Vegas Bash: YouTube slot room opens in downtown Las Vegas
2/19/2021
The Press-Enterprise: 5 construction and opening updates for Las Vegas
1/29/2021
Las Vegas Review-Journal: YouTube influencer Brian Christopher's slot area already a hit at Plaza
1/29/2021
Casino.org: Plaza Casino to open slot area with Brian Christopher, targets younger players
1/27/2021
Las Vegas Review-Journal: Slot machine influencer teaming up with Plaza on new gaming area
2020 Press Mentions
12/3/2020
The Toronto Star: Rude! This Burlington man became a YouTube sensation playing slots and it’s now his full-time job
11/6/2020
Press Enterprise: How to win slots and influence people
11/5/2020
Los Angeles Daily News: Southern California casinos welcome social media influencers who can bring in a crowd
10/14/2020
Virtual G2E: Property leaders discuss "the Scramble drill" in closing and reopening casino
9/16/2020
CDC Gaming Reports: Three casino operators to share COVID-19 reopening experiences for virtual G2E kick-off
8/19/2020
CDC Gaming Reports: 21 casinos. 9 states. 107 days. This player’s journey of staying COVID-19 free
7/22/2020
Comped Travel: Brian Christopher’s YouTube Channel takes “hand pay” to “paycheck”
7/20/2020
CDC Gaming Reports: Smoking ban would prove casinos want to protect health
6/26/2020
CDC Gaming Reports: Adams Analysis Q2 2020: Influencers and A New Spectator Sport
5/2/2020
Las Vegas Review-Journal: YouTube slot machine stars to help bring back Vegas tourists
5/10/2020
The Spokesman-Review: ‘We’re here, live in Idaho’: Well-known gambling YouTuber streams experience at reopened CdA Casino
The Toronto Star: Rude! This Burlington man became a YouTube sensation playing slots and it’s now his full-time job
11/6/2020
Press Enterprise: How to win slots and influence people
11/5/2020
Los Angeles Daily News: Southern California casinos welcome social media influencers who can bring in a crowd
10/14/2020
Virtual G2E: Property leaders discuss "the Scramble drill" in closing and reopening casino
9/16/2020
CDC Gaming Reports: Three casino operators to share COVID-19 reopening experiences for virtual G2E kick-off
8/19/2020
CDC Gaming Reports: 21 casinos. 9 states. 107 days. This player’s journey of staying COVID-19 free
7/22/2020
Comped Travel: Brian Christopher’s YouTube Channel takes “hand pay” to “paycheck”
7/20/2020
CDC Gaming Reports: Smoking ban would prove casinos want to protect health
6/26/2020
CDC Gaming Reports: Adams Analysis Q2 2020: Influencers and A New Spectator Sport
5/2/2020
Las Vegas Review-Journal: YouTube slot machine stars to help bring back Vegas tourists
5/10/2020
The Spokesman-Review: ‘We’re here, live in Idaho’: Well-known gambling YouTuber streams experience at reopened CdA Casino
Featured Articles
Las Vegas Sun
No more cherries and lemons: Technologically advanced slots appeal to younger crowd
by Bryan Horwath, Las Vegas Sun · February 6, 2022
No more cherries and lemons: Technologically advanced slots appeal to younger crowd
by Bryan Horwath, Las Vegas Sun · February 6, 2022
As he meandered through Red Rock Resort, Aaron Bettale gravitated toward a slot machine featuring animated video of stampeding buffaloes and explosions of gold coins, ringing bells and the refrain of a disembodied voice exclaiming, “Buffalo.”
“I like the flashy stuff,” Bettale, who is in his 20s, said as he examined the Buffalo Link machine. “I don’t like the ones that just have the three sevens.” For casino operators, gamblers like Bettale, who recently moved to Las Vegas from Colorado, represent the coveted young adult demographic. The hope is young players can be cultivated into lifelong casino patrons. The average age of U.S. casino customers declined from about 50 in 2019 to 43 last year, according to the American Gaming Association. And 25% of casino patrons were under age 29, the group noted. The trend can at least partly be attributed to the coronavirus pandemic, said Jon Hanlin, a senior vice president of commercial strategy and business analytics for slot manufacturer Aristocrat Gaming. After movie theaters, concert halls, nightclubs and other entertainment venues closed during the early months of the pandemic in 2020, casinos were some of the first to reopen, Hanlin said. “That created a new bubble of people who had never frequented casinos before,” Hanlin said. Sign-ups for casino players club cards have skyrocketed among 21- to 35-year-olds, he said.
Red Rock has recently introduced a number of games geared toward young adults, including a skills-based offering called Megamatch-Jelly Kingdom, a cross between a video game — similar to Candy Crush Saga — and a traditional slot machine. Jelly Kingdom, which is now on the casino floors at six Station Casinos properties, is made by an Australian company called Wymac Development. Sally Bernard, a Las Vegas local who works as vice president of business development for Wymac, said young people “are more interested in slot machines these days compared to before the pandemic.”
“There are many variables to understand slot demographic behavior and how and why things have changed over time. When looking at data over the last dozen years prior to COVID-19, it had been on a steady decline,” she said. Another Wymac skill-based game, Fortunes of the Brave-Dragon Forge, recently went through testing at Green Valley Ranch in Henderson, Bernard said. The game, which has a feature where players can create a customized character, is expected to be formally introduced later this year. Last year, Aristocrat shipped out slot machines based on the 2021 remake of the science fiction movie “Dune” to some Las Vegas casinos, Hanlin said. The game was released about the same time as the remake, creating a cross-promotion opportunity at some Station Casinos properties with theaters. “We noticed that people coming out of the movie were more likely to try the game out,” Hanlin said. “We tried to capture that younger segment with our ‘Dune’ machines.” “Something else that has driven a younger audience is the willingness of casinos to allow for filming on the floor,” said Hanlin, who has previously worked as a regional vice president of slots for Caesars Entertainment.
“When I was a casino operator, we’d tell people to put their phones down. That’s changed in the last three or four years,” Hanlin said. “People are filming and I can tell you they’re not posting anything about losing on social media. They’re posting about hitting jackpots. It creates a younger vibe.” Brian Christopher, a California resident and slots aficionado who runs a YouTube page with more than 450,000 subscribers, is one of the most well-known personalities in the slot machine social media world. Aristocrat welcomed Christopher last year to its Las Vegas complex to play the Buffalo Link game before it hit the casino floor. “Even just in the past year and a half, our audience has gotten a lot younger,” Christopher said. “The pandemic may have helped a little in the beginning when people just needed a place to go, but it’s more than that. Right now, it’s the male millennial that is driving the YouTube page and my videos.” Christopher said his YouTube channel, which features live game demonstrations and video blogs, can help familiarize people with the casino scene. He said certain casinos seemed to “get it” by having an active presence on social media channels, which can help to market to a younger demographic. In Las Vegas, he mentioned the Plaza and Cosmopolitan as being forward-thinking in that regard.
“My fans make the comment a lot that they try new games that we highlight,” Christopher said. “What we do is important in helping people understand what’s going on. It can be very overwhelming to sit at a slot machine that you’ve never played before. We’re no longer talking about a three-wheel game.” “There are fun and exciting games with fun and exciting bonuses,” Christopher said. “If I look at the games that my parents or grandparents played, they don’t excite me. Now, we’re always on our mobile devices or in front of a TV screen and these games match that.” Michael Green, an associate professor of history at UNLV who follows the region’s gaming industry, said technological advances in the presentation and complexity of slot machines have played a big role in attracting more millennial and Generation Z players.
“Younger people have grown accustomed to smartphones and devices on their wrists, and slots have advanced technologically too,” Green said. “I think back to when people used to stand there, pull a handle and watch a wheel spin and pop up cherry, cherry, lemon. The technology has advanced a lot.”
It seems hard to believe, but I’ve now been out of the casino industry almost six years. Being an old person, I still visit casinos on a regular basis (more on that age demographic thing later). I keep in touch with a number of my former colleagues and suppliers and get an occasional industry newsletter in my inbox from time to time. A recent one had a link to a story in the Las Vegas Review-Journal that I thought was super interesting: The Plaza downtown was opening an area of their slot floor dedicated to a YouTuber named Brian Christopher.
As a nerd, I’m normally pretty open to new gaming trends, but I never fully understood the desire to watch other people play video games on Twitch (and other services). To see that a major casino in Vegas was partnering with someone who records himself playing slot machines was surprising to me, given what I know about casino marketing and security. I started following the BC Slots channel on YouTube about a month ago and I have to admit I now understand the appeal.
So what’s this all about?
While there are probably hundreds of slot machine YouTubers out there now, what Brian Christopher has accomplished so far is impressive. The 40-year-old is originally from Toronto, moved to Los Angeles and now lives in Palm Springs (more on his backstory here). His branding appears to have changed over time – he owns BrianGambles.com and casinoswag.com, for example – and joined YouTube way back in 2006 (he went full-time with BC Slots in 2016).
As of March 2021, his videos have more than 222 million views, with 358,000 subscribers to his channel. His fans are called “Rudies” and he gets financial support from them via Patreon, where people can pay anywhere from $5 to $1200 a month, and from contributions during live chats. Other financial aspects of his business, including sponsorships and appearance fees, are not disclosed. His YouTube account was suspended briefly in 2018 (along with many other gaming channels), as documented in this story from The Atlantic.
Christopher has an appealing video presence (he was an actor before YouTube), with many catchphrases popular among the Rudies. Many of these end up on merchandise that he sells online. In addition to the partnership with The Plaza, he has hosted promotions with many regional casinos and at least one slot manufacturer (Aristocrat). He’s mentioned on recent videos that he attended the G2E conference, an industry trade show not open to the general public.
BC Slots has a small staff in Palm Springs and outsources aspects of the operation (video editing and social media management were specifically mentioned in an interview). Videos are posted daily to the YouTube channel, he does periodic live streams on YouTube and Facebook and has regular content on Instagram and Twitter as well. Assistant Britt appears in most videos, while his husband Marco makes less frequent appearances. Other routines include handing out free “lucky wristbands” to fans and hosting group pulls, where participants normally pay $200-$500 for a set amount of spins (usually on a high-limit machine).
So what is my take on all of this from the perspective of a former casino operator? My initial reaction was “there is no way security would allow this to happen” in Minnesota. Casino security guards are notorious for yelling at people who take pictures on their slot floors (let alone video). On one of his old blog posts, Christopher lists casinos he has visited (including several in Las Vegas that he said were rude and that he would never return to <cough>Caesar’s Palace<cough>). My guess is that those visits involved security getting involved before marketing knew what was going on.
Getting back to the age demographic thing, the entire time I worked in the casino industry, leaders and pundits were afraid of the aging demographic. All the best players were getting older and dying off and there was this constant fear of trying to appeal to younger generations. I always felt this was a little misplaced, because 1) your older players still have a lot of money and 2) younger people will get older and want to eventually do some of these same things. The success of BC Slots (and other gaming YouTubers) show that younger players can get interested in these “traditional” games just like their parents (and grandparents). What will be interesting to see is if the casinos decide to start producing this content themselves. The videos are a great way to train players on new games and generate excitement that can drive future visits.
I love the production value of the videos that Christopher produces. He doesn’t edit out the losses and only show bonuses and jackpots (although I think he does project a luckier-than-average overall image). I also applaud him using his platform to promote causes like Smoke Free Casinos, an effort I’ve long supported (and which may finally get some traction post-pandemic). The partnership with The Plaza is very clever – the section has his favorite games, you can watch videos of him winning jackpots on those games and you can earn your own lucky wristband with 100 points of play in that area. Another recent promotion gave $100 in free play to the first 300 people that mentioned his name in Palm Springs (all were gone the first day). It’s also great that he has a link to NCPG in every video.
So what’s not to like? Security directors will surely see many more copycats try to film without permission. In general, I’d like to see those policies change anyways – from a marketing standpoint, it’s important that guests can share images and videos of them having fun. It’s good for the guest and good for the casinos. I think we are mostly beyond the days of people not wanting to be pictured at a casino (which is not to say guest privacy isn’t important). There are also copyright issues with filming in a casino for profit – some of his videos have to be edited to conceal logos from clothes or mute a song playing in the background. Seems like most of the slot manufacturers are good with their intellectual property being shared and promoted (although I wonder if that will change if some games start to get bad publicity).
The other issue I have with BC Slots is bet size and disclosure. Personally, I’ve always been a minimum bet slot player who likes to maximize time on machine (it is, after all, entertainment). It rubs me the wrong way that BC highlights max betting in all his videos and tends to make light of those that don’t follow suit. While casinos love max bet players, the majority of people can’t afford it and shouldn’t gamble that way. Granted, videos with $25 spins are much more exciting to watch than those with 40-cent spins, but I think it’s unfair if there is no disclosure that some (or all) of that play is coming from the house. From his FAQ page:
How much money do you gamble with & where do you get it from? Well money is a delicate subject as it’s very personal. I will say however that I am very smart with money. I strictly use an entertainment budget to play with and understand how slot machines work (more on that below). Also a lot of my money gets recycled from previous trips and the key is knowing when to CASH OUT. And just like I don’t ask or know how much my sister and brother make at their jobs, I’m not going to get into finances with complete strangers either 😉
It’s a whole lot easier to do ten pulls on a $100 slot machine if that $1000 was given to you by the casino, no?
That said, I do enjoy watching these videos and will likely continue to do so.
Time will tell if it changes the way I play in real life or not. I did try a few new games on my last casino trip based on things I had seen in the videos (although definitely not at those same denomination and bet levels). I think it would also be really interesting if someone compiled statistics/analytics on his videos (index of games played, amounts won/lost, bonuses hit).
In my opinion, there is an amazing lack of information on slot machines online that makes it hard for people to learn about what games they would like (volatility, best odds, payouts, rules). That is probably the biggest benefit to casinos from YouTubers like this – people can see how the games are played before they risk their own money. Hmm…maybe there is a new side hustle in my future…
Las Vegas Review-Journal
Wheel of Fortune still top slot 25 years later
by Richard N Velotta, Las Vegas Review-Journal · August 5, 2021
You hear it all the time across the casino, the siren’s call to come play. Wheel … of … Fortune!
The game’s sound effects, tones and melodies peeled from the popular television game show are just one of the reasons IGT’s most popular slot machine has endured for 25 years. Since June 15 and over the next several months through Dec. 1, the company is observing “25 Weeks of Wheel of Fortune,” a silver anniversary tribute to the brand that includes special giveaways through the Wheel Facebook page. IGT says Wheel of Fortune marked the first licensed slot machine brand and is a forerunner for many more themed games featuring prominent movies, television shows and celebrities. And while Wheel of Fortune has a big visual impact on the casino floor with its 250 different game variations — some of them in cabinets that are more than 11 feet tall — it’s the sounds they make that seem to keep fans coming back.
Wheel zone
“You can’t walk across a casino floor without hearing it,” said Boris Hallerbach, IGT’s director of product management for premium products in Reno. “It’s like the games are calling out to the players.” That’s the same impression Plaza CEO Jonathan Jossel has. The downtown property has the Wheel of Fortune Slots Zone where a mix of different variations of the machine are grouped together. “It’s iconic,” Jossel said. “It’s the sound of the game, everyone knows those noises of the Wheel of Fortune game, whether you hear them in the airport or in the casino. It’s the first sound you hear when you get to Las Vegas and the last sound you hear when you leave. It’s almost synonymous with Vegas, that Wheel of Fortune song and the sound of those reels.” But those sounds traveled a lengthy path to get to the casino floor. By Hallerbach’s account, it began when former IGT Chairman Charles Mathewson attended an awards dinner and by “happy accident” sat next to an executive from Sony Pictures Television. During the dinner, they chatted about the potential of teaming to develop a game show collaboration on a slot machine. It wasn’t a slam-dunk deal. In 1996, when the details were being worked out, gaming still carried a stigma. “Getting an entertainment and television company to consider their content on slot machines was a little difficult,” Hallerbach said. “Sensitivity to how we represented the slot game and the experience was important and we wanted to have some separation from the television show and the slot machine.” While 1996 is acknowledged as the year Wheel of Fortune was born, a significant development occurred a decade earlier that eventually would create much of Wheel’s success.
Wide-area progressive jackpots
IGT introduced wide-area progressive jackpots, essentially linking machines from a broad area that feed money into one prize pool. IGT introduced the concept with another king of the slot floor, Megabucks. Ten years later, Wheel of Fortune would borrow the wide-area progressive system, assuring that some of the game’s biggest winners would become millionaires. The earliest Wheel of Fortune game that came out didn’t even have a wheel. It was just a three-reeled mechanical-reel nickel slot game with the game-show theme.
Anchor’s role
Around that time, a small Las Vegas company, Anchor Gaming, had a patented wheel that was a perfect fit to incorporate into Wheel of Fortune play. Anchor made slot games, including its Wheel of Gold, and operated casinos in Cripple Creek and Black Hawk, Colorado, and a tribal casino in California. But its biggest contribution to the industry was supplying the wheel that made Wheel of Fortune famous. IGT at first leased the rights to use the wheel. But in 2001, IGT had grown to a dominating international presence and acquired Anchor in a stock deal for $1.1 billion, forming, at the time, Nevada’s largest publicly traded company. “We used that wheel from Anchor in the process and created the game that combined the Wheel of Fortune brand with strong IGT base games like Double Diamond and created something that really struck a positive nerve with players,” Hallerbach said. “It was the first brand in slots and people with their familiarity with the show on television every night I think had an instant affinity to the Wheel of Fortune slot game.” With the popularity of the Wheel slot and the TV show climbing, IGT’s network of studios began inventing variations of the game that turned out to be as popular as the earliest versions. IGT introduced the video version of Wheel in 2001. As technology improved, IGT added more pay lines and mixed in more denominations for play, attracting a wider audience for the game. In 2006, IGT introduced the “Wheel of Fortune Super Spin,” a vehicle to get more people to the game’s bonus features faster. In 2009, thanks to those wide-area progressive jackpots, Wheel delivered its largest jackpot of all time, $14.4 million, to a gambler in Biloxi, Mississippi. Cabinets and displays got bigger for the game. Some versions had seats for multiple players. The graphics got crisper and more realistic. When IGT first promoted its True 3D screen products in 2016, the TV show’s Vanna White met and took pictures with people attending the Global Gaming Expo trade show in Las Vegas that year. She received the ceremonial Key to the City of Las Vegas as part of the celebration.
MegaTower arrives
IGT followed with the Wheel of Fortune MegaTower, standing just over 11 feet tall, in 2017, and in 2018, the company introduced a new visual element of the game, True 4D, in which elements of the game seemingly jump off the video screen and into the player’s lap. A total 250 different variations of the game currently are offered, and today players can sit down and play while the voices of host Pat Sajak along with co-host and letter-turner Vanna White interact with them. Players might also hear Jim Thornton, the television show’s announcer, whose voice also appears on Wheel slot games. For proprietary reasons, IGT officials won’t say how many Wheel of Fortune games are installed on casino floors across North America where the game is most popular, but Nick Khin, IGT’s chief operating officer for gaming, said it’s in the thousands. “Players are very loyal to the product; they trust the game because it’s been on casino floors for so long,” Khin said. “They’re very comfortable with it and many players have a relationship with the game that goes back a long time. Players will come to the casino specifically looking for that game.” The sounds, the progressive jackpots and the familiarity of the game has enabled Wheel of Fortune to develop a diverse player base. Another way IGT keeps Wheel in front of people is through lottery tickets. IGT is one of the largest worldwide operators of lottery games. In the United States, the company sells lottery tickets in 25 states. West of the Mississippi River, they can be bought in Oregon, Idaho, Arizona, New Mexico, Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri, Minnesota and Texas.
Social media influencer
Possibly the most recognizable Wheel of Fortune slot machine player in the country is social media influencer Brian Christopher, a Toronto actor who moved to Southern California to try to make it in Hollywood and ended up becoming a YouTube sensation. “One day, I posted a couple of funny videos of me gambling and those videos ended up going viral,” Christopher said of the birth of bcslots.com and his company, BC Slots. Christopher travels around the country, mostly in the Southwest, and comes to Las Vegas several times a year, making YouTube videos of him playing and explaining slot machines. “I show how you win, how you lose and the excitement of just playing,” he said. He admits the variations of Wheel of Fortune are his favorites and notes that when he produces a livestream of him playing, one of his more than 500,000 fans invariably ask him to play a Wheel game. As much as possible, he obliges. “I think we all grew up with Wheel of Fortune at home and the excitement around it,” he said. “It was always a family game and something all ages could all enjoy together. I think everyone’s dream is to spin the wheel. Now you have a chance to do that in the casino. “Honestly, spinning wheels is always an exciting part of any slot machine, so when you mix the two things together you get this amazing game,” Christopher said. “And, of course, we’ve all come to love Vanna White and you see her in a lot of the newer games, interacting with the guests. There’s always the excitement of maybe this will be the one spin where I hit it big.” Christopher started off playing the low-denomination Wheel games and branched out as he became more financially stable with the sale of BC Slots merchandise on his website — hats, T-shirts, sweatshirts, lucky wristbands and, more recently, masks. A few years ago, Christopher was in the middle of a livestream when he won $10,000 playing Wheel of Fortune. He duplicated the feat in June while playing at Park MGM, a new favorite for him because he’s become an advocate for smoke-free casinos. When Plaza’s Jossel had Christopher on as a guest on his “On the Corner of Main Street” podcast, Christopher was asked what the future held for BC Slots and he half jokingly suggested that a resort produce a Brian Christopher-themed hotel room or slot machine area. Jossel took him up on the idea and produced an area in the Plaza casino — smoke-free, of course — that features Christopher’s favorite slot games. The only thing missing is a Wheel of Fortune game, but that’s OK with him because Plaza’s Wheel of Fortune Zone is right near him on the floor.
What’s next?
So what’s next for the nation’s most popular slot machine? Right now, IGT is enjoying the attention of the “25 Weeks of Wheel of Fortune” promotion that ends Dec. 1. IGT’s studios are working to come up with more game variations. “For 25 years, IGT has artfully captured the fun, excitement and authenticity of the Wheel of Fortune brand through its world-class Wheel of Fortune Slots portfolio,” said Suzanne Prete, Sony Pictures Television’s senior vice president of global licensing and brand management. “Wheel of Fortune Slots’ jackpot-paying legacy and capacity to entertain people across diverse generations, geographies and channels perfectly align with the global Wheel of Fortune brand.” Asked about the prospect of developing a skill-based game that involves solving a Wheel of Fortune word puzzle as they do on the game show, Hallenbach and Khin said there are no plans in the works — but Christopher thought it would be a cool feature if it could be done.
CDC Gaming Reports
NIGA Tradeshow: Influencers can generate buzzworthy events for casinos
by Rege Behe, CDC Gaming Reports · July 22, 2021
NIGA Tradeshow: Influencers can generate buzzworthy events for casinos
by Rege Behe, CDC Gaming Reports · July 22, 2021
Brian Christopher and Lucky Lady HQ are sought-after casino guests. They aren’t whales who gamble enormous amounts of money or valued patrons who frequently visit properties. Christopher and Lady Luck – whose real name is Francine Maric – bring something equally, if not more valuable, to casino properties.
“They’ve got a lot of followers, they’re interactive, they’re talking to people, and most importantly for casinos, they’re gamers,” said Justin Shank, owner of Shank Marketing Services Wednesday during the panel discussion “The Marketing of Influence” at the Indian Gaming Tradeshow & Convention in Las Vegas. “They’re people who play casino games, with people interacting with them, watching them.”
Christopher’s YouTube channel has more than 407,000 subscribers, known as Rudies, who watch him play slots at the more than 100 casinos he’s visited. When he started five years ago, Christopher had to beg casinos to permit him to film live events.
“More and more, they’re reaching out to us,” he said, noting casinos now help him set up livestreams, meet-and-greets, and other events at their properties. “We just work with them on whatever their needs are to make sure they’re comfortable with what we’re doing.”
Maric quit her day job in April 2021 to devote herself fulltime to her Lady Luck HQ channels on YouTube and Instagram. A high-stakes player, her average bet range is $50-$100. Maric’s audience is 70 percent male and between 21 and 60 years old, with 50 percent from countries outside the U.S.
“I’m super-excited about it,” Maric said.
Shanks says the most popular influencers, including Christopher and Maric, can command fees between $5,000 and $20,000, to appear at a property. That might seem like an exorbitant amount of money to watch someone play a slot machine (Maric sometimes plays table games), but Shank says the content that influencers produce on their channels essentially stays online forever.
“It’s the same as if you’re hosting a comedian or any other type of entertainment on site,” Shank said. “This is an entertainment value you’re adding to your property floor. It’s kind of the marriage between influencers as an advertising element and as well as a promotional element for the property, one that will directly equate to bigger numbers on the gaming floor while they’re there.”
Last August, as gaming operators were reopening properties after being closed during the COVID pandemic, Christopher appeared at one of Shank’s client casinos. As soon as he entered the casino, Christopher drew a huge crowd.
“We’ve become so popular that when we do livestreams, so many fans rush to the casino, we actually do viewing parties now in the casino in a separate room with big screens,” Christopher says, noting his meet-and-greets often attract 200 fans, with more trying to get in.
Moderator Julia Carcamo, president of the casino marketing and consulting agency J. Carcamo and Associates, said because many influencers will sign up devotees through their own channels, they can provide the names of fans, and perhaps player card numbers, to gaming operators.
“You can immediately create a group to start tracking (players),” she said. “My recommendation would be to have ambassador cards and to be ready to card people you may not have information on. It’s a very trackable investment.”
Influencers also can pay dividends through social media campaigns. Shank says hosting casinos can create a buzz via Facebook, Instagram or other channels prior to appearances of popular and photogenic influencers such as Christopher or Maric.
The other good thing about influencers it that, unlike a band or comedian, they don’t need a lot of equipment or personnel.
“They’ve got their own camera equipment, they’ve got their people, and they’ve got their own style,” Shank says. “Everybody has their own way of doing things. Being self-contained means you have to put less people on the floor. It’s not a like a big concert where you have to staff it up massively.”
CDC Gaming Reports
Nonsmoking advocates insist smoking bans are good for casinos
by Rege Behe, CDC Gaming Reports · April 28, 2021
CDC Gaming Reports
Nonsmoking advocates insist smoking bans are good for casinos
by Rege Behe, CDC Gaming Reports · April 28, 2021
Mayor LaToya Cantrell of New Orleans was a councilwoman six years ago when she led an effort to ban smoking in casinos, bars, and restaurants in the city. Everywhere she went Cantrell was told that there was no way the measure would pass.
Instead, the New Orleans Smoke-Free Air Act passed by a 7-0 vote.
“We had the courage to stand up for our musicians who were saying their lungs were their instruments,” Cantrell said during a Wednesday conference call hosted by Americans for Nonsmokers’ Rights. “We stood up for restaurants and bars and casinos, people who said we shouldn’t have to die to earn an honest living.”
In New Orleans, the indoor smoking ban affected just one casino – Harrah’s New Orleans – the only property operating within the city limits. Harrah’s created an outside smoking plaza for its customers.
Cantrell was one of several advocates who insist that nonsmoking casinos are not an impediment to the operators’ bottom lines, and are a boon to the health of employees. ANR President and CEO Cynthia Hallett said that because most brick-and-mortar casinos eliminated smoking because of health mandates during the COVID-19 pandemic, now is the time to continue those policies.
“We are urging casinos to keep these policies in place, even once the pandemic is behind us,” Hallett said.
Casinos have long resisted pleas to ban smoking, fearing they will alienate smokers. But according to slot influencer Brian Christopher, CEO of BC Slots who has more than 700,000 followers on his YouTube channel, those fears are misplaced. BC Slots surveyed its club members, and 19% of respondents were smokers.
“But a majority of them preferred nonsmoking casinos,” Christopher said, adding that 95% of all respondents stated a preference for nonsmoking casinos.
At least one casino that has banned smoking has no regrets. In November 2014, Ho-Chunk Casino Madison in Wisconsin decided to survey club members about their smoking preferences. The results were surprising.
“Gambling and smoking seemed to go hand in hand, but what we found out was 70% of our clientele was in favor of us going smoke-free,” said Missy Tracy, municipal relations coordinator for the casino.
Ho-Chunk went smoke-free in August 2015, and revenues “took a nice big dip,” Tracy said. “But by the fifteenth month, we exceeded revenue and we became our nation’s flagship casino. … Our headcount went down, but our coin in went up.”
Tracy added it’s also been easier to recruit new employees, many of whom are millennials who prefer to work in a non-smoking environment.
CDC Gaming Reports
Smoking at casinos declines as COVID-19 and health concerns force casinos to re-evaluate policies
by Rege Behe, CDC Gaming Reports · April 8, 2021
Smoking at casinos declines as COVID-19 and health concerns force casinos to re-evaluate policies
by Rege Behe, CDC Gaming Reports · April 8, 2021
Casino operators have long been resistant to banning smoking indoors, wary of alienating a segment of gamblers who prefer to light up while playing slots, blackjack, or other games. But in 2015, Ho-Chunk Gaming Madison in Wisconsin decided to go non-smoking. Shortly after the prohibition was enacted, executive manager Dan Brown was talking to a colleague outside the casino when a car arrived. A woman exited the vehicle and the driver started yelling, waving a pack of cigarettes at Brown. “He said, 'I will never be back,’ and literally just peeled out of the parking lot,” Brown says, laughing. “There were people who were pretty outspoken about it, but what was really encouraging were the number of comment cards thanking us.”
For the last three years, Brown says Ho-Chunk has set record revenue numbers. With the COVID-19 pandemic causing many brick-and-mortar casinos to enact smoking bans due to state-mandated health and safety restrictions, the long debate about smoking in casinos appears to have reached a turning point.
In a recent partner call, Brian King of the Centers for Disease Control’s Office on Smoking and Health said that the pandemic “resulted in an increase in smokefree casino adoption” at more than 200 commercial and tribal casinos. “With these policies that were decided during a time of closure, the benefit is that it allows these casinos that were already doing extensive cleaning for safety to reopen smoke free and really maximize that sense of having a safe, clean environment,” said Bronson Frick, the director of advocacy for the nonprofit groups Americans for Nonsmokers Rights and the Americans Nonsmokers Rights Foundation Incorporated in 1984, the ANR produces programs that advocate for the prevention of harmful effects of secondhand smoke and smoking among youth and adults. Gaming operators, in efforts to address concerns about second-hand smoke, have long implemented measures to placate nonsmokers.But according to Frick, the inherent problem with designated smoking areas, smoking rooms, and ventilation systems is simple: They don’t work. “They don’t stop the smoke from spreading and none of those approaches address the health hazard of second-hand smoke,” Frick says.
While gaming customers can ostensibly make attempts to avoid smoking areas, casino workers have little choice if they are assigned to work in smoking sections. Workers can lobby employers to work in non-smoking sections, but sometimes they have no recourse.Indoor smoking, Frick says, can be a detriment to “recruiting a talented, diverse workforce. But more importantly to retaining those workers once they onboard, particularly younger workers who were maybe recruited by their friends. Nobody wants to work in a smoking section.” Brown notes the Ho-Chunk smoking ban was enacted after considering the makeup of its future customer base. According to the CDC, only 8% of adults between 18 and 24 smoke, compared to 16.7 adults ages 25-44, and 17% of adults between 45 and 64.
“We have to be looking to the future and what kind of market are we going to try to cultivate,” Brown says. “At the time we enacted the ban the millennials were the hot ticket, and that’s an active group, they’re outdoors doing things, they’re into healthy lifestyles. It was a very conscious decision to be sure that we keep them in mind in terms of tomorrow’s market segment.” But do patrons want to eliminate smoking? According to Brian Christopher, the founder of BC Slots and, a slots influencer who has a slots room named after him at the Plaza Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, the answer is an unequivocal yes. Christopher collaborated with ANR to develop a survey that gauges how slots players feel about gambling. “We wanted to find out the truth, because most casinos don’t make that effort,” Christopher says. “They literally just walk in their own casinos and see smoke, so they think everyone is smoking.”
The results of the survey include:
· 70% of gamblers admit they are bothered by smoking in casinos
· 95% of respondents think smoking is a health hazard
· 88% of smokers would choose a non-smoking casino over a smoking casino, provided there was an outdoor option, such as a smoking patio
While only 13% of U.S. citizens smoke, it skews slightly higher with gamblers, with 19% admitting they smoke. But that still means 81% of casino patrons don’t smoke. Christopher says the pandemic has forced casino operators to reassess their commitment to customer safety. The installation of high-tech HVAC systems, air purifiers, and mask requirements are welcome developments. But one more step is needed. “If safety was their No. 1 priority, there would be no smoking,” Christopher said, adding he especially feels bad for casino employees working in smoking sections. “I just came back from being at a smoking casino for five days and I’ve been coughing now for two weeks. It’s just not good, and working in it has got to be a lot worse for (employees).”
Rege Behe is lead contributor to CDC Gaming Reports. He can be reached at rbehe@cdcgaming.com. Please follow @RegeBehe_exPTR on Twitter.
Small Screen
Top YouTube Channels for Casino Lovers
by Small Screen Staff · July 22, 2021
It isn’t uncommon for people to look to YouTubers when they need to learn more about a specific area of interest. You’ll find lots of fantastic resources for casinos if you are a fan of gambling video content. Obviously, most of the content will be about famous non-UK casinos similar to ones you can find on NonGamStopBets. However, it takes a lot of thorough searches to spot the best out of the lot. Here are the top YouTube channels for casino lovers:
BRIAN CHRISTOPHER
Brian Christopher is the host of the top-rated BCSlots DAILY YouTube channel, and you will find every single episode useful if you enjoy slot games. As a social media influencer whose video content revolves around the fun and highly rewarding world of the casino, Brian has more than 155,000 subscribers and records over 92 million views on every video. Brian has been a Forbes article subject, but it is fun to know he only started the YouTube channel as a hobby in 2016.
At the time, he was still a Hollywood actor. Once he realized that his subscriber count had begun to grow, he finally gave up his day job and fully committed to his channel. Much of his channel’s success is attributed to the fact that he posts his videos daily, but that’s not to dismiss their brilliance in any way. Travelling across the United States, Christopher Brian’s content primarily shows live streams of him visiting various casinos, losing, winning, and reacting in his trademark manner. He’s really great at what he does that he now has a fan club, who call themselves the Rudies.
VEGASLOWROLLER
Look past the funny name, and visit this YouTube channel with more than 80,000 subscribers. VegasLowRoller is one hugely popular YouTube personality who offers excellent content. His videos have an estimated combined view count of about 51 million, which tells so much about their quality. Based in Las Vegas, this channel is focused on his love affair with casino slots (popularly known as the one-armed bandit or fruit machine). He often travels around the many casinos in the city, filming his juicy wins and sharing them with everyone who cares to follow his channel. Although he calls himself a low roller, he’s still very successful, and that makes his content ideal for anyone who loves slots and needs the motivation to try a couple.
AMERICAN CASINO GUIDE
If the American Casino Guide sounds familiar, it’s because it has been published every year since 1992 and has been the number one bestselling publication in America on the subject of gambling and casinos. It has a very famous YouTube channel counterpart, with more than 85,000 subscribers and nearly 29 million regular views. Author Steve Bourie runs this YouTube channel, and it provides viewers with useful strategies and tips on how to be a super, more intelligent gambler, touching everything from baccarat to poker.
Poker is possibly the most loved and renowned gambling game, and a few historians claim it dates as far back as a 10th-century Chinese emperor! On the other hand, baccarat is a simple casino game where you get to draw three cards and place a bet on whether the dealer or you will be favoured. Covering every aspect of the play in a detailed manner is a very useful channel for players who want to play for real soon.
ROCKNROLLA’S GAMBLING CHANNEL
Although his choice of language is quite colourful and may not be the perfect choice for a more conservative player, this remains one YouTube personality who knows how to carry his viewers along with him as he experiences every high and low. Engaging, genuine, knowledgeable, and never attempting to avoid betting it all, his channel is a perfect place for some fantastic viewing.
SO, WHY SHOULD YOU WATCH IT?
Some people can easily feel an aversion to entitling other’s to success simply for doing what they enjoy. But while the YouTube high rollers live every day to share videos of themselves doing just that, you can’t deny the fact that their win count both in views and in their game is impressive. Plus, there’s a boatload of varied content out there with a dedication to a casino that it can’t be cake work to make the top ranks the way these guys have done.
However, it’s super easy to see how dedicated they are to what they do and how much knowledge they want to share with viewers with their engaging and honest presentational styles. Many other YouTubers put in a lot of work to create and deliver fantastic casino content, but these are a few of the ones you can bet your bottom dollar on.
CDC Gaming Reports
Frank Floor Talk: What's a slot influencer?
by Buddy Frank, CDC Gaming Reports · March 16, 2021
Frank Floor Talk: What's a slot influencer?
by Buddy Frank, CDC Gaming Reports · March 16, 2021
What skills do you need to become one of the well-known and highly paid folks in the casino industry? How about acting, filmmaking, driving for Uber and playing slot machines?
That’s what Brian Christopher did, and now he’s one of most important folks in all of gaming. But, he’s not a CEO, CFO or ‘C” anything. He’s not even a “whale host.” He’s a “slot influencer,” and that category is quickly becoming one of our most important positions.
If you haven’t heard of Christopher and other slot influencers, you’re not alone. But you are also not an avid slot player or a progressive marketing pro. In your defense, this narrow profession is truly in its infancy. But not in importance. That’s why marketing consultant Julia Carcamo recently created a virtual series of eight webinars events titled “Winning Influencer Marketing.” The sessions are part of J. Carcamo & Associates’ “Casino Marketing Boot Camp,” exploring new and established techniques.
As this story was written, they’ve canned five webinars on “Marketing Influencers” and featured Christopher himself on the week of March 18th.
While the term may be new, the idea of using celebrities or personalities to pitch products is not. Mark Twain hawked fountain pens in the late 1890s. Doris Day lent her name to steamrollers for International Harvester in the 1960s. And today George Clooney is the front man for Nespresso.
You’d probably never heard of Salton electric grills until they decided to pay George Foreman a staggering $200M over the years to pitch what has now become the hottest-selling appliance ever, the “George Foreman Grill.”
But using celebrities to promote casinos has been limited. To highlight the opening of the Melco Crown casino on Macau’s Cotai Strip in 2014, the owners paid Robert DeNiro and Leonardo DiCaprio $13M to do a promotional film directed by Martin Scorsese. But that was a rare event.
It’s the internet that has taken things to a whole new level in almost every industry, including ours. Ryan Kahi, who is still in elementary school, is a “toy influencer” known as just “Ryan” to his 28.9 million YouTube subscribers. Forbes pegged his annual salary at $26M. Did I mention he is nine and still in elementary school?!
But he’s nothing compared to “PewDiePie.” His real name is Felix Kjellberg. He started his professional career as a hot dog salesman. Today he makes nearly $60 million a year as a “video game influencer.” That works out to just under $29,000/hour, or just slightly above the federal minimum wage of $7.25.
While Brian Christopher is not in PewDiePie’s league, he is the Number One slot influencer today. He has 350,000 subscribers on YouTube and another 275,000 fans on Facebook. Most importantly, those subscribers watch because they love slot machines. They subscribe because they want to learn about the latest slot games, how bonuses work; and they want to be part of the “reality show” that is Brian’s casino adventures. In contrast, it is doubtful that any of PewDiePie’s or Ryan’s fans will ever be visiting your casino (at least not for a decade or two).
In a recent “LV Review Journal” article, Jonathan Jossel, the CEO at the Plaza Casino in downtown Las Vegas, said, “Social media has transformed the casino experience, and we are very excited to partner with Brian on this unique space that I know our guests will enjoy.” They had such confidence in Christopher’s prestige that they dedicated an entire section of their floor to him. “For years, my fans have been asking which games were my favorite, and now I finally have a place where they can experience it for themselves,” Christopher said in a Plaza news release. “The new ‘Brian Christopher Slots’ at the Plaza is like having my own miniature casino. I hand-selected the games that represent everything I love about playing slot machines.”
It’s not just casinos that are on board. The game makers (the manufacturers of slot machines) are perhaps even bigger fans of slot influencers. Meghan Sleik, Director of Partnership Marketing and Communications at Aristocrat, said on a recent “Boot Camp” panel that the pandemic shutdowns last spring brought a new appreciation of the slot influencers that went both ways.
“The influencers were virtually out of content since all the casinos were shutdown. So, we opened our showrooms to them. While there was no money at risk, they (the influencers) did get to play the new games that we’re going to launch upon re-openings.” She added that it also helped them internally, “With the input from the influencers, we were able to keep our R&D department and game designers busy with good input about what was working and what was not.”
Interestingly, in the world of influencers and camera-equipped cell phones, she said that game designers often think about giving players the time to get out their phones when big bonuses are about to happen. That wasn’t even a design consideration a few years ago.
On the same panel, Daria Wu, the Slot Director at the Golden Nugget in Las Vegas, said it is important to train your staff to assist the influencers. While everyone on the panel had stories about security officers evicting slot influencers attempting to film slots back in the early days, the problems now, she said, are more related to handling the crowds and onlookers that accompany their live sessions. “With COVID-19 restrictions in place, we wanted to make sure that everyone is following the proper guidelines and that the live sessions reflect that.”
Jay Ellenberger, the Director of Casino Operations at Oregon’s Seven Feathers Hotel & Casino, added, “We needed to manage people and their spacing to make sure we placed the influencers in the right areas.”
All seven of the panelists in the “Influencer Marketing” webinar titled “The Slots & Operations Experts” agreed that, at first, they had no idea just how popular some of these folks were. They were surprised at the crowds they could draw just to watch and be a small part of someone else’s slot playing experience.
Each of them also stressed the importance of educating their team to be prepared for this new age of digital captures with good lighting, sound and, especially, the availability of high-speed internet on the casino floor.
There’s also a lot of work behind making it all happen in an entertaining way. “My friends are shocked by my success. I mean, all I do is play slot machines,” Christopher says, “What they don’t see is that managing a massive YouTube Channel is a full-time job, and I have had to hire a talented Editor and a hard-working Social Media Manager, just to keep up! I’m not complaining though, I love what I do – I was born to be online.”
He produces a dozen videos a week, each viewed by an average audience of 300,000. And it’s not just a Las Vegas thing. He says that 25% of his audience is international, including Canada (Christopher’s original home) as well as Australia and New Zealand.
There are several other prominent influencers with similar formats and impressive crowds of followers. Scott Richter from Colorado is also known as “Raja” on his “Big Jackpot” channel. He, too, celebrated 300,000 subscribers recently.
Sarah, aka the “Slotlady,” is another slot influencer approaching 200,000 followers. Recently, she has made some joint appearances with Christopher. Unlike Brian, she only uses her first name and seldom shares much about her personal life. The same goes for “NG Slot” out of Los Angeles who doesn’t share his real name but has also racked up 200,000 or more subscribers.
One reason reviewers praise Christopher as the industry’s best is that, despite a similar number of followers as others, Brian shares almost everything about his life. His videos are truly a casino version of a reality show. “My Dad doesn’t play slots at all, but he watches all my videos to learn more about what I’m doing and where I’m going. I don’t mean that we don’t talk and share privately, it’s just that he hears more about my adventures day-to-day on the slot videos.”
If it sounds like he’s been doing this for years, you’d be right. But only for five years. He began by simply watching random videos online shot by various players because he wanted to learn more about slots. With his background in filmmaking, he realized he could do a better job than what he saw at the time. It only took about a month before he made more money with the videos than he did with his day job as an aspiring actor/Uber driver.
He learned quickly. Aristocrat’s Sleilk said its almost embarrassing that, “I sometimes feel that the slot influencers know more about how our games work than many of us who work here.”
It’s the education element that earns praise from many casino operators. Ellenberger praised Christopher and other influencers for teaching his own staff about slots. “We cover the basics in orientation, but they can learn so much more by watching the videos.”
How do influencers make their money? According to Christopher, advertisers using his site are the biggest source of his income. Surprisingly, it’s not casinos or slot makers placing the majority of the ads. Using Google’s artificial intelligence algorithms, the ads will be unique for each user depending on their own “likes.” If you are a fan of both slots and ukuleles, you might find ads on “BC Slots” for ukulele lessons. Likewise, you may find commercials for cosmetics, air compressors, QVC or NFL football depending on what, and where, you’ve searched online in the past.
Christopher also sells a lot of merchandise, most of it with the brand “Rude.” To quote from the fan page, “The Rudies Club is a private group of people who have a common interest and love for gambling and especially my channel, Brian Christopher Slots, on YouTube. The name itself was voted on by its members and chosen based on my regular use of the catchphrase ‘RUDE’.” Accordingly, Christopher sells t-shirts, hoodies, ‘lucky’ wrist bands, bumper stickers and the like.
So how do you decide if Raja or Sarah or Brian or another influencer would be the right one to help you build brand awareness at your casino? Sleik says there are two important points in making that evaluation:
If there’s a good match, an influencer could be a positive force in your future revenue growth.
Stories abound that even table games players and/or video poker fans with little past interest in traditional slots were “converted” after just a few exposures to these YouTube stars.
So forget GM or CFO. The quickest way to fame and fortune in the casino world may be to spread a little influence on the slot floor.
That’s what Brian Christopher did, and now he’s one of most important folks in all of gaming. But, he’s not a CEO, CFO or ‘C” anything. He’s not even a “whale host.” He’s a “slot influencer,” and that category is quickly becoming one of our most important positions.
If you haven’t heard of Christopher and other slot influencers, you’re not alone. But you are also not an avid slot player or a progressive marketing pro. In your defense, this narrow profession is truly in its infancy. But not in importance. That’s why marketing consultant Julia Carcamo recently created a virtual series of eight webinars events titled “Winning Influencer Marketing.” The sessions are part of J. Carcamo & Associates’ “Casino Marketing Boot Camp,” exploring new and established techniques.
As this story was written, they’ve canned five webinars on “Marketing Influencers” and featured Christopher himself on the week of March 18th.
While the term may be new, the idea of using celebrities or personalities to pitch products is not. Mark Twain hawked fountain pens in the late 1890s. Doris Day lent her name to steamrollers for International Harvester in the 1960s. And today George Clooney is the front man for Nespresso.
You’d probably never heard of Salton electric grills until they decided to pay George Foreman a staggering $200M over the years to pitch what has now become the hottest-selling appliance ever, the “George Foreman Grill.”
But using celebrities to promote casinos has been limited. To highlight the opening of the Melco Crown casino on Macau’s Cotai Strip in 2014, the owners paid Robert DeNiro and Leonardo DiCaprio $13M to do a promotional film directed by Martin Scorsese. But that was a rare event.
It’s the internet that has taken things to a whole new level in almost every industry, including ours. Ryan Kahi, who is still in elementary school, is a “toy influencer” known as just “Ryan” to his 28.9 million YouTube subscribers. Forbes pegged his annual salary at $26M. Did I mention he is nine and still in elementary school?!
But he’s nothing compared to “PewDiePie.” His real name is Felix Kjellberg. He started his professional career as a hot dog salesman. Today he makes nearly $60 million a year as a “video game influencer.” That works out to just under $29,000/hour, or just slightly above the federal minimum wage of $7.25.
While Brian Christopher is not in PewDiePie’s league, he is the Number One slot influencer today. He has 350,000 subscribers on YouTube and another 275,000 fans on Facebook. Most importantly, those subscribers watch because they love slot machines. They subscribe because they want to learn about the latest slot games, how bonuses work; and they want to be part of the “reality show” that is Brian’s casino adventures. In contrast, it is doubtful that any of PewDiePie’s or Ryan’s fans will ever be visiting your casino (at least not for a decade or two).
In a recent “LV Review Journal” article, Jonathan Jossel, the CEO at the Plaza Casino in downtown Las Vegas, said, “Social media has transformed the casino experience, and we are very excited to partner with Brian on this unique space that I know our guests will enjoy.” They had such confidence in Christopher’s prestige that they dedicated an entire section of their floor to him. “For years, my fans have been asking which games were my favorite, and now I finally have a place where they can experience it for themselves,” Christopher said in a Plaza news release. “The new ‘Brian Christopher Slots’ at the Plaza is like having my own miniature casino. I hand-selected the games that represent everything I love about playing slot machines.”
It’s not just casinos that are on board. The game makers (the manufacturers of slot machines) are perhaps even bigger fans of slot influencers. Meghan Sleik, Director of Partnership Marketing and Communications at Aristocrat, said on a recent “Boot Camp” panel that the pandemic shutdowns last spring brought a new appreciation of the slot influencers that went both ways.
“The influencers were virtually out of content since all the casinos were shutdown. So, we opened our showrooms to them. While there was no money at risk, they (the influencers) did get to play the new games that we’re going to launch upon re-openings.” She added that it also helped them internally, “With the input from the influencers, we were able to keep our R&D department and game designers busy with good input about what was working and what was not.”
Interestingly, in the world of influencers and camera-equipped cell phones, she said that game designers often think about giving players the time to get out their phones when big bonuses are about to happen. That wasn’t even a design consideration a few years ago.
On the same panel, Daria Wu, the Slot Director at the Golden Nugget in Las Vegas, said it is important to train your staff to assist the influencers. While everyone on the panel had stories about security officers evicting slot influencers attempting to film slots back in the early days, the problems now, she said, are more related to handling the crowds and onlookers that accompany their live sessions. “With COVID-19 restrictions in place, we wanted to make sure that everyone is following the proper guidelines and that the live sessions reflect that.”
Jay Ellenberger, the Director of Casino Operations at Oregon’s Seven Feathers Hotel & Casino, added, “We needed to manage people and their spacing to make sure we placed the influencers in the right areas.”
All seven of the panelists in the “Influencer Marketing” webinar titled “The Slots & Operations Experts” agreed that, at first, they had no idea just how popular some of these folks were. They were surprised at the crowds they could draw just to watch and be a small part of someone else’s slot playing experience.
Each of them also stressed the importance of educating their team to be prepared for this new age of digital captures with good lighting, sound and, especially, the availability of high-speed internet on the casino floor.
There’s also a lot of work behind making it all happen in an entertaining way. “My friends are shocked by my success. I mean, all I do is play slot machines,” Christopher says, “What they don’t see is that managing a massive YouTube Channel is a full-time job, and I have had to hire a talented Editor and a hard-working Social Media Manager, just to keep up! I’m not complaining though, I love what I do – I was born to be online.”
He produces a dozen videos a week, each viewed by an average audience of 300,000. And it’s not just a Las Vegas thing. He says that 25% of his audience is international, including Canada (Christopher’s original home) as well as Australia and New Zealand.
There are several other prominent influencers with similar formats and impressive crowds of followers. Scott Richter from Colorado is also known as “Raja” on his “Big Jackpot” channel. He, too, celebrated 300,000 subscribers recently.
Sarah, aka the “Slotlady,” is another slot influencer approaching 200,000 followers. Recently, she has made some joint appearances with Christopher. Unlike Brian, she only uses her first name and seldom shares much about her personal life. The same goes for “NG Slot” out of Los Angeles who doesn’t share his real name but has also racked up 200,000 or more subscribers.
One reason reviewers praise Christopher as the industry’s best is that, despite a similar number of followers as others, Brian shares almost everything about his life. His videos are truly a casino version of a reality show. “My Dad doesn’t play slots at all, but he watches all my videos to learn more about what I’m doing and where I’m going. I don’t mean that we don’t talk and share privately, it’s just that he hears more about my adventures day-to-day on the slot videos.”
If it sounds like he’s been doing this for years, you’d be right. But only for five years. He began by simply watching random videos online shot by various players because he wanted to learn more about slots. With his background in filmmaking, he realized he could do a better job than what he saw at the time. It only took about a month before he made more money with the videos than he did with his day job as an aspiring actor/Uber driver.
He learned quickly. Aristocrat’s Sleilk said its almost embarrassing that, “I sometimes feel that the slot influencers know more about how our games work than many of us who work here.”
It’s the education element that earns praise from many casino operators. Ellenberger praised Christopher and other influencers for teaching his own staff about slots. “We cover the basics in orientation, but they can learn so much more by watching the videos.”
How do influencers make their money? According to Christopher, advertisers using his site are the biggest source of his income. Surprisingly, it’s not casinos or slot makers placing the majority of the ads. Using Google’s artificial intelligence algorithms, the ads will be unique for each user depending on their own “likes.” If you are a fan of both slots and ukuleles, you might find ads on “BC Slots” for ukulele lessons. Likewise, you may find commercials for cosmetics, air compressors, QVC or NFL football depending on what, and where, you’ve searched online in the past.
Christopher also sells a lot of merchandise, most of it with the brand “Rude.” To quote from the fan page, “The Rudies Club is a private group of people who have a common interest and love for gambling and especially my channel, Brian Christopher Slots, on YouTube. The name itself was voted on by its members and chosen based on my regular use of the catchphrase ‘RUDE’.” Accordingly, Christopher sells t-shirts, hoodies, ‘lucky’ wrist bands, bumper stickers and the like.
So how do you decide if Raja or Sarah or Brian or another influencer would be the right one to help you build brand awareness at your casino? Sleik says there are two important points in making that evaluation:
- Look at examples of their work on YouTube or other formats
- Have them share some basic demographics of their fan base
If there’s a good match, an influencer could be a positive force in your future revenue growth.
Stories abound that even table games players and/or video poker fans with little past interest in traditional slots were “converted” after just a few exposures to these YouTube stars.
So forget GM or CFO. The quickest way to fame and fortune in the casino world may be to spread a little influence on the slot floor.
Best US Casinos
YouTube social media influencer designs casino's slots floor
by Jeremiah Booker, Best US Casinos · February 27, 2021
10 years ago, you might have never guessed that a YouTuber playing slot machines would be a big deal. However, slots social media influencers have become quite popular.
Brian Christopher is one of the more-popular influencers. He’s amassed a YouTube following of over 336,000 thanks to his entertaining videos.
Christopher has become so big in the gaming world that he recently got the chance to design a casino’s real money slots area. You can read more on Christopher along with the details on his new venture.
“Brian Christopher Slots at the Plaza” Launches in Las VegasThe Plaza Hotel & Casino Las Vegas has teamed up with Christopher to present a newly designed slots section. Brian Christopher Slots at the Plaza features many of the YouTuber’s favorite slot machines in one spot.
Plaza CEO Jonathan Jossel spoke with the Las Vegas Review-Journal’s Baily Schultz on the new gaming area. Jossel had this to say:
“Social media has transformed the casino experience, and we are very excited to partner with Brian on this unique space that I know our guests will enjoy.”
Some of the notable slot machines that are available in this space include Cleopatra II, Dollar Storm, Huff N Puff, and Lightning Zap. A ribbon-cutting ceremony was held to celebrate the launch of this slots area, which includes 16 machines in all. Brian Christopher stated:
“For years, my fans have been asking which games were my favorite, and now I finally have a place where they can experience it for themselves, the new Brian Christopher Slots at the Plaza is like having my own miniature casino. I hand-selected the games that represent everything I love about playing slot machines.”
More on Brian Christopher
Christopher has been streaming his slots play for several years. He visits land-based casinos and provides glimpses of popular slot machines.
For example, one of his videos shows him playing Buffalo Gold and Dragon Cash for $25 per spin. Those who watch videos like these get to see games that they might not have played before along with high-stakes play.
After all, most gamblers can only afford to bet $1 or less per spin. Few have the bankroll to survive long with $25 spins.
Christopher’s videos have helped him draw over 302 million views to date. He’s arguably the most-influential slots influencer in the game today.
Slots & Casino Gaming YouTube Channels Are GrowingSlot machines are solo affairs that pit you against the games. Watching somebody else play slots doesn’t seem like it would be a thrill.
However, it actually does resonate with many gamblers. YouTubers like Christopher have gained large followings just by visiting casinos and playing slots.
SlotsLady is another popular influencer who has many followers. She often plays slot machines in downtown Vegas—rather than at the glitzier Vegas Strip venues.
Despite her name, SlotsLady also plays a fair amount of casino table games. She shows clips from blackjack, casino hold’em, and Let It Ride sessions.
The SlotsBoom channel showcases slot machines everywhere from Vegas to southern California. It offers in-depth explanations of how bonus rounds and other features work.
Launched in 2008, RocknRolla has been in the industry since the early days of YouTube. He plays a broad range of games, including blackjack, poker, roulette, and slot machines.
Casinodaddy is a popular YouTube channel that operates out of Europe. The three Swedish brothers who make up Casinodaddy offer highlight reels of their gambling sessions, including funny moments and big payouts.
What Will You Get Out of Following Casino YouTubers?
You can see that plenty of gamblers are gaining fame and fortune through their channels. But what exactly do they have to offer? Here are the main benefits to watching gaming YouTubers.
See Cool Casino Games
Unlike with online casinos, you can’t preview land-based casino games from home. You also can’t play them for free either.
They visit brick-and-mortar casinos and stream the games they’re playing. As a result, you get to see different land-based slot machines without even leaving the house.
Learn the Basics
The casino is an intimidating place when you’re new to gambling. You may wonder around aimlessly looking at all of the slots and table games.
As with SlotsBoom and VegasLowRoller, some YouTubers gear content towards beginners. They show everything from how certain slots bonuses work to the basics of blackjack.
Of course, you can learn some of this through basic research. However, social media influencers provide visual game instructions and familiarity with the casino environment.
Pick Up Gambling Tips
You can find slots strategy and tips for many other casino games across the internet. But you might also enjoy getting advice from YouTubers too.
A live streamer might play casino hold’em, for example, and provide tips afterward. They could also give advice on other strategic table games, such as blackjack, Caribbean stud, and three-card poker.
Check Out the Casinos
As mentioned before, visiting casinos takes time and money. You might not have enough cash to take a 2-hour casino trip—let alone fly out to visit Las Vegas or Atlantic City.
If you’re planning a future gambling trip someday, though, then you may appreciate seeing the casinos in advance. Watching a YouTube channel gives you a great look at a casino’s gaming floor.
Have Some Fun
You don’t always have to get something out of watching slots channels. Instead, you can just kick back and have fun.
If you’re a gambler, you may appreciate seeing a slots or blackjack session through the eyes of somebody else. You can critique their play, enjoy seeing new games, and celebrate in their big wins.
Will Gaming Social Media Influencers Stay Popular?
No slots YouTuber is anywhere close to taking over Felix “PewDiePie” Kjellberg (108 million subscribers) any time soon. However, this niche as a whole is definitely growing.
Back when RocknRolla started in 2008 hardly anybody was watching slots YouTubers. Things have changed greatly in this regard today.
Speaking of which, Christopher shows just how popular slots influencers have become. He has, after all, now designed a section of the Plaza’s slots floor.
Other slot machine YouTubers could also be in line for trend-setting moves like these. That said, you shouldn’t expect to see popular slots social media influencers going anywhere. They’ll only continue growing their audiences.
Should You Care About Social Media Influencers?
I don’t use social media much, and most of the old time gamblers I spend time around don’t either. For this reason, I don’t care much about what the social media influencers have to say about slot machines or gambling.
But I also know that the younger generation of gamblers uses social media a lot more than I do. And I also know that some of these influencers have a large sway over what some gamblers do and where they play.
If you’re a business owner you need to be aware of social media influencers. But if you’re just a gambler and don’t currently use social media much, there’s no need to start paying attention.
In the end, whether you care about watching real people gamble and what they have to do with slot machines is up to you.
Check Out Social Media Gamblers on YouTube
The slots YouTubing industry has become quite notable. Case in point, the Plaza Hotel and Casino tabbed Brian Christopher to choose some of their slot machines.
Christopher is a worthy choice for this honor. After all, he boasts more than 336k YouTube followers and 302 million-plus views.
The Plaza and Brian Christopher Slots may very well start a trend. It’s certainly possible that other casinos will partner with gambling YouTubers in various ventures.
The Vegas Bash
YouTube slot room opens in downtown Las Vegas
by Peggy Leon, The Vegas Bash · February 26, 2021
YouTube slot room opens in downtown Las Vegas
by Peggy Leon, The Vegas Bash · February 26, 2021
Everybody loves a good slot parlor in Las Vegas. The flash of bright lights, the merry jingle that dances into your ears with every spin. Slot machine lovers have even more reasons to adore Las Vegas now. A new slot room by famous Youtuber Brian Christopher is open Downtown.
Brian Christopher Slots at The Plaza
This quirky slot room is conveniently located in Vegas at The Plaza. The 850 square-foot area hosts enough slot machines to accommodate several players at a time.
Considering the slot room has only been functional for a short time, the large numbers it's already attracting can be attributed to Brian's online influence. He has a massive following of more than 500,000 online friends who avidly watch him play slot machines worldwide. His influence is massive. The Plaza has recorded a significant boom in traffic since the slot room opened its doors end of January. Most of the people visiting the room are players, but many Brian Christopher fans visit the Plaza hoping to meet their slot machine star.
According to Christopher, his audience is primarily made up of young males who look to him to find out which slot machines they should play. Many of them will make a point to visit his top recommended spots, and his slot room will be no exception.
The Press-Enterprise
5 construction and opening updates for Las Vegas
by Alex Groves, The Press-Enterprise · February 19, 2021
Contrary to the popular expression, what happens in Las Vegas doesn’t necessarily stay there, especially if that thing is news about long awaited projects and attractions — and there’s a lot to share on that front lately.
Casino operators and developers have recently been reversing course on a lot of the decisions they made earlier in the pandemic. Resorts that have been shuttering midweek plan to go back to full-time operation, attractions have opened up for tourists for the first time and the finish line is in sight for long awaited projects.
Here’s a look at what’s happening in Sin City.
1. MGM Resorts to resume midweek operations
MGM Resorts International announced Wednesday, Feb. 17, that it would resume 24/7 hotel operations beginning March 3 at its properties that had been closing midweek, including Mandalay Bay, Park MGM and The Mirage.
Those properties had been closing as travel waned due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, but MGM Resorts’ CEO and President Bill Hornbuckle said in the news release that the company was beginning to see “positive signs” about the public’s interest in traveling.
That increased interest, coupled with progress on vaccinations and decreasing numbers of COVID-19 cases, made resuming full-week operations an important step for the company, according to Hornbuckle.
2. Virgin Hotels Las Vegas announces planned opening
After pushing back its planned Jan. 15 opening date because of the novel coronavirus pandemic, Virgin Hotels Las Vegas now plans to open on Thursday, March 25, according to a news release from JC Hospitality, the company that owns the property.
Richard “Boz” Bosworth, president and CEO of JC Hospitality, said in a statement that confidently announcing a new opening date has been a journey.
“Today we are not only celebrating the fact that we finally get to welcome back guests to the most exciting resort to open in Las Vegas in years, but we also get to bring our team members back to work,” the statement from Bosworth said.
The property will have 1,505 rooms, a five-acre pool area, event lawn and a theater that can fit 4,500 people.
It will also have the first tribally operated casino in the city with Mohegan Sun Casino at Virgin Hotels Las Vegas, according to a news release. The 60,000-square-foot casino will have slots, table games, high-limit areas and a race and sports book.
3. Sin City’s newest art installation
A supermarket-themed art exhibition featuring installation-filled rooms and more than 250 unique art projects opened for the first time to the public on Thursday, Feb. 18.
Omega Mart, which bills itself as “America’s Most Exceptional Grocery Store,” opened in AREA15, an arts and entertainment district located minutes from the Las Vegas Strip. It’s the second permanent installation from Meow Wolf, a Santa Fe-based arts and entertainment company. More than 300 artists helped create the attraction, according to the news release.
Pictures of the space have already made their way to Instagram. Some parts of the exhibit seemed to be supermarket-themed, with surreal artworks filling mock store shelves. Other parts of the exhibit had an otherworldly kind of feel with glowing hallways and geometric structures rising to the ceiling.
Pandemic-related safety precautions were in place at the exhibit, including keeping ticket sales exclusively online, limiting capacity to 25% and requiring visits to wear face masks, get their temperature checked and maintain social distancing.
Tickets were $45 general admission (with discounts available for children, seniors, military and Nevada residents) and could be purchased by visiting the attraction’s website.
4. Brian Christopher expands his influence
When it comes to casino slot machines, influencer Brian Christopher has become a well-recognized authority. His YouTube channel has amassed more than 330,000 followers and Christopher even has his own dedicated fan club. Now his brand is expanding.
The Plaza Hotel & Casino debuted the new “Brian Christopher Slots at the Plaza” gaming area late last month. The new area features some of Christopher’s favorite slot machines, including Cleopatra II, Dollar Storm, Lightning Zap, Huff N Puff and others.
The area started with 16 machines when it debuted, but more were expected to be added, according to a news release.
5. The Strat opens new High Limit Room
The Strat Hotel, Casino & SkyPod celebrated the opening of a new high limit lounge and the beginning of Lunar New Year with a traditional lion dance on Feb. 14.
The 3,600-square-foot lounge has eight table games, an on-site casino host, tea service and five high-definition TVs around its center columns, according to a resort news release.
Table games include two double-deck blackjack games, one six-deck blackjack table where the dealer stands on soft 17 and five baccarat tables.
Casino operators and developers have recently been reversing course on a lot of the decisions they made earlier in the pandemic. Resorts that have been shuttering midweek plan to go back to full-time operation, attractions have opened up for tourists for the first time and the finish line is in sight for long awaited projects.
Here’s a look at what’s happening in Sin City.
1. MGM Resorts to resume midweek operations
MGM Resorts International announced Wednesday, Feb. 17, that it would resume 24/7 hotel operations beginning March 3 at its properties that had been closing midweek, including Mandalay Bay, Park MGM and The Mirage.
Those properties had been closing as travel waned due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, but MGM Resorts’ CEO and President Bill Hornbuckle said in the news release that the company was beginning to see “positive signs” about the public’s interest in traveling.
That increased interest, coupled with progress on vaccinations and decreasing numbers of COVID-19 cases, made resuming full-week operations an important step for the company, according to Hornbuckle.
2. Virgin Hotels Las Vegas announces planned opening
After pushing back its planned Jan. 15 opening date because of the novel coronavirus pandemic, Virgin Hotels Las Vegas now plans to open on Thursday, March 25, according to a news release from JC Hospitality, the company that owns the property.
Richard “Boz” Bosworth, president and CEO of JC Hospitality, said in a statement that confidently announcing a new opening date has been a journey.
“Today we are not only celebrating the fact that we finally get to welcome back guests to the most exciting resort to open in Las Vegas in years, but we also get to bring our team members back to work,” the statement from Bosworth said.
The property will have 1,505 rooms, a five-acre pool area, event lawn and a theater that can fit 4,500 people.
It will also have the first tribally operated casino in the city with Mohegan Sun Casino at Virgin Hotels Las Vegas, according to a news release. The 60,000-square-foot casino will have slots, table games, high-limit areas and a race and sports book.
3. Sin City’s newest art installation
A supermarket-themed art exhibition featuring installation-filled rooms and more than 250 unique art projects opened for the first time to the public on Thursday, Feb. 18.
Omega Mart, which bills itself as “America’s Most Exceptional Grocery Store,” opened in AREA15, an arts and entertainment district located minutes from the Las Vegas Strip. It’s the second permanent installation from Meow Wolf, a Santa Fe-based arts and entertainment company. More than 300 artists helped create the attraction, according to the news release.
Pictures of the space have already made their way to Instagram. Some parts of the exhibit seemed to be supermarket-themed, with surreal artworks filling mock store shelves. Other parts of the exhibit had an otherworldly kind of feel with glowing hallways and geometric structures rising to the ceiling.
Pandemic-related safety precautions were in place at the exhibit, including keeping ticket sales exclusively online, limiting capacity to 25% and requiring visits to wear face masks, get their temperature checked and maintain social distancing.
Tickets were $45 general admission (with discounts available for children, seniors, military and Nevada residents) and could be purchased by visiting the attraction’s website.
4. Brian Christopher expands his influence
When it comes to casino slot machines, influencer Brian Christopher has become a well-recognized authority. His YouTube channel has amassed more than 330,000 followers and Christopher even has his own dedicated fan club. Now his brand is expanding.
The Plaza Hotel & Casino debuted the new “Brian Christopher Slots at the Plaza” gaming area late last month. The new area features some of Christopher’s favorite slot machines, including Cleopatra II, Dollar Storm, Lightning Zap, Huff N Puff and others.
The area started with 16 machines when it debuted, but more were expected to be added, according to a news release.
5. The Strat opens new High Limit Room
The Strat Hotel, Casino & SkyPod celebrated the opening of a new high limit lounge and the beginning of Lunar New Year with a traditional lion dance on Feb. 14.
The 3,600-square-foot lounge has eight table games, an on-site casino host, tea service and five high-definition TVs around its center columns, according to a resort news release.
Table games include two double-deck blackjack games, one six-deck blackjack table where the dealer stands on soft 17 and five baccarat tables.
Las Vegas Review-Journal
YouTube influencer Brian Christopher's slot area already a hit at Plaza
by Bailey Schulz, Las Vegas Review-Journal · January 29, 2021
When slot machine YouTuber Brian Christopher told Plaza CEO Jonathan Jossel that he should launch his own slot room at the Plaza, he didn’t think the suggestion would be taken seriously.
The social media influencer bounced the idea while recording an episode of the Plaza’s podcast, “On the Corner of Main Street,” with Jossel in September.
Turns out, Jossel liked the idea.
“I had an email the next day saying, ‘How do we make this happen?’” said Christopher, who has more than 500,000 online followers who watch him play slot machines around the world. “We went full-throttle with it.”
Four months later, “Brian Christopher Slots at the Plaza” is up and running. Industry watchers say the space follows a growing trend of separated slot areas and could help drive foot traffic in Las Vegas.
Drawing in visitors
The space, which opened Wednesday, is already bringing in more foot traffic to the Plaza.
The YouTuber said he has been running into fans “nonstop” since he got into town, including one couple who told him they canceled their hotel reservations at a Strip property to stay at the Plaza once they learned about the slot area.
Christopher expects the 850-square-foot slot area to continue to draw more visitors, especially younger players, to Las Vegas.
“Our No. 1 audience on Facebook are male millennials … in that 24- to 34-year-old range. And they’re loving what they’re seeing,” Christopher said. “If they see Brian playing at the Plaza in downtown Vegas, that’s exactly where they want to go when they come. They look to me to find out where they should be going.”
Rick Eckert, managing director of slot performance and analytics at Eilers & Krejcik Gaming, said Christopher can be viewed as the biggest independent casino host in the country.
“The amount of people he can reach by saying something positive about your casino or posting a big win can really be influential,” he said. “For somebody to brand an area of the floor dedicated to Brian Christopher and his YouTube channel, just seems like a great idea. I wouldn’t be surprised to see more of these pop up.”
Joshua O’Connell, a 38-year-old subscriber from Connecticut, said he plans to visit the slot area on his next Las Vegas trip.
Each slot machine has a QR code that links to a video of Christopher playing the same game. O’Connell said such special touches bring back memories for him and thousands of others who have been following Christopher’s videos over the last four years.
“It creates a connection between the slot machine and Brian’s moment and now your moment,” he said. “There’s that emotional connection to those stories. … When you watch people playing slots day after day, you get to know them. They become like a virtual friend.”
A growing trend
The Plaza started forging connections with YouTubers about two years ago, after realizing the large audiences they draw. Jossel said that popularity has led to an”incredible” first two days for the slot area.
“He’s a star in that community, and I see it as a great way to partner as far as our brand and his brand coming together,” he said. “To give (his fans) a one-stop shop to play his game or run into him … it’s a natural fit. So far, it’s been a very, very encouraging two days.”
Christopher showed off the area and its 16 slot machines on YouTube livestreams Wednesday and Thursday. He said his YouTube and Facebook picked up a combined 10,000 subscribers in those two days, and Wednesday was his “biggest livestream of all time.”
The space is the second themed slot room the Plaza has launched this year. The downtown hotel-casino also opened a nearly 3,000-square-foot space dedicated exclusively to Wheel of Fortune-themed slot machines this month.
“They seem to be in tune to what players like myself are into,” O’Connell said. “It’s interesting to see the Plaza taking some of these steps to offer something different.”
Eckert said these segmented slot areas are a growing trend that allow casino floors to better serve and communicate with players. Other examples include the Strat’s Link Slot Lounge or the Rampart Casino’s Buffalo Bar.
“Players that are true gamblers and not just entertainment players really know what they’re looking for,” he said. “It just makes it easier to market to those players.”
The social media influencer bounced the idea while recording an episode of the Plaza’s podcast, “On the Corner of Main Street,” with Jossel in September.
Turns out, Jossel liked the idea.
“I had an email the next day saying, ‘How do we make this happen?’” said Christopher, who has more than 500,000 online followers who watch him play slot machines around the world. “We went full-throttle with it.”
Four months later, “Brian Christopher Slots at the Plaza” is up and running. Industry watchers say the space follows a growing trend of separated slot areas and could help drive foot traffic in Las Vegas.
Drawing in visitors
The space, which opened Wednesday, is already bringing in more foot traffic to the Plaza.
The YouTuber said he has been running into fans “nonstop” since he got into town, including one couple who told him they canceled their hotel reservations at a Strip property to stay at the Plaza once they learned about the slot area.
Christopher expects the 850-square-foot slot area to continue to draw more visitors, especially younger players, to Las Vegas.
“Our No. 1 audience on Facebook are male millennials … in that 24- to 34-year-old range. And they’re loving what they’re seeing,” Christopher said. “If they see Brian playing at the Plaza in downtown Vegas, that’s exactly where they want to go when they come. They look to me to find out where they should be going.”
Rick Eckert, managing director of slot performance and analytics at Eilers & Krejcik Gaming, said Christopher can be viewed as the biggest independent casino host in the country.
“The amount of people he can reach by saying something positive about your casino or posting a big win can really be influential,” he said. “For somebody to brand an area of the floor dedicated to Brian Christopher and his YouTube channel, just seems like a great idea. I wouldn’t be surprised to see more of these pop up.”
Joshua O’Connell, a 38-year-old subscriber from Connecticut, said he plans to visit the slot area on his next Las Vegas trip.
Each slot machine has a QR code that links to a video of Christopher playing the same game. O’Connell said such special touches bring back memories for him and thousands of others who have been following Christopher’s videos over the last four years.
“It creates a connection between the slot machine and Brian’s moment and now your moment,” he said. “There’s that emotional connection to those stories. … When you watch people playing slots day after day, you get to know them. They become like a virtual friend.”
A growing trend
The Plaza started forging connections with YouTubers about two years ago, after realizing the large audiences they draw. Jossel said that popularity has led to an”incredible” first two days for the slot area.
“He’s a star in that community, and I see it as a great way to partner as far as our brand and his brand coming together,” he said. “To give (his fans) a one-stop shop to play his game or run into him … it’s a natural fit. So far, it’s been a very, very encouraging two days.”
Christopher showed off the area and its 16 slot machines on YouTube livestreams Wednesday and Thursday. He said his YouTube and Facebook picked up a combined 10,000 subscribers in those two days, and Wednesday was his “biggest livestream of all time.”
The space is the second themed slot room the Plaza has launched this year. The downtown hotel-casino also opened a nearly 3,000-square-foot space dedicated exclusively to Wheel of Fortune-themed slot machines this month.
“They seem to be in tune to what players like myself are into,” O’Connell said. “It’s interesting to see the Plaza taking some of these steps to offer something different.”
Eckert said these segmented slot areas are a growing trend that allow casino floors to better serve and communicate with players. Other examples include the Strat’s Link Slot Lounge or the Rampart Casino’s Buffalo Bar.
“Players that are true gamblers and not just entertainment players really know what they’re looking for,” he said. “It just makes it easier to market to those players.”
Casino.org
Plaza Casino to open slot area with Brian Christopher, targets younger players
by Ed Silverstein, Casino.org · January 29, 2021
The gaming area at the downtown property will provide players the chance to try their luck on the popular games they have seen Christopher play in videos posted on YouTube and Facebook.
It will open with 16 slot machines, and more will be added to the mix in the coming months. Slot games at the new Plaza space include: Cleopatra II, Dollar Storm, Lightning Zap, and Huff N Puff.
Christopher’s online channels have over 302 million views and some 528,000 followers, his company says. Often in videos, he is shown playing slots worldwide.
The gaming space at the casino will formally be known as “Brian Christopher Slots at the Plaza.” A ribbon-cutting for the gaming area is to take place at 4:30 pm Friday.
A Draw to Younger Players
“This is just trying to provide entertainment to a much younger group of gamblers,” said the Rev. Richard McGowan, a finance professor at Boston College who closely follows gambling trends, to Casino.org.
Slots have traditionally been associated with older age groups,” McGowan said. “So Brian Christopher made playing slots acceptable for a much younger age group.”
But there’s another benefit to the partnership, according to James P. Whelan, a psychology professor at the University of Memphis, where he also directs the Institute for Gambling Education and Research.
“From the psychological end, people will be drawn to things that they believe will be enjoyable,” Whelan told Casino.org. “Certainly, it will draw the attention to those familiar with Brian Christopher’s YouTube page.”
For decades, slots have been a draw for Las Vegas’s gaming properties. Last month, a lucky slot player at Las Vegas’s Suncoast Hotel and Casino got a historic present Christmas Eve after winning almost $15.5 million during a brief stop at the Boyd Gaming property.
GGR Remains Low in Vegas
But the new gaming space at the Plaza comes as Truist Securities recently reported that December gross gaming revenue (GGR) on the Strip was down 51 percent when comparing year-over-year. That represents “the worst Y/Y figure since a 61 percent decline in June,” Truist’s Barry Jonas said in a note to investors.
Slot GGR was down 55 percent year-over-year on the Strip, he added in the report about December totals.
In contrast, GGR for downtown Las Vegas declined 28 percent year-over-year in December. Jonas said it was “likely impacted by decreased tourism and visitation.”
GGR on the Strip in November totaled $349.8 million, according to the Nevada Gaming Control Board. That’s a 32.5 percent reduction from November 2019.
Las Vegas Review-Journal
Slot machine influencer teaming up with Plaza on new gaming area
by Bailey Schulz, Las Vegas Review-Journal · January 27, 2021
Slot machine YouTube channels have been growing in recent years, with certain videos capturing millions of views. Now, one of the most popular influencers in the space is teaming up with the Plaza to launch a new gaming area.
“Brian Christopher Slots at the Plaza” brings some of Christopher’s favorite slot machines in one space. His social media channels, which show him playing slots around the world, have over 302 million views and more than 500,000 followers.
“Social media has transformed the casino experience, and we are very excited to partner with Brian on this unique space that I know our guests will enjoy,” said Plaza CEO Jonathan Jossel in a Wednesday news release.
The space’s new web page, www.bcslotsatplaza.com, features videos of Christopher playing each game inside the new space. Games were chosen based on some of his videos most “iconic moments,” and include Cleopatra II, Dollar Storm, Lightning Zap and Huff N Puff, according to the release.
The area is set to open with 16 slot machines with a ribbon cutting ceremony at 4:30 p.m. Friday, with more installations set for the coming weeks. Fans can get a sneak peek of the space Wednesday and Thursday at 5 p.m., when Christopher previews the space through a YouTube live stream.
“For years, my fans have been asking which games were my favorite, and now I finally have a place where they can experience it for themselves,” Christopher said in the news release. “The new Brian Christopher Slots at the Plaza is like having my own miniature casino. I hand selected the games that represent everything I love about playing slot machines.”
Visitors who earn 100 points on their Plaza Reward player’s card will have the chance to receive an exclusive wristband with Christopher’s signature while supplies last.
“Brian Christopher Slots at the Plaza” brings some of Christopher’s favorite slot machines in one space. His social media channels, which show him playing slots around the world, have over 302 million views and more than 500,000 followers.
“Social media has transformed the casino experience, and we are very excited to partner with Brian on this unique space that I know our guests will enjoy,” said Plaza CEO Jonathan Jossel in a Wednesday news release.
The space’s new web page, www.bcslotsatplaza.com, features videos of Christopher playing each game inside the new space. Games were chosen based on some of his videos most “iconic moments,” and include Cleopatra II, Dollar Storm, Lightning Zap and Huff N Puff, according to the release.
The area is set to open with 16 slot machines with a ribbon cutting ceremony at 4:30 p.m. Friday, with more installations set for the coming weeks. Fans can get a sneak peek of the space Wednesday and Thursday at 5 p.m., when Christopher previews the space through a YouTube live stream.
“For years, my fans have been asking which games were my favorite, and now I finally have a place where they can experience it for themselves,” Christopher said in the news release. “The new Brian Christopher Slots at the Plaza is like having my own miniature casino. I hand selected the games that represent everything I love about playing slot machines.”
Visitors who earn 100 points on their Plaza Reward player’s card will have the chance to receive an exclusive wristband with Christopher’s signature while supplies last.
The Toronto Star
Rude! This Burlington man became a YouTube sensation playing slots and it’s now his full-time job
by Morgan Bocknek, The Toronto Star · December 3, 2020
Did you ever think you could base a career off of gambling? More specifically: did you ever think you could make a living entirely on playing slot machines? Brian Christopher certainly didn’t. But not only has he made it his livelihood, he’s a rock star in the gambling world.
Christopher, 39, grew up in Burlington, Ont. His YouTube channel has 190 million views as of Nov. 17 and an average of 207,000 daily views. His channel is growing exponentially and, on Nov. 15, he reached 300,000 subscribers. He’s celebrating by gambling $30,000 on slots via a live stream on Dec. 10 at 8 p.m. on Live.BCSlots.com at San Manuel Casino in Highland, Calif.
But Christopher didn’t start a YouTube slot channel on purpose, at least at the beginning. In early 2016, he was living in Los Angeles with his husband, Marco, working as an actor (as well as driving for Uber, Lyft and working for a catering company, as actors do). He’d appeared regularly on the small screen: Hallmark’s “The Christmas Parade,” a Tim Horton’s commercial, as well as various TV shows, including CTV’s “The Listener,” and BBC’s “Copper.” So when he recorded himself playing slots while on his second ever vacation to Las Vegas, it was on a whim.
“I decided I would record some of my slot play because I had seen people doing it on YouTube. And I thought that would be kind of fun to do. But I didn’t really think much of it, there was no plan of action of ‘I’m gonna make this my job,’ it was just ‘let me film this for fun,’” Christopher said.
On April 18, 2016, Christopher posted his first video, which he said he thought only his friends and family would watch. Within a month, his following was growing so rapidly that he was invited to the YouTube partner program, allowing him to earn money from his videos. YouTubers in the program make an average of $3 to $5 per 1,000 views, meaning a video with one million streams would net up to $5,000, according to software company Intuit.
“I decided you know what, maybe I should follow this and see where it takes me. And I’m glad I did,” he said.
Christopher made YouTube his full-time job. He started booking trips and travelling to casinos to film content. He decided he wanted to upload a new video every day, as no one else who was filming themselves playing slots was posting at that pace.
“I think that’s what really definitely helped my channel grow very rapidly as well. I had no idea where this was gonna take me, but I’m like, ‘This is so much fun.’ I love to gamble and I love to entertain and I’m doing everything together,” he said.
After one year, Christopher hired a video editor. He worked hard: on top of posting daily, he took classes on how to best use YouTube, attended conferences and constantly reached out to casinos across the U.S. to see if they were interested in hosting him. He was also genuinely good at being in front of the camera from the get-go, which he credits to his acting experience.
“I always pretend my audience is right there with me. It’s just me basically talking to them the whole time.”
In the first year, Christopher lost money overall on the machines, but said he knew he was going to profit soon, and not from the slot machines themselves.
“I was OK with (not profiting) at the time, because it was an investment. I could see, month over month, my viewership was growing, my income was growing, and I knew there was going to be a point where they would cross and I’d start making more money.”
He also routinely tells viewers that it is impossible to make money just by playing slots.
“Slot machines are designed to take your money. So I always tell people: ‘If you’ve made a dollar, cash out, take your money and run. Because you’ve already beat the system.’”
As his audience grew, so did their appetite for Christopher. They latched onto phrases he’d repeat. Christopher’s first catchphrase was “rude,” whenever he didn’t win on a spin. This became the foundation of his fan club, the Rudies, and the words Christopher would attach to his merchandise. This past June, Christopher continuously mispronounced the word “banzai” as “banza” whenever he won while playing a Karate Kid-themed slot machine during a livestream. His team, now a staff of five with an office, had shirts for sale featuring the word before the stream had ended.
Christopher’s most dedicated fans don’t just watch his videos. Many follow him on all social media platforms. While subscribing to a YouTube channel is free, many of his fans pay to join his tiered fan club, run through Patreon, where users choose incremental monthly fees to have more access to creators.
In Christopher’s case, $5 a month gets you access to a private Facebook group; $10 means he’ll follow you back on social platforms and give you access to monthly live chats. $20 gets you all that, plus occasional postcards. Christopher has over 2,000 members of his fan club. He also gives his fans the opportunity to gamble with him in real life.
“He continues to evolve to ensure his channel doesn’t get stale,” said Joshua O’Connell, 38, based in West Haven, Ct., who operates Know Your Slots, an educational gambling blog.
“I had been watching slot videos on YouTube for a few years by the time I found Brian. YouTube would periodically recommend new channels I had not encountered and Brian came up quite early in his channel’s existence. When he got started there were still only a handful of people doing it and now there’s hundreds,” O’Connell said.
O’Connell first went to a meetup Christopher hosted in New York City in late 2017 and said he’s been to “easily a dozen” meetups since.
O’Connell attended the first “Rudies Weekend” and combined money with another Rudie. They ended up winning O’Connell’s first and only “hand pay,” meaning a win of $1,200 or more. This amount has to be filed with the U.S. federal government and casino staff will typically bring cash winnings over by hand.
“Some of my experiences with other fans are among the most fond memories I have from visiting casinos in recent years,” he said.
Even with the COVID-19 pandemic tearing through the United States, Rudies are still coming to see Christopher play slots. The main differences are they’re physically distant and masked, often wearing a Brian Christopher branded mask. To date, they’ve sold over 15,000 masks.
The Centers for Disease Control, a United States federal agency, has put forward detailed considerations for reopening and reducing virus spread. Christopher notes that these rules vary by state. Though his channel had a bit of a lull in March, he’s now halfway booked through the next year. Christopher says some casinos currently see his channel as a way to promote how they have safely reopened with protective measures in place.
Christopher notes operators that told him a year ago they weren’t interested in hosting him have now changed their tune, often seeing it as a way to show patrons how they have safely reopened.
“You can put a billboard up or commercial up on the TV network. And maybe like 10 per cent or five per cent of people that watch it are actually your customers whereas, you know, when I put something up, 100 per cent of people watching are gamblers,” he said.
Another major industry that Christopher will pioneer through reopening is United States cruises. He’ll be celebrating his 40th birthday aboard a Royal Caribbean cruise liner for the “Rudies Cruise” in February, which is completely sold out online.
Royal Caribbean is currently running “test cruises” docked in the United States to prove to their customers and regulators that they can now operate safely, and plan to start sailing again once they have approval from the CDC. As of late last month, over 100,000 people had signed up for these trials.
“It’ll be a different feeling than our last few, but hopefully it’ll be great,” says Christopher.
Though he can travel through many states, he’s been unable to visit home, cancelling a trip to visit his family in September, unable to take two weeks off work to quarantine. But one of his next goals is to break into his home turf.
“They seem to be a little more hesitant to allowing a camera in the casino, but I’m hoping that one day we’ll be able to break (into the) market,” he said.
Christopher, 39, grew up in Burlington, Ont. His YouTube channel has 190 million views as of Nov. 17 and an average of 207,000 daily views. His channel is growing exponentially and, on Nov. 15, he reached 300,000 subscribers. He’s celebrating by gambling $30,000 on slots via a live stream on Dec. 10 at 8 p.m. on Live.BCSlots.com at San Manuel Casino in Highland, Calif.
But Christopher didn’t start a YouTube slot channel on purpose, at least at the beginning. In early 2016, he was living in Los Angeles with his husband, Marco, working as an actor (as well as driving for Uber, Lyft and working for a catering company, as actors do). He’d appeared regularly on the small screen: Hallmark’s “The Christmas Parade,” a Tim Horton’s commercial, as well as various TV shows, including CTV’s “The Listener,” and BBC’s “Copper.” So when he recorded himself playing slots while on his second ever vacation to Las Vegas, it was on a whim.
“I decided I would record some of my slot play because I had seen people doing it on YouTube. And I thought that would be kind of fun to do. But I didn’t really think much of it, there was no plan of action of ‘I’m gonna make this my job,’ it was just ‘let me film this for fun,’” Christopher said.
On April 18, 2016, Christopher posted his first video, which he said he thought only his friends and family would watch. Within a month, his following was growing so rapidly that he was invited to the YouTube partner program, allowing him to earn money from his videos. YouTubers in the program make an average of $3 to $5 per 1,000 views, meaning a video with one million streams would net up to $5,000, according to software company Intuit.
“I decided you know what, maybe I should follow this and see where it takes me. And I’m glad I did,” he said.
Christopher made YouTube his full-time job. He started booking trips and travelling to casinos to film content. He decided he wanted to upload a new video every day, as no one else who was filming themselves playing slots was posting at that pace.
“I think that’s what really definitely helped my channel grow very rapidly as well. I had no idea where this was gonna take me, but I’m like, ‘This is so much fun.’ I love to gamble and I love to entertain and I’m doing everything together,” he said.
After one year, Christopher hired a video editor. He worked hard: on top of posting daily, he took classes on how to best use YouTube, attended conferences and constantly reached out to casinos across the U.S. to see if they were interested in hosting him. He was also genuinely good at being in front of the camera from the get-go, which he credits to his acting experience.
“I always pretend my audience is right there with me. It’s just me basically talking to them the whole time.”
In the first year, Christopher lost money overall on the machines, but said he knew he was going to profit soon, and not from the slot machines themselves.
“I was OK with (not profiting) at the time, because it was an investment. I could see, month over month, my viewership was growing, my income was growing, and I knew there was going to be a point where they would cross and I’d start making more money.”
He also routinely tells viewers that it is impossible to make money just by playing slots.
“Slot machines are designed to take your money. So I always tell people: ‘If you’ve made a dollar, cash out, take your money and run. Because you’ve already beat the system.’”
As his audience grew, so did their appetite for Christopher. They latched onto phrases he’d repeat. Christopher’s first catchphrase was “rude,” whenever he didn’t win on a spin. This became the foundation of his fan club, the Rudies, and the words Christopher would attach to his merchandise. This past June, Christopher continuously mispronounced the word “banzai” as “banza” whenever he won while playing a Karate Kid-themed slot machine during a livestream. His team, now a staff of five with an office, had shirts for sale featuring the word before the stream had ended.
Christopher’s most dedicated fans don’t just watch his videos. Many follow him on all social media platforms. While subscribing to a YouTube channel is free, many of his fans pay to join his tiered fan club, run through Patreon, where users choose incremental monthly fees to have more access to creators.
In Christopher’s case, $5 a month gets you access to a private Facebook group; $10 means he’ll follow you back on social platforms and give you access to monthly live chats. $20 gets you all that, plus occasional postcards. Christopher has over 2,000 members of his fan club. He also gives his fans the opportunity to gamble with him in real life.
“He continues to evolve to ensure his channel doesn’t get stale,” said Joshua O’Connell, 38, based in West Haven, Ct., who operates Know Your Slots, an educational gambling blog.
“I had been watching slot videos on YouTube for a few years by the time I found Brian. YouTube would periodically recommend new channels I had not encountered and Brian came up quite early in his channel’s existence. When he got started there were still only a handful of people doing it and now there’s hundreds,” O’Connell said.
O’Connell first went to a meetup Christopher hosted in New York City in late 2017 and said he’s been to “easily a dozen” meetups since.
O’Connell attended the first “Rudies Weekend” and combined money with another Rudie. They ended up winning O’Connell’s first and only “hand pay,” meaning a win of $1,200 or more. This amount has to be filed with the U.S. federal government and casino staff will typically bring cash winnings over by hand.
“Some of my experiences with other fans are among the most fond memories I have from visiting casinos in recent years,” he said.
Even with the COVID-19 pandemic tearing through the United States, Rudies are still coming to see Christopher play slots. The main differences are they’re physically distant and masked, often wearing a Brian Christopher branded mask. To date, they’ve sold over 15,000 masks.
The Centers for Disease Control, a United States federal agency, has put forward detailed considerations for reopening and reducing virus spread. Christopher notes that these rules vary by state. Though his channel had a bit of a lull in March, he’s now halfway booked through the next year. Christopher says some casinos currently see his channel as a way to promote how they have safely reopened with protective measures in place.
Christopher notes operators that told him a year ago they weren’t interested in hosting him have now changed their tune, often seeing it as a way to show patrons how they have safely reopened.
“You can put a billboard up or commercial up on the TV network. And maybe like 10 per cent or five per cent of people that watch it are actually your customers whereas, you know, when I put something up, 100 per cent of people watching are gamblers,” he said.
Another major industry that Christopher will pioneer through reopening is United States cruises. He’ll be celebrating his 40th birthday aboard a Royal Caribbean cruise liner for the “Rudies Cruise” in February, which is completely sold out online.
Royal Caribbean is currently running “test cruises” docked in the United States to prove to their customers and regulators that they can now operate safely, and plan to start sailing again once they have approval from the CDC. As of late last month, over 100,000 people had signed up for these trials.
“It’ll be a different feeling than our last few, but hopefully it’ll be great,” says Christopher.
Though he can travel through many states, he’s been unable to visit home, cancelling a trip to visit his family in September, unable to take two weeks off work to quarantine. But one of his next goals is to break into his home turf.
“They seem to be a little more hesitant to allowing a camera in the casino, but I’m hoping that one day we’ll be able to break (into the) market,” he said.
The Press Enterprise
How to win slots and influence people
by Alex Groves, The Press Enterprise · November 6, 2020 at 9:34am
Influencer Brian Christopher is all smiles outside Agua Caliente Resort Casino Spa Rancho Mirage on Thursday, Oct. 8, 2020. The popular YouTuber has an office not far away in Palm Springs. (Photo by Terry Pierson, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG)
A few years ago, Brian Christopher had just moved to Los Angeles from San Francisco to build his acting career and planned his first trip to Las Vegas. When he did a quick search of YouTube for information on what casinos he should visit, Christopher found himself sucked into watching videos of people playing slot machines.
“I thought it was kind of weird that anyone would watch that kind of stuff, but I checked it out and I kept watching it so I said, ‘Oh maybe when I get up to Vegas, I’ll film a couple and put them on my YouTube acting channel just for fun’,” Christopher said. “So I did that for fun and it turned out to be more than that.”
Those videos blossomed into Christopher’s full-time career as an influencer. He’s turned his YouTube channel and various social media accounts into a business where he reaches a vast audience of a niche interest: casinos and slot machines.
Christopher makes videos of himself playing slot machines, showing off casino amenities and, more recently, talking about safety measures being taken by the casinos during the novel coronavirus pandemic. More than four years since that fateful trip to Las Vegas, he has racked up nearly 300,000 subscribers for his YouTube channel, Brian Christopher Slots, and has three full-time staffers helping him expand his increasingly popular brand.
Now, Christopher not only finds himself stopped by fans on gaming floors but also frequently invited out by the casinos to make videos.
“More and more they’re reaching out to us as they become more familiar with what we do,” he said. “I think when I first started doing this a casino would shy away from a camera being on their slot floor, but now that we have 180 million views on our channel, they realize, ‘Hey wait a minute, he’s onto something here.’ And we can utilize that.”
Building the brand
Before dedicating his YouTube channel to slot play, Christopher might have only visited a casino three or four times a year. Now, he visits casinos weekly, primarily in Southern California and Las Vegas.
Each visit usually spans about three nights. During the day he’s continuously filming content to be edited later and for two of the nights, he’ll stream his live slot play for 90 minutes each.
Christopher uses his own money to gamble with, but does earn free play with his player’s club cards like those any gambler can sign up for at various properties.
At his Palm Springs office, Christopher said, there’s a ton of preparation work. He’s always in meetings with casinos, slot manufacturers and other partners and working with his staff to make sure his videos have catchy titles that will draw the attention of audiences.
There’s also a merchandising side to what Christopher does: YouTube views on their own aren’t lucrative, so to support his business he does a mixture of sponsorships, fan clubs and products.
Christopher said his fan shop sells between 1,000 and 2,000 products a month. Merchandise on his website includes T-shirts, face masks, wrist bands, souvenir poker chips and lanyards.
He has also has a very active fan club of about 2,000 people. There are varying membership tiers ranging in cost from $5-$20 monthly. The most basic tier gives fans access to a special private Facebook page where they can see behind-the-scenes posts and special livestreams.
For the highest tier, Christopher will follow fans back on Facebook, Snapchat or Instagram; do monthly private live chats with his fans; and send his fans signed postcards that either feature his photo, or a photo he took, every three months.
YouTubing during the pandemic
Many of Christopher’s recent videos have been dedicated to casino safety measures during the novel coronavirus pandemic.
“Because of what I do people look up to me for advice on things related to the casinos and so I really wanted to make it a point to visit these casinos,” he said.
He estimated he’s visited 25 casinos in different parts of the country so far since casinos reopened after closing due to the coronavirus.
In his videos, Christopher will take his fans through the motions of what it’s like to visit casinos during the pandemic from before you enter to what it looks once you get onto the gaming floor itself.
Christopher said most casinos take the same safety measures, including mandatory masks and requiring social distancing, but some casinos have gone the extra mile. Some measures he thought were particularly interesting were the casinos changing out pens between each customer; putting cards indicating when a machine had just been cleaned in the slots for player’s club cards; and temperature checking guests before they even exited their vehicles.
A personal touch
Christopher said he isn’t afraid to get personal in his videos, telling stories about his life when he’s not spinning the reels. He said he’s frequently stopped by fans who talk to him about the experiences he’s shared as well as his positive energy in videos.
“That means the world to me that we can have that kind of impact by just playing slot machines and having a good time,” he said.
“I thought it was kind of weird that anyone would watch that kind of stuff, but I checked it out and I kept watching it so I said, ‘Oh maybe when I get up to Vegas, I’ll film a couple and put them on my YouTube acting channel just for fun’,” Christopher said. “So I did that for fun and it turned out to be more than that.”
Those videos blossomed into Christopher’s full-time career as an influencer. He’s turned his YouTube channel and various social media accounts into a business where he reaches a vast audience of a niche interest: casinos and slot machines.
Christopher makes videos of himself playing slot machines, showing off casino amenities and, more recently, talking about safety measures being taken by the casinos during the novel coronavirus pandemic. More than four years since that fateful trip to Las Vegas, he has racked up nearly 300,000 subscribers for his YouTube channel, Brian Christopher Slots, and has three full-time staffers helping him expand his increasingly popular brand.
Now, Christopher not only finds himself stopped by fans on gaming floors but also frequently invited out by the casinos to make videos.
“More and more they’re reaching out to us as they become more familiar with what we do,” he said. “I think when I first started doing this a casino would shy away from a camera being on their slot floor, but now that we have 180 million views on our channel, they realize, ‘Hey wait a minute, he’s onto something here.’ And we can utilize that.”
Building the brand
Before dedicating his YouTube channel to slot play, Christopher might have only visited a casino three or four times a year. Now, he visits casinos weekly, primarily in Southern California and Las Vegas.
Each visit usually spans about three nights. During the day he’s continuously filming content to be edited later and for two of the nights, he’ll stream his live slot play for 90 minutes each.
Christopher uses his own money to gamble with, but does earn free play with his player’s club cards like those any gambler can sign up for at various properties.
At his Palm Springs office, Christopher said, there’s a ton of preparation work. He’s always in meetings with casinos, slot manufacturers and other partners and working with his staff to make sure his videos have catchy titles that will draw the attention of audiences.
There’s also a merchandising side to what Christopher does: YouTube views on their own aren’t lucrative, so to support his business he does a mixture of sponsorships, fan clubs and products.
Christopher said his fan shop sells between 1,000 and 2,000 products a month. Merchandise on his website includes T-shirts, face masks, wrist bands, souvenir poker chips and lanyards.
He has also has a very active fan club of about 2,000 people. There are varying membership tiers ranging in cost from $5-$20 monthly. The most basic tier gives fans access to a special private Facebook page where they can see behind-the-scenes posts and special livestreams.
For the highest tier, Christopher will follow fans back on Facebook, Snapchat or Instagram; do monthly private live chats with his fans; and send his fans signed postcards that either feature his photo, or a photo he took, every three months.
YouTubing during the pandemic
Many of Christopher’s recent videos have been dedicated to casino safety measures during the novel coronavirus pandemic.
“Because of what I do people look up to me for advice on things related to the casinos and so I really wanted to make it a point to visit these casinos,” he said.
He estimated he’s visited 25 casinos in different parts of the country so far since casinos reopened after closing due to the coronavirus.
In his videos, Christopher will take his fans through the motions of what it’s like to visit casinos during the pandemic from before you enter to what it looks once you get onto the gaming floor itself.
Christopher said most casinos take the same safety measures, including mandatory masks and requiring social distancing, but some casinos have gone the extra mile. Some measures he thought were particularly interesting were the casinos changing out pens between each customer; putting cards indicating when a machine had just been cleaned in the slots for player’s club cards; and temperature checking guests before they even exited their vehicles.
A personal touch
Christopher said he isn’t afraid to get personal in his videos, telling stories about his life when he’s not spinning the reels. He said he’s frequently stopped by fans who talk to him about the experiences he’s shared as well as his positive energy in videos.
“That means the world to me that we can have that kind of impact by just playing slot machines and having a good time,” he said.
Los Angeles Daily News
Southern California casinos welcome social media influencers who can bring in a crowd
by Alex Groves, The Press Enterprise · November 5, 2020
Brian Christopher plays a slot machine at Agua Caliente Resort Casino Spa Rancho Mirage on Thursday, Oct. 8, 2020. Christopher’s YouTube channel, Brian Christopher Slots, has nearly 300,000 subscribers and has had more than 180 million views. (Photo by Terry Pierson, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG)
There’s a certain kind of guest coveted by many of Southern California’s casinos, one who gets special access to the gaming floor, first dibs at a new restaurant or complimentary spa treatments and hotel stays.
But these perks aren’t being showered on just high rollers anymore; they’re increasingly being provided to social media influencers, whose currency is measured in views and followers rather than credit lines or stacks of cash.
As the role of social media continues to increase in society, casinos have increasingly embraced influencers — people who promote products or experiences for their niche but relatively large audiences on social media — hoping that their posts and videos will translate to more visitors walking through the casino doors.
Casinos such as San Manuel Casino near Highland, Morongo Casino, Resort & Spa near Cabazon and Harrah’s Resort Southern California in Northern San Diego County have brought influencers in for visits to expand their marketing reach, sometimes sharing new amenities or promotions at the properties and other times capitalizing on an idea from the influencer.
This shouldn’t be a surprise: Influencers have come into their own as marketing forces in the last few years in a range of industries, and so it’s unsurprising that casinos would want in on the action.
It’s a marked change from the early 2000s when people were often bothered by the idea that a blogger was being paid or doing product placement in their writing, said Heather Honea, chair of the marketing department at the Fowler College of Business at San Diego State University. However, with today’s social media influencers, people accept that the job is basically product placement — as long as the products endorsed fit the influencer’s brand.
According to guidelines issued by the Federal Trade Commission, influencers have to disclose when they’ve been paid or received something of significant value in exchange for their endorsement. However, if they receive a product for free with the expectation that they’ll promote or discuss the product, they don’t have to disclose that.
To attract influencers, casinos might promise lavish experiences or grant the influencer early access to a new amenity.
At Harrah’s Resort Southern California, time is spent getting to know influencers and what it is they’re looking to promote before they’re brought on the property so that a specialized itinerary can be put together to capitalize on the partnership, said Amber Lussier, Harrah’s director of resort marketing.
At Harrah’s, part of the marketing is telling the story of its own city, “Funner,” which has included honorary celebrity mayors such as David Hasselhoff and Rob Riggle. The swearing-in of the new mayor of Funner is one of the biggest influencer events at the resort.
“We really roll out the red the carpet and we customize everything that we do for them so when they show up, they’re going to walk out to a cabana that’s fully decked out with maybe a foot bath and their favorite beer in a bucket of ice and some balloons and decorations,” Lussier said.
San Manuel Casino has worked with influencers for almost five years, said General Manager Peter Arceo, and they have become an important part of the casino’s marketing strategy, particularly when the complex opens a new venue or amenity.
Fitting the brand
Some casinos are more selective in their approach to influencers.
Morongo Casino, Resort & Spa only does two or three engagements with influencers a year, according to Executive Director of Marketing Simon Farmer.
He said that the casino looks at a variety of factors beyond how many followers an influencer may have. Casino officials will consider the influencer’s content, how they represent themselves, what demographics they’re speaking to and where their audience is located. He said that if an influencer does not draw in an audience that’s traditionally apt to gamble or visit a casino, or if that audience is in a different geographic area, then they may not be the best choice to work with.
“It’s not simply reach or exposure for the sake of exposure that we’re looking for; we’re looking for effective exposure,” Farmer said.
Honea said that having a small audience isn’t necessarily a bad thing either.
“It can be really valuable to get a little more niche where they have a really committed set of loyal followers,” she said.
Michael Felci, public relations manager for Fantasy Springs Resort Casino in Indio, said Fantasy Springs doesn’t currently work with influencers. He said getting people in to play on the gaming floor is the most important thing and that Fantasy Springs’ research indicated there wasn’t enough of a crossover between their gaming customer base and social influencers.
“We haven’t seen enough data on that to make it a relevant thing for us at this point,” he said.
Casinos get influencer-friendly
Brian Christopher is a well-known YouTube influencer whose channel, Brian Christopher Slots, has amassed an audience of nearly 300,000 loyal fans.
He frequently visits casino floors in Southern California and elsewhere in the country to film videos of himself checking out the newest and most popular slot games. His channel and videos have grown more sophisticated over time, and now he also livestreams from gaming floors.
“We’re always trying to go the next step and see what else we can do that’s new and different and exciting,” he said.
Filming slots may not seem that groundbreaking when everyone has a video camera on their phone, but what Christopher is doing was — and still is — taboo. Many casinos still shy away from filming on the gaming floor, but some are warming up to it.
Arceo said Christopher was the first influencer San Manuel worked with after loosening the policy on taking photos and videos of slot play nearly 5 years ago.
Since that time, because of Christopher’s popularity, and San Manuel’s easy-going policy, the casino has seen more influencers putting together similar content — and they seem to be getting results.
“When we see people coming in within a day or two, or sometimes hours after a broadcast, then we know it works because it’s stimulated someone to get out of their house or wherever they’re at, walk in the door and search for the game that they just saw someone playing online,” he said.
The impact of the pandemic
Some casinos have even utilized influencers to help with their communication during the coronavirus pandemic.
When San Manuel reopened after a months-long closure on June 15, they invited Christopher and several other influencers to spread the word about the reopening and the casino’s safety precautions.
“We just said, ‘Look, when you come here, feel free to tell your followers what the difference is’,” Arceo said.
In his video, Christopher shared details about San Manuel doing two temperature checks and said he thought it was smart that staff had been professionally trained to ask COVID screening questions. Another YouTuber was quick to point out the thermal cameras and plexiglass.
And having someone else share that made all the difference, Arceo said.
“We can say it all day long, but I think when people see real people talking about it then it’s received better that way,” he said.
Lussier said she saw the number of influencers visiting Harrah’s decrease after it reopened from its coronavirus closure in May, which she attributed that to people being cautious about traveling and staying in hotels.
“We’ve seen a steady increase throughout the year, and now I feel like we’re cranking,” Lussier said. ” We’re almost back to where we were pre-COVID.”
Arceo anticipates that social media influencing will continue to rise in prominence and more people will adopt it as part of their strategy.
“I think most people don’t understand it,” he said. “They shy away from it because they don’t understand how it works, but I think just like anything else, once people get the hang of it and see how successful others have been with it, I think they’ll follow suit.”
But these perks aren’t being showered on just high rollers anymore; they’re increasingly being provided to social media influencers, whose currency is measured in views and followers rather than credit lines or stacks of cash.
As the role of social media continues to increase in society, casinos have increasingly embraced influencers — people who promote products or experiences for their niche but relatively large audiences on social media — hoping that their posts and videos will translate to more visitors walking through the casino doors.
Casinos such as San Manuel Casino near Highland, Morongo Casino, Resort & Spa near Cabazon and Harrah’s Resort Southern California in Northern San Diego County have brought influencers in for visits to expand their marketing reach, sometimes sharing new amenities or promotions at the properties and other times capitalizing on an idea from the influencer.
This shouldn’t be a surprise: Influencers have come into their own as marketing forces in the last few years in a range of industries, and so it’s unsurprising that casinos would want in on the action.
It’s a marked change from the early 2000s when people were often bothered by the idea that a blogger was being paid or doing product placement in their writing, said Heather Honea, chair of the marketing department at the Fowler College of Business at San Diego State University. However, with today’s social media influencers, people accept that the job is basically product placement — as long as the products endorsed fit the influencer’s brand.
According to guidelines issued by the Federal Trade Commission, influencers have to disclose when they’ve been paid or received something of significant value in exchange for their endorsement. However, if they receive a product for free with the expectation that they’ll promote or discuss the product, they don’t have to disclose that.
To attract influencers, casinos might promise lavish experiences or grant the influencer early access to a new amenity.
At Harrah’s Resort Southern California, time is spent getting to know influencers and what it is they’re looking to promote before they’re brought on the property so that a specialized itinerary can be put together to capitalize on the partnership, said Amber Lussier, Harrah’s director of resort marketing.
At Harrah’s, part of the marketing is telling the story of its own city, “Funner,” which has included honorary celebrity mayors such as David Hasselhoff and Rob Riggle. The swearing-in of the new mayor of Funner is one of the biggest influencer events at the resort.
“We really roll out the red the carpet and we customize everything that we do for them so when they show up, they’re going to walk out to a cabana that’s fully decked out with maybe a foot bath and their favorite beer in a bucket of ice and some balloons and decorations,” Lussier said.
San Manuel Casino has worked with influencers for almost five years, said General Manager Peter Arceo, and they have become an important part of the casino’s marketing strategy, particularly when the complex opens a new venue or amenity.
Fitting the brand
Some casinos are more selective in their approach to influencers.
Morongo Casino, Resort & Spa only does two or three engagements with influencers a year, according to Executive Director of Marketing Simon Farmer.
He said that the casino looks at a variety of factors beyond how many followers an influencer may have. Casino officials will consider the influencer’s content, how they represent themselves, what demographics they’re speaking to and where their audience is located. He said that if an influencer does not draw in an audience that’s traditionally apt to gamble or visit a casino, or if that audience is in a different geographic area, then they may not be the best choice to work with.
“It’s not simply reach or exposure for the sake of exposure that we’re looking for; we’re looking for effective exposure,” Farmer said.
Honea said that having a small audience isn’t necessarily a bad thing either.
“It can be really valuable to get a little more niche where they have a really committed set of loyal followers,” she said.
Michael Felci, public relations manager for Fantasy Springs Resort Casino in Indio, said Fantasy Springs doesn’t currently work with influencers. He said getting people in to play on the gaming floor is the most important thing and that Fantasy Springs’ research indicated there wasn’t enough of a crossover between their gaming customer base and social influencers.
“We haven’t seen enough data on that to make it a relevant thing for us at this point,” he said.
Casinos get influencer-friendly
Brian Christopher is a well-known YouTube influencer whose channel, Brian Christopher Slots, has amassed an audience of nearly 300,000 loyal fans.
He frequently visits casino floors in Southern California and elsewhere in the country to film videos of himself checking out the newest and most popular slot games. His channel and videos have grown more sophisticated over time, and now he also livestreams from gaming floors.
“We’re always trying to go the next step and see what else we can do that’s new and different and exciting,” he said.
Filming slots may not seem that groundbreaking when everyone has a video camera on their phone, but what Christopher is doing was — and still is — taboo. Many casinos still shy away from filming on the gaming floor, but some are warming up to it.
Arceo said Christopher was the first influencer San Manuel worked with after loosening the policy on taking photos and videos of slot play nearly 5 years ago.
Since that time, because of Christopher’s popularity, and San Manuel’s easy-going policy, the casino has seen more influencers putting together similar content — and they seem to be getting results.
“When we see people coming in within a day or two, or sometimes hours after a broadcast, then we know it works because it’s stimulated someone to get out of their house or wherever they’re at, walk in the door and search for the game that they just saw someone playing online,” he said.
The impact of the pandemic
Some casinos have even utilized influencers to help with their communication during the coronavirus pandemic.
When San Manuel reopened after a months-long closure on June 15, they invited Christopher and several other influencers to spread the word about the reopening and the casino’s safety precautions.
“We just said, ‘Look, when you come here, feel free to tell your followers what the difference is’,” Arceo said.
In his video, Christopher shared details about San Manuel doing two temperature checks and said he thought it was smart that staff had been professionally trained to ask COVID screening questions. Another YouTuber was quick to point out the thermal cameras and plexiglass.
And having someone else share that made all the difference, Arceo said.
“We can say it all day long, but I think when people see real people talking about it then it’s received better that way,” he said.
Lussier said she saw the number of influencers visiting Harrah’s decrease after it reopened from its coronavirus closure in May, which she attributed that to people being cautious about traveling and staying in hotels.
“We’ve seen a steady increase throughout the year, and now I feel like we’re cranking,” Lussier said. ” We’re almost back to where we were pre-COVID.”
Arceo anticipates that social media influencing will continue to rise in prominence and more people will adopt it as part of their strategy.
“I think most people don’t understand it,” he said. “They shy away from it because they don’t understand how it works, but I think just like anything else, once people get the hang of it and see how successful others have been with it, I think they’ll follow suit.”
Brian Christopher has his own channel on You Tube, Brian Christopher Slots, with nearly 300,000 subscribers and more than 180 million views. He plays slot machines all over Southern California. Pictured is Christopher doing one of his live shows at Agua Caliente Resort Casino Spa Rancho Mirage on Thursday, Oct. 8, 2020. (Photo by Terry Pierson, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG)
Virtual G2E
Property leaders discuss ‘the ‘scramble drill’ in closing and reopening casino
by Howard Stutz, CDC Gaming Reports · October 14, 2020
Property leaders discuss ‘the ‘scramble drill’ in closing and reopening casino
by Howard Stutz, CDC Gaming Reports · October 14, 2020
Top left, moderator Brian Christopher; bottom left, Hollywood Toledo GM Justin Carter; top right, Firekeepers CEO Kathy George; bottom right, Coeur d’Alene CEO Laura Stensgar.
When word came down in mid-March that Ohio’s gaming market was closing due to the spreading coronavirus pandemic, Hollywood Casino Toledo General Manager Justin Carter sent members of his team to the neighboring Home Depot to purchase heavy-duty locks for the building’s front doors.
The property operates 24/7, so the deadbolts were rarely used.
“When you have to lock the doors to a casino, that’s never a good thing,” Carter said during an hour-long panel discussion Wednesday, which served as a prelude to this month’s Virtual Global Gaming Expo.
“Fortunately, we had an idea (the closing would be announced). We were able to move quickly because we had to close by midnight,” Carter said. “The scramble drill started.”
Nearly 1,000 commercial and tribal casinos in 43 states closed throughout March when governors, regulators, and tribal governments ordered the shutdown in an effort to slow the pandemic. Roughly 90% of the properties have reopened.
Laura Stensgar, CEO of Coeur d’Alene resort in Idaho, said her state’s shutdown was only anticipated to last a couple of weeks but went on for five weeks until the property reopened in early May. Coeur d’Alene, which is operated by the Coeur d’Alene Tribe, was the first casino in the country to reopen.
“We wanted to ensure safety and always be looked upon as a good community member,” said Stensgar, noting the tribe and management reviewed numerous government and Centers for Disease Control health and safety guidelines and the protocols authored by Wynn Resorts in Las Vegas.
Carter and Stensgar were joined by Kathy George, CEO of Firekeepers Casino in Michigan, during the discussion titled. “Leading through COVID-19.” The session was moderated by social influencer Brian Christopher, who publishes BCSlots.com.
The Virtual G2E is scheduled for Oct. 27-29 and is a substitute for the annual G2E conference and tradeshow in Las Vegas, which was canceled due to the pandemic.
The discussion covered both the issues surrounding closing down a property during an emergency, but also how to reopen safely under new guidelines. At the outset, Christopher asked the three property leaders if the casinos’ revenues had increased year-over-year. All three answered yes.
George said the key was the Firekeepers’ employees, who had many additional job duties in wake of the ongoing pandemic.
“They embraced all the business protocols and we hired extra staff to clean and sanitize areas of the property,” George said. “We felt the need to increase communication more with both our customers and our employees.”
She added that some of the new communications efforts will continue beyond the pandemic.
Carter said he found himself doing different jobs to help get the Hollywood property open. The casino was one of the first entertainment locations to open in the Toledo area when the state allowed gaming to restart in early June.
“We were able to learn from what others were doing,” he said. “It was all hands on deck to do any job we could so we could reopen our facility. We wanted to create an environment of fun and service while protecting people and making them feel safe.”
That said, Hollywood Toledo had “gallons of hand sanitizer” and “secured very bit of alcohol wipes” to add to the health and safety guidelines.
All three executives their customer make-ups had changed, with properties skewing younger and others attracting an older crowd. Stensgar said a good portion of the Coeur d’Alene’s customer base comes from neighboring Canada, the border crossing has been closed due to the pandemic.
“We have been able to regain revenues because we’re attracting true gamers. Some customers came from competitors that had not opened,” Stensgar said.
The return of non-gaming entertainment is being viewed as a potential boost for next year.
George said Firekeepers’ entertainment line-up all picked out new dates for 2021. Stensgar said comedian Bill Engvall is the property’s first planned headliner for Feb. 26, 2021.
“We’re keeping our fingers crossed,” she said.
Howard Stutz is the executive editor of CDC Gaming Reports. He can be reached at hstutz@cdcgaming.com. Follow @howardstutz on Twitter.
CDC Gaming Reports
Three casino operators to share COVID-19 reopening experiences for virtual G2E kick-off
by Howard Stutz, CDC Gaming Reports · September 16, 2020
The virtual Global Gaming Expo will kick-off on Oct. 14 with a discussion involving three casino operators with first-hand experience reopening their regional and tribal gaming properties following the COVID-19 pandemic shut down this spring.
Producers of G2E – the American Gaming Association and Reed Exhibitions – said the event is a prelude to the two-day virtual conference, scheduled for Oct. 27-28, with a program that includes keynote addresses, education sessions, pre-planned meetings, and networking opportunities.
In the Wednesday morning (8 a.m. PT, 11 a.m. ET) session, Justin Carter, general manager of Hollywood Casino Toledo in Ohio; Kathy George, CEO of Firekeepers Casino in Michigan; and Laura Stensgar, CEO of Coeur d’Alene resort in Idaho, will participate in the discussion on how the pandemic has impacted employees, communities, and business.
Nearly 1,000 commercial and tribal casinos in 43 states closed when governors, regulators, and tribal governments ordered the shutdown during the middle of March in an effort to slow the spreading coronavirus pandemic. Nearly 90% of the properties have reopened.
Brian Christopher, a social influencer for casinos and slot machines who publishes BCSlots.com and two channels on YouTube, will lead the discussion on how the casino operators lead through the crisis and create strategies to move forward.
Christopher wrote a commentary for CDC Gaming Reports in August detailing his visit to 21 casinos in nine states following the more than two months of shutdowns.
“From the kickoff keynote to our last networking session, the goal for G2E 2020 is to provide insights, connections, and business opportunities that participants cannot find elsewhere and directly support our industry’s recovery,” Cait DeBaun, AGA’s senior director of strategic communications and responsibility, said in a statement.
The virtual G2E is replacing the annual three-day event in Las Vegas that was canceled by organizers in July due to global travel restrictions and currently unknown guidance on large public gatherings during the pandemic.
G2E’s two-day program will offer networking, business opportunities, and feature content from thought leaders to share perspectives on pressing gaming industry topics, including COVID-19 recovery, modernization of payments, tribal gaming, and the expansion of legalized sports betting in America.
G2E’s virtual platform will also enable exhibitors and buyers to conduct business through virtual showrooms, product demos, AI-driven matchmaking, and one-on-one meetings.
“Every year, G2E spotlights the latest trends through education and product discovery and facilitates personal connections that empower gaming companies and industry leaders for success,” said Korbi Carrison, G2E’s event director. “This year will be no exception. We’re excited for the opportunity G2E’s virtual format gives us to expand the universe of speakers and reach larger audiences worldwide.”
Additional details can be found at https://www.globalgamingexpo.com/virtual-event/.
G2E, the casino industry’s largest conference and tradeshow, was planned for October 5-8 at the Sands Expo and Convention Center in Las Vegas. Current Nevada state regulations ban public gatherings of 50 people or more and the state also saw a spike of COVID-19 infections during the summer.
G2E attracts nearly 30,000 attendees annually from across the globe, including top executives and managers from the industry’s largest manufacturers and gaming equipment providers. The world’s top casino operators, sports betting companies, and FinTech and digital payments facilitators, are often represented at G2E.
Organizers said they have scheduled the 2021 G2E from October 4-7 at the Sands Expo.
Howard Stutz is the executive editor of CDC Gaming Reports. He can be reached at hstutz@cdcgaming.com. Follow @howardstutz on Twitter.
Producers of G2E – the American Gaming Association and Reed Exhibitions – said the event is a prelude to the two-day virtual conference, scheduled for Oct. 27-28, with a program that includes keynote addresses, education sessions, pre-planned meetings, and networking opportunities.
In the Wednesday morning (8 a.m. PT, 11 a.m. ET) session, Justin Carter, general manager of Hollywood Casino Toledo in Ohio; Kathy George, CEO of Firekeepers Casino in Michigan; and Laura Stensgar, CEO of Coeur d’Alene resort in Idaho, will participate in the discussion on how the pandemic has impacted employees, communities, and business.
Nearly 1,000 commercial and tribal casinos in 43 states closed when governors, regulators, and tribal governments ordered the shutdown during the middle of March in an effort to slow the spreading coronavirus pandemic. Nearly 90% of the properties have reopened.
Brian Christopher, a social influencer for casinos and slot machines who publishes BCSlots.com and two channels on YouTube, will lead the discussion on how the casino operators lead through the crisis and create strategies to move forward.
Christopher wrote a commentary for CDC Gaming Reports in August detailing his visit to 21 casinos in nine states following the more than two months of shutdowns.
“From the kickoff keynote to our last networking session, the goal for G2E 2020 is to provide insights, connections, and business opportunities that participants cannot find elsewhere and directly support our industry’s recovery,” Cait DeBaun, AGA’s senior director of strategic communications and responsibility, said in a statement.
The virtual G2E is replacing the annual three-day event in Las Vegas that was canceled by organizers in July due to global travel restrictions and currently unknown guidance on large public gatherings during the pandemic.
G2E’s two-day program will offer networking, business opportunities, and feature content from thought leaders to share perspectives on pressing gaming industry topics, including COVID-19 recovery, modernization of payments, tribal gaming, and the expansion of legalized sports betting in America.
G2E’s virtual platform will also enable exhibitors and buyers to conduct business through virtual showrooms, product demos, AI-driven matchmaking, and one-on-one meetings.
“Every year, G2E spotlights the latest trends through education and product discovery and facilitates personal connections that empower gaming companies and industry leaders for success,” said Korbi Carrison, G2E’s event director. “This year will be no exception. We’re excited for the opportunity G2E’s virtual format gives us to expand the universe of speakers and reach larger audiences worldwide.”
Additional details can be found at https://www.globalgamingexpo.com/virtual-event/.
G2E, the casino industry’s largest conference and tradeshow, was planned for October 5-8 at the Sands Expo and Convention Center in Las Vegas. Current Nevada state regulations ban public gatherings of 50 people or more and the state also saw a spike of COVID-19 infections during the summer.
G2E attracts nearly 30,000 attendees annually from across the globe, including top executives and managers from the industry’s largest manufacturers and gaming equipment providers. The world’s top casino operators, sports betting companies, and FinTech and digital payments facilitators, are often represented at G2E.
Organizers said they have scheduled the 2021 G2E from October 4-7 at the Sands Expo.
Howard Stutz is the executive editor of CDC Gaming Reports. He can be reached at hstutz@cdcgaming.com. Follow @howardstutz on Twitter.
CDC Gaming Reports
21 casinos. 9 states. 107 days. This player’s journey of staying COVID-19 free.
by Brian Christopher, CDC Gaming Reports · August 18, 2020
Brian Christopher at Coeur D’Alene Casino
I’d like to take a gamble that I have visited more casinos in the U.S. since they re-opened post COVID-19 than anyone else.
Since attending the first major casino re-opening by Coeur D’Alene Casino in Idaho the first week of May, I have visited a total of 21 casinos across nine states. I have done so with the utmost care and precaution, while ensuring to follow all state guidelines. Having been tested numerous times, I have never held a trace of antibodies and continue to test negative as recent as a few days ago at the time of writing this article.
As a social influencer for casinos, my followers look to me for guidance and answers. So, I took it upon myself to show them what life is like now in casinos. The results varied – some casinos went above and beyond their required duties, while others fell far behind.
The best casinos I visited implemented the following rules:
And most importantly…
The properties who exceeded my expectations took extra steps including providing a clean pen for every guest when signing receipts (putting the dirty one to a “sanitize later” pile), wiping down the counters between each guest, taking temperature checks from peoples cars prior to entering the property and allowing patrons to press the ‘service’ button in order to get a slot machine. Some went too far in my opinion, like not providing soap or shampoo in the hotel room or making the room key expire every single day in order to have guests take a new temperature check to get the key. Of course, I’d much prefer they go too far than not far enough.
The casinos I visited that put the least effort into making a safe environment had no mask policy in place (though were eventually forced to), removed “some” amount of chairs from the gaming floor, and had zero enforcement for mask wearing or social distancing. There were even some dance floors open with zero masks worn.
In the casinos that allowed it, smoking proved to be a major issue that negated other preventative measures.
Aside from the fact the US is one of the few countries left in the world that has no nationwide restrictions on smoking indoors, being a non-smoker in a smoking casino and wearing mask was completely horrific. It also proved to me that by allowing patrons to smoke in casinos basically gave them a hall pass to walk around mask-free so long as a cigarette was in their hand.
Fast-forward over 100 days from the first re-openings and I’m sad to report that while COVID-19 cases are on the rise, many casinos have eliminated most of their original implementations. Casinos have gone from turning off every other slot machine and/or removing half of the chairs to the approach that seems to say ‘We prefer to leave all slot machines turned on and let the players decide how to social distance on their own’. The ones I talked to claimed they felt bad turning off machines that some people would specifically want to play.
My safety should not be a gamble when walking into a casino. I have visited 21 casinos with varying levels of rules in place and have managed to stay safe and healthy while enjoying casino amenities. By sticking to the guidelines of wearing a mask (triple-layered are cheap and effective), washing your hands often and not touching your face, you can help mitigate risk.
Casinos are among the most populated areas allowed open at the moment, so another wave coming could result in them being shut down again. Just this week, increasing cases in Illinois have prompted the government to enact an earlier closing time on casinos in the St. Louis-area. To ensure they remain open, casinos simply must put the health and safety of all its customers and staff first.
Brian Christopher is a top social media influencer for casinos and slot machines. He manages BCSlots.com and two channels on YouTube with a combined audience of over 300,000. He can be reached at brian@bcslots.com.
Since attending the first major casino re-opening by Coeur D’Alene Casino in Idaho the first week of May, I have visited a total of 21 casinos across nine states. I have done so with the utmost care and precaution, while ensuring to follow all state guidelines. Having been tested numerous times, I have never held a trace of antibodies and continue to test negative as recent as a few days ago at the time of writing this article.
As a social influencer for casinos, my followers look to me for guidance and answers. So, I took it upon myself to show them what life is like now in casinos. The results varied – some casinos went above and beyond their required duties, while others fell far behind.
The best casinos I visited implemented the following rules:
- Went smoke-free (over 150 casinos have!) and moved the smoking section to outdoors only
- Turned off every other slot machine
- Temperature checks and questions about exposure at the door
- Socially distanced tables at restaurant and closed bartop seated service
And most importantly…
- Staff followed AND enforced the above policies
The properties who exceeded my expectations took extra steps including providing a clean pen for every guest when signing receipts (putting the dirty one to a “sanitize later” pile), wiping down the counters between each guest, taking temperature checks from peoples cars prior to entering the property and allowing patrons to press the ‘service’ button in order to get a slot machine. Some went too far in my opinion, like not providing soap or shampoo in the hotel room or making the room key expire every single day in order to have guests take a new temperature check to get the key. Of course, I’d much prefer they go too far than not far enough.
The casinos I visited that put the least effort into making a safe environment had no mask policy in place (though were eventually forced to), removed “some” amount of chairs from the gaming floor, and had zero enforcement for mask wearing or social distancing. There were even some dance floors open with zero masks worn.
In the casinos that allowed it, smoking proved to be a major issue that negated other preventative measures.
Aside from the fact the US is one of the few countries left in the world that has no nationwide restrictions on smoking indoors, being a non-smoker in a smoking casino and wearing mask was completely horrific. It also proved to me that by allowing patrons to smoke in casinos basically gave them a hall pass to walk around mask-free so long as a cigarette was in their hand.
Fast-forward over 100 days from the first re-openings and I’m sad to report that while COVID-19 cases are on the rise, many casinos have eliminated most of their original implementations. Casinos have gone from turning off every other slot machine and/or removing half of the chairs to the approach that seems to say ‘We prefer to leave all slot machines turned on and let the players decide how to social distance on their own’. The ones I talked to claimed they felt bad turning off machines that some people would specifically want to play.
My safety should not be a gamble when walking into a casino. I have visited 21 casinos with varying levels of rules in place and have managed to stay safe and healthy while enjoying casino amenities. By sticking to the guidelines of wearing a mask (triple-layered are cheap and effective), washing your hands often and not touching your face, you can help mitigate risk.
Casinos are among the most populated areas allowed open at the moment, so another wave coming could result in them being shut down again. Just this week, increasing cases in Illinois have prompted the government to enact an earlier closing time on casinos in the St. Louis-area. To ensure they remain open, casinos simply must put the health and safety of all its customers and staff first.
Brian Christopher is a top social media influencer for casinos and slot machines. He manages BCSlots.com and two channels on YouTube with a combined audience of over 300,000. He can be reached at brian@bcslots.com.
CDC Gaming Reports
Smoking ban would prove casinos want to protect health
by Mark Gruetze, CDC Gaming Reports · July 20, 2020 at 4:00 pm
A leading YouTube influencer on a mission to extol the fun and excitement of slot machines has a message for casinos: If you’re serious about protecting health, ban smoking now.
“This is the best time to make this change,” says Brian Christopher, who has more than 300,000 YouTube followers for daily videos showing him playing slots at casinos throughout the United States. “If we make this change right now (after the coronavirus closures), people will come back. And they will stay and they will play. Nobody’s going to give up gambling just because they can’t have a cigarette while doing it.”
He says a survey on his site, available here, backs up his claim. The survey, written in conjunction with the American Nonsmokers Rights Foundation, is still accepting responses. As of July 18, Christopher says, 1,300 people had filled it out, with these results:
Christopher, originally from Canada, now lives in Los Angeles, where he moved several years ago in hopes of starting an acting career. That path hasn’t worked out yet, but he started posting videos of himself playing slots after a family trip to Las Vegas. In about three months, he had 4,349 subscribers and was invited to join the YouTube partner program, according to his blog. He put acting on hold and now has two YouTube channels, plus 70,000 followers on Facebook and 20,000 on Instagram. He says he’s the world’s number-one influencer on slot machines and casinos.
A few months after starting his YouTube slots channel, he attended the Global Gaming Expo in Las Vegas, saw the ANRF booth and offered to help its campaign. The foundation is a non-lobbying, educational, nonprofit organization that provides resources for schools, health departments, medical organizations, and others interested in issues involving smoking and secondhand smoke. Its projects include SmokeFreeCasinos.org, which focuses on secondhand smoking risks to staff and customers in America’s commercial and tribal casinos and other gaming facilities.
A former smoker, Christopher says America’s smoking rules flabbergasted him. “My jaw hit the floor when I saw people smoking in casinos still,” he says. “I had no idea that people could still do that anywhere in the world.”
The foundation has sponsored some of Christopher’s casino trips, as have casinos and slot manufacturers. Christopher says all his gambling money comes from his own pocket.
His current travel plans include a stop in Oklahoma, five days in Maryland, then on to Oregon and back to Oklahoma for four days. He posts at least one 30- to 90-minute video every day and does two to four live streams per week.
He declines to give his age publicly, but classifies himself as a Millennial, the generation that supposedly doesn’t enjoy slot machines. “I love everything about slots,” he says. “It’s the thrill, the excitement. And it’s something I’ve done with my friends a lot.”
Casinos trying to attract Millennials should do a better job of soliciting their opinions and listening to them, he says, rather than doing what they think is exciting. “We (Millennials) are different birds, and we do like to keep our money more,” he says. “We’ve learned that from our parents.”
He says his father worked his life at a job he did not like, staying only because it paid a good wage.
“He instilled in me to make sure you follow your dreams and your passions and be happy and not follow the buck. I think that’s what our generation is all about. We do want to have fun, but we also want to be responsible about it and not throw all our money away.”
He noted that more than 150 casinos nationwide have become nonsmoking, at least temporarily, since the coronavirus shutdowns. He urges casinos to make that change permanent.
“It’s really important to look outside of the United States at countries that have made the change and have made it work,” he says. The smoke-free approach protects staff, reduces sick days, and cuts expenses such as ventilation and cleaning.
“Honestly, if you really want to earn long-term gamblers,” Christopher adds, “wouldn’t you want them to live longer?”
“This is the best time to make this change,” says Brian Christopher, who has more than 300,000 YouTube followers for daily videos showing him playing slots at casinos throughout the United States. “If we make this change right now (after the coronavirus closures), people will come back. And they will stay and they will play. Nobody’s going to give up gambling just because they can’t have a cigarette while doing it.”
He says a survey on his site, available here, backs up his claim. The survey, written in conjunction with the American Nonsmokers Rights Foundation, is still accepting responses. As of July 18, Christopher says, 1,300 people had filled it out, with these results:
- 20 percent of respondents are full-time smokers (the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say the most recent nationwide figure is 13.7 percent).
- 78 percent say now is the time to make casinos smoke-free.
- 82 percent of the smokers say they would patronize non-smoking casinos that offer an outdoor area with slot machines where smoking is allowed.
- 94 percent of respondents believe secondhand smoke is harmful to health.
Christopher, originally from Canada, now lives in Los Angeles, where he moved several years ago in hopes of starting an acting career. That path hasn’t worked out yet, but he started posting videos of himself playing slots after a family trip to Las Vegas. In about three months, he had 4,349 subscribers and was invited to join the YouTube partner program, according to his blog. He put acting on hold and now has two YouTube channels, plus 70,000 followers on Facebook and 20,000 on Instagram. He says he’s the world’s number-one influencer on slot machines and casinos.
A few months after starting his YouTube slots channel, he attended the Global Gaming Expo in Las Vegas, saw the ANRF booth and offered to help its campaign. The foundation is a non-lobbying, educational, nonprofit organization that provides resources for schools, health departments, medical organizations, and others interested in issues involving smoking and secondhand smoke. Its projects include SmokeFreeCasinos.org, which focuses on secondhand smoking risks to staff and customers in America’s commercial and tribal casinos and other gaming facilities.
A former smoker, Christopher says America’s smoking rules flabbergasted him. “My jaw hit the floor when I saw people smoking in casinos still,” he says. “I had no idea that people could still do that anywhere in the world.”
The foundation has sponsored some of Christopher’s casino trips, as have casinos and slot manufacturers. Christopher says all his gambling money comes from his own pocket.
His current travel plans include a stop in Oklahoma, five days in Maryland, then on to Oregon and back to Oklahoma for four days. He posts at least one 30- to 90-minute video every day and does two to four live streams per week.
He declines to give his age publicly, but classifies himself as a Millennial, the generation that supposedly doesn’t enjoy slot machines. “I love everything about slots,” he says. “It’s the thrill, the excitement. And it’s something I’ve done with my friends a lot.”
Casinos trying to attract Millennials should do a better job of soliciting their opinions and listening to them, he says, rather than doing what they think is exciting. “We (Millennials) are different birds, and we do like to keep our money more,” he says. “We’ve learned that from our parents.”
He says his father worked his life at a job he did not like, staying only because it paid a good wage.
“He instilled in me to make sure you follow your dreams and your passions and be happy and not follow the buck. I think that’s what our generation is all about. We do want to have fun, but we also want to be responsible about it and not throw all our money away.”
He noted that more than 150 casinos nationwide have become nonsmoking, at least temporarily, since the coronavirus shutdowns. He urges casinos to make that change permanent.
“It’s really important to look outside of the United States at countries that have made the change and have made it work,” he says. The smoke-free approach protects staff, reduces sick days, and cuts expenses such as ventilation and cleaning.
“Honestly, if you really want to earn long-term gamblers,” Christopher adds, “wouldn’t you want them to live longer?”
Global Gaming Business
Slot Stars Bring New Audience to the Gaming Floor
by Frank Legato · December 8, 2019
Photo Courtesy by Global Gaming Business
The phenomenon of YouTube “slot influencers” has more casinos allowing filming on the slot floor. Among the most popular: Brian Christopher (l.), whose BCSlots YouTube channel has more than 200,000 subscribers and more than 4 million views per month.
Gambling in a casino traditionally was an anonymous activity. Players didn’t want to be known, to the point that many have resisted joining slot clubs to retain their anonymity. Consequently, outside of planned marketing, casinos traditionally forbade customers from even taking pictures inside a casino.
In general, you won’t get thrown out of a casino for snapping a cellphone photo of a slot jackpot these days, although in most places, it’s still officially frowned upon—and some casinos still forbid even a simple Instagram moment.
However, as more casinos warm up to the benefits of social media, those old traditions are beginning to fade. Some casinos now not only permit pictures, but a once-unthinkable practice—random video of gambling inside a casino.
The rise of YouTube and other social networks led to a new type of celebrity—the “YouTube star,” also called a “social media influencer.” These are people who establish credibility in a certain activity or industry and develop a large audience of followers on a social network. The No. 1 YouTube channel is Pewdiepie, run by Swedish comedian Felix Kjellberg, who hosts videos to more than 100 million followers worldwide in which he introduces and plays video games.
It was only a matter of time before the YouTube phenomenon reached casinos, where a number of channels are now run by “slot influencers” who pick a slot game and stream iPhone videos of themselves spinning reels, getting bonus rounds and winning jackpots. They host the sessions as if they were hosting a TV show or sporting event, doing play-by-play for every spin and getting excited like a sports announcer when big wins hit. And YouTubers eat it up, with slot-influencer YouTube videos garnering hundreds of thousands of views.
Some of the slot influencers are like rock stars on a casino floor, with instant recognition from fans who spend hours watching videos introducing the newest slot games. One of the most popular is Brian Christopher, whose BCSlots YouTube channel boasts more than 200,000 subscribers and more than 4 million views per month.
In the three years since Christopher began using an iPhone to film his own slot play, his fans have amassed 124 million views of his videos. The majority of Christopher’s fans are aged 18 to 44. Two-thirds are male, and most watch on their phones. In other words, Christopher’s followers are in the sweet spot of the younger demographic casinos are beginning to court to eventually replace the older female demographic that’s dominated the slot floor traditionally. And many casinos are beginning to welcome him with “open filming policies.”
Christopher, a former actor, launched his YouTube channel as a hobby in 2016. It’s now his full-time job. He tours casinos across the country, drawing crowds as he streams video of slot games in action. He even has an executive assistant who provides a second camera angle. Fans cheer him on as he plays, and thousands watch online. His YouTube channel hosts more than 1,700 videos, and they also are available on bcslots.com, his website. He has more than 10,000 email subscribers.
Casinos are taking notice. Mohegan Sun recently flew Christopher to Connecticut for that property’s first-ever live stream of slot play. While most big Las Vegas Strip casinos still forbid video, Christopher and other influencers are welcomed at the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas because he brings his fans in the door with him, and his business is beginning to spread across the country as the pre-internet barriers begin to tumble.
“I wasn’t the first person to upload my slot play,” Christopher told GGB News. “There are a few channels that had already started doing that, but after my channel started, it definitely started going in a whole new direction.
“Cosmo is the only location on Strip that has an open filming policy. A few others have allowed some filming on occasion, including the Linq, Wynn, Aria and MGM, but it’s not necessarily the rule. I have yet to start visiting local casinos, but we have commenced reaching out to them recently. We have worked with multiple casinos in Michigan, Indiana, Atlantic City, Maryland, Oklahoma, Reno, Vegas, California and New York—around two dozen casinos and growing.”
Christopher says the growth of his fan base was 100 percent organic. “It was word of mouth, mainly,” he said. “I was completely shocked when my numbers started rising so fast at the beginning, because I was new to the whole YouTube world. And it just keeps growing, and whenever I see fans, most of them say, ‘Oh my sisters or my husband used to watch you all the time and now I watch.’”
Slot influencers also are the only people who can actually make a living playing slot machines, through ads on their YouTube pages, subscriptions, and swag sold on their websites. “Sometimes we’ll have sponsors for some videos, and there are other ways of generating income,” Christopher said.
While the number of casinos that allow folks like Christopher to do their thing is growing, he says San Manuel Casino in Highland, California and the Cosmopolitan and Plaza in Las Vegas are currently his biggest hosts.
“Social media influencers have been around since the early days of blogging,” Peter Arceo, general manager of San Manuel Casino, told GGB News. “I have always been on the lookout for positive influencers in our industry. I get excited when I see people having fun in videos from our floor and enjoying the thrilling atmosphere that our team works very hard to create for our guests.
“Working with influencers allows us to show how much fun our casino can be for slot players. Some audiences prefer to receive information through the lens of a person that they have come to trust and whose content they enjoy, rather than content published directly from a casino. Allowing an influencer to convey their perspective and their experience to their audience is just another way for us to reach those people.”
“I can absolutely say that the Cosmopolitan was the first in Vegas to embrace the slot filming community,” said Kevin Sweet, vice president of slot operations and marketing at the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas, in an interview with GGB News. “There was always a stigma that filming in a casino was completely illegal, which simply wasn’t true. We live in a social age. It’s 2019, and everyone has a cellphone. We can’t run from technology or the world around us. It was common sense from my perspective to find a way to let this type of activity happen in our casino.
“I’ve been pretty active with the slot influencer community since early 2016. I am in full support of anything that increases the popularity and reach of casino gaming, and slot-playing videos being posted on YouTube or live-streamed certainly do that.”
Sweet said there are simple ground rules, such as limiting filming to handheld devices and limiting videos to a player and one machine, but the activity boosts business, so it’s welcome.
The influencers appreciate it. “At the San Manuel and the Cosmo, anyone can just record their slot play if they want to or take photos, and they’re encouraged to do so,” Christopher said. “I was stopped by a security guard at the Cosmo and he said, ‘I just wanted you to know that what you’re doing is totally fine with us.’ And because of that, all my fans go to those two casinos.”
San Manuel’s Arceo says the influencer phenomenon has broadened the casino’s audience. “It has widened the audience of people who have become familiar with the San Manuel Casino brand,” he said. “People from as far away as Hawaii have talked to me about Brian. In fact, my cousins in Hawaii have told me that they watch his videos and can’t wait to visit the casinos that Brian has featured.
“We’ve done controlled tests, and in one case allowed Brian to host an event that was attended purely by his audience. The results were great, which is why we continue to work with influencers.”
Sweet reports similar results at the Cosmo. “For every one complaint or issue we encounter in this space, there are 25 interactions where a customer asks a member of my slot team about a machine location because they saw their favorite streamer playing it at my casino and now they want to go play it,” he said. “I don’t think it’s attracting any one particular demographic. This isn’t a millennial play, in my opinion. This is a play for people who like gambling, who like to see nice slot jackpots, and for people who share an interest and want to belong to a larger community.”
According to Christopher, while there is still widespread resistance to filming or even photographing slot play, things are slowly changing. “I know fans who have been removed from casinos because they didn’t want to delete a (jackpot) photo off their phone. And, I’ve been removed from the casino once before because I filmed a bonus.
“We’re slowly breaking down those barriers. We just filmed in Palm Springs, and it was the first time that they allowed such a thing, and part of it was due to the fact that they had some new people coming in because of social media. They recognize the power of an influencer.”
“Some of these influencers themselves partner with cruise lines and bring hundreds of people out for weeklong cruises; it’s very impressive,” said the Cosmopolitan’s Sweet. “Maybe I should hire them as casino hosts.”
Gambling in a casino traditionally was an anonymous activity. Players didn’t want to be known, to the point that many have resisted joining slot clubs to retain their anonymity. Consequently, outside of planned marketing, casinos traditionally forbade customers from even taking pictures inside a casino.
In general, you won’t get thrown out of a casino for snapping a cellphone photo of a slot jackpot these days, although in most places, it’s still officially frowned upon—and some casinos still forbid even a simple Instagram moment.
However, as more casinos warm up to the benefits of social media, those old traditions are beginning to fade. Some casinos now not only permit pictures, but a once-unthinkable practice—random video of gambling inside a casino.
The rise of YouTube and other social networks led to a new type of celebrity—the “YouTube star,” also called a “social media influencer.” These are people who establish credibility in a certain activity or industry and develop a large audience of followers on a social network. The No. 1 YouTube channel is Pewdiepie, run by Swedish comedian Felix Kjellberg, who hosts videos to more than 100 million followers worldwide in which he introduces and plays video games.
It was only a matter of time before the YouTube phenomenon reached casinos, where a number of channels are now run by “slot influencers” who pick a slot game and stream iPhone videos of themselves spinning reels, getting bonus rounds and winning jackpots. They host the sessions as if they were hosting a TV show or sporting event, doing play-by-play for every spin and getting excited like a sports announcer when big wins hit. And YouTubers eat it up, with slot-influencer YouTube videos garnering hundreds of thousands of views.
Some of the slot influencers are like rock stars on a casino floor, with instant recognition from fans who spend hours watching videos introducing the newest slot games. One of the most popular is Brian Christopher, whose BCSlots YouTube channel boasts more than 200,000 subscribers and more than 4 million views per month.
In the three years since Christopher began using an iPhone to film his own slot play, his fans have amassed 124 million views of his videos. The majority of Christopher’s fans are aged 18 to 44. Two-thirds are male, and most watch on their phones. In other words, Christopher’s followers are in the sweet spot of the younger demographic casinos are beginning to court to eventually replace the older female demographic that’s dominated the slot floor traditionally. And many casinos are beginning to welcome him with “open filming policies.”
Christopher, a former actor, launched his YouTube channel as a hobby in 2016. It’s now his full-time job. He tours casinos across the country, drawing crowds as he streams video of slot games in action. He even has an executive assistant who provides a second camera angle. Fans cheer him on as he plays, and thousands watch online. His YouTube channel hosts more than 1,700 videos, and they also are available on bcslots.com, his website. He has more than 10,000 email subscribers.
Casinos are taking notice. Mohegan Sun recently flew Christopher to Connecticut for that property’s first-ever live stream of slot play. While most big Las Vegas Strip casinos still forbid video, Christopher and other influencers are welcomed at the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas because he brings his fans in the door with him, and his business is beginning to spread across the country as the pre-internet barriers begin to tumble.
“I wasn’t the first person to upload my slot play,” Christopher told GGB News. “There are a few channels that had already started doing that, but after my channel started, it definitely started going in a whole new direction.
“Cosmo is the only location on Strip that has an open filming policy. A few others have allowed some filming on occasion, including the Linq, Wynn, Aria and MGM, but it’s not necessarily the rule. I have yet to start visiting local casinos, but we have commenced reaching out to them recently. We have worked with multiple casinos in Michigan, Indiana, Atlantic City, Maryland, Oklahoma, Reno, Vegas, California and New York—around two dozen casinos and growing.”
Christopher says the growth of his fan base was 100 percent organic. “It was word of mouth, mainly,” he said. “I was completely shocked when my numbers started rising so fast at the beginning, because I was new to the whole YouTube world. And it just keeps growing, and whenever I see fans, most of them say, ‘Oh my sisters or my husband used to watch you all the time and now I watch.’”
Slot influencers also are the only people who can actually make a living playing slot machines, through ads on their YouTube pages, subscriptions, and swag sold on their websites. “Sometimes we’ll have sponsors for some videos, and there are other ways of generating income,” Christopher said.
While the number of casinos that allow folks like Christopher to do their thing is growing, he says San Manuel Casino in Highland, California and the Cosmopolitan and Plaza in Las Vegas are currently his biggest hosts.
“Social media influencers have been around since the early days of blogging,” Peter Arceo, general manager of San Manuel Casino, told GGB News. “I have always been on the lookout for positive influencers in our industry. I get excited when I see people having fun in videos from our floor and enjoying the thrilling atmosphere that our team works very hard to create for our guests.
“Working with influencers allows us to show how much fun our casino can be for slot players. Some audiences prefer to receive information through the lens of a person that they have come to trust and whose content they enjoy, rather than content published directly from a casino. Allowing an influencer to convey their perspective and their experience to their audience is just another way for us to reach those people.”
“I can absolutely say that the Cosmopolitan was the first in Vegas to embrace the slot filming community,” said Kevin Sweet, vice president of slot operations and marketing at the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas, in an interview with GGB News. “There was always a stigma that filming in a casino was completely illegal, which simply wasn’t true. We live in a social age. It’s 2019, and everyone has a cellphone. We can’t run from technology or the world around us. It was common sense from my perspective to find a way to let this type of activity happen in our casino.
“I’ve been pretty active with the slot influencer community since early 2016. I am in full support of anything that increases the popularity and reach of casino gaming, and slot-playing videos being posted on YouTube or live-streamed certainly do that.”
Sweet said there are simple ground rules, such as limiting filming to handheld devices and limiting videos to a player and one machine, but the activity boosts business, so it’s welcome.
The influencers appreciate it. “At the San Manuel and the Cosmo, anyone can just record their slot play if they want to or take photos, and they’re encouraged to do so,” Christopher said. “I was stopped by a security guard at the Cosmo and he said, ‘I just wanted you to know that what you’re doing is totally fine with us.’ And because of that, all my fans go to those two casinos.”
San Manuel’s Arceo says the influencer phenomenon has broadened the casino’s audience. “It has widened the audience of people who have become familiar with the San Manuel Casino brand,” he said. “People from as far away as Hawaii have talked to me about Brian. In fact, my cousins in Hawaii have told me that they watch his videos and can’t wait to visit the casinos that Brian has featured.
“We’ve done controlled tests, and in one case allowed Brian to host an event that was attended purely by his audience. The results were great, which is why we continue to work with influencers.”
Sweet reports similar results at the Cosmo. “For every one complaint or issue we encounter in this space, there are 25 interactions where a customer asks a member of my slot team about a machine location because they saw their favorite streamer playing it at my casino and now they want to go play it,” he said. “I don’t think it’s attracting any one particular demographic. This isn’t a millennial play, in my opinion. This is a play for people who like gambling, who like to see nice slot jackpots, and for people who share an interest and want to belong to a larger community.”
According to Christopher, while there is still widespread resistance to filming or even photographing slot play, things are slowly changing. “I know fans who have been removed from casinos because they didn’t want to delete a (jackpot) photo off their phone. And, I’ve been removed from the casino once before because I filmed a bonus.
“We’re slowly breaking down those barriers. We just filmed in Palm Springs, and it was the first time that they allowed such a thing, and part of it was due to the fact that they had some new people coming in because of social media. They recognize the power of an influencer.”
“Some of these influencers themselves partner with cruise lines and bring hundreds of people out for weeklong cruises; it’s very impressive,” said the Cosmopolitan’s Sweet. “Maybe I should hire them as casino hosts.”
CDC Gaming Reports
Adams Analysis Q2 2020: Influencers and A New Spectator Sport
by Ken Adams, CDC Gaming Reports · June 26, 2020
A new category of influencers has emerged recently: YouTube slot players. The host of a YouTube video goes to a casino and plays slot machines while making a videocast of the action. Followers and subscribers sit at home and watch the action. If they like what they see they may go out and play the games themselves. Subscribers pay a monthly fee to have full access to the videocasts and a two-way dialogue with Brian.
One of this new variety of influencers, spinning the slot reels, is Brian Christopher, who has been playing slot machines and recording that for his YouTube videocasts for four years. The followers enjoy the opportunity to learn about new slot machines, see different casinos, and get the vicarious thrill of watching spinning reels and feeling the rush of anticipation. Brian has 250,000 followers and is starting to get the attention of casinos and slot companies.
While he plays, Brain explains games, themes, symbols, pay-lines, and bonuses. He keeps up a rapid-fire, non-stop, play-by-play narrative of hope, despair, and joy. “Come on, sevens, right now! Ooh, almost, so close. I need that bonus now. Uggh, a near miss, maybe next spin. Oh my god! Oh god, look at that, amazing, I can’t believe it!” When he walks toward the next game, he begins a new storyline, which might start “Now, I am going to play [name of game], I played it yesterday and won. It is an IGT game and I love it.” His narrative sounds like the internal dialogue of a regular slot player, at least as I imagine that.
While Brian is playing and talking, his followers post messages to him. He reads some of the messages and responds live. People comment on the games he is playing, suggest others, wish him luck, and invite him to visit their favorite casino. One woman even invited him to help her have a baby, “Oh, you are sooo handsome.” YouTube slot players like Brian also talk about the casino, food, employees, social distancing, and their family. Brian is careful not to show other players unless they wish to be on camera. He also limits actual footage of the casino floor in accordance with casino policy.
Brian’s YouTube channel is under his own name, but other influencers have names like Slot Queen, NG Slot, Slot Cats, King Jason Slots, Windy City Frenzy, and Neily 777. At the moment, Brian seems to be the top star in the field, a position he probably solidified in April. On April 27th the Coeur d’Alene casino in Idaho was the first casino in the country to reopen. Brian was on hand and broadcasting, which gained him national attention. His presence was reflective of his sense of marketing – there are no accidentals in his activities.
Brian has created a successful business by marketing images of himself playing in casinos. He seems to have tapped into a phenomenon that few people even knew existed: lots of people like to watch other people play slot machines. And in the process, he has gained the power of influencing which slot machines people play.
There have always been people who influenced other people. The clothes that Jackie Kennedy wore shaped the fashion of her time, just as the wardrobe, attitude, and lifestyle of Lady Gaga, Madonna, Cher, and hundreds of other famous entertainers have done. The men who exert the most influence over fashion are athletes, although rappers certain have an impact. Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, and LeBron James became very rich not only because of their athletic abilities but due to their value to advertisers. “Be Like Mike!” – and millions of young men tried to do just that. It is conceivable that without Michael Jordan, Nike might have slid into obscurity along with most other athletic shoe companies of the 1980 and 1990s. Instead, it is a $120 billion clothing giant.
Celebrity endorsements have been around for a very long time. A hundred years ago, famous people started appearing in magazines touting cigarettes, soap, soup, coffee, cars, breakfast cereal, crackers, cameras, tea, toothpaste, watches, gasoline, and thousands of other products. In the early years, a celebrity would make simplistic statements like, “I smoke Camels, they are mild, refreshing and they agree with my throat.” Fred Astaire, Phil Silvers, Dennis O’Keefe, Dick Haynes, Dick Powell, Henry Fonda, Margaret Piazza, Ava Gabor, and Maureen O’Hara all embraced Camels with words like that.
Beginning in the 1930s, radio and television joined in the fun. Opera and popular singers sang company ditties with the same enthusiasm that they brought to other songs. Dinah Shore encouraged us to “See the USA in your Chevrolet” and Nat King Cole sang of the joys of using Wildroot Cream Oil Hair Tonic. It seemed that almost no product was off-limits for a star to use and no celebrity was above accepting advertisers’ dollars. By the 1980s, marketing had become more sophisticated. Celebrities were still shown with the product, but their endorsements were more subtle.
Television was the perfect medium for celebrity endorsements, showing a celebrity actually using a product. Those commercials – or to more exact, the money paid to show those commercials – made television possible. Without those products, television would never have come to dominate the culture the way that it did before the internet arrived. Today the internet is slowly but certainty supplanting television as the place we all go for information and for entertainment. It is ubiquitous, available everywhere we go. With its constant presence comes instant feedback. The 24-hour news cycle of television news is, on the internet, closer to a 24-second news cycle – as soon as something happens it is being shared online.
It might not hold center stage any longer, but television changed our national culture. It created a nation of spectators. Television made it possible to sit at home and watch a presidential inaugural parade, historic votes in congress, famous funerals, demonstrations, and the fireworks around the world on New Year’s Eve. But perhaps most importantly, television allowed a fan to attend almost any sporting event in the country.
Television creates a culture of watching, not doing. The only thing that television encouraged members of the audience to do was to use the products it advertised. People watching sporting contests on televisions are not encouraged to jump up and go play sports. Rather, they are enticed into sitting at home and watch the action while eating and drinking. The internet extended the events that can be attended vicariously, adding big things (riots, arrests) and, now, small ones (birthday parties, family game nights, drinking together). It also added new places where a celebrity could sell products – anywhere a screen was in use, whether on a home computer, a tablet, or a smartphone.
The internet also gave rise to a new kind of celebrity – a self-appointed taster of life and an influencer of others. Like Brian Christopher, influencers sell subscriptions to watch them live an exciting life, as well as getting income from product placement and endorsements. Except for being self-appointed, an influencer is not much different from a 1930s movie star smoking cigarettes and telling his/her fans that a Camel is a great smoke. Both are motivated by money, the desire to create a larger fanbase, and the ability to charge advertisers for their recommendations.
That brings me back to Brian Christopher and slot influencing. In marketing himself, he appears to have targeted three different audiences. His fans are of course the primary target – he needs their monthly subscriptions to pay his staff, travel expenses, and his own salary. Without those loyal subscribers, it would be difficult to influence anyone.
Brian plays slot machines in real-time and talks about the games – he names them as he plays, and he identifies the game manufacturer. When he wins, regardless of how small the win, he talks up the game and celebrates. His comments excite his followers and subscribers and influence them to seek out those same games when they are in a casino. That makes slot manufacturers another target.
Brian does not always name the manufacturer; that’s his choice. He sets limits on his play on any game, either a specific amount of money to be wagered or lost, or a time limit. When he reaches that limit, Brian moves to another slot machine. His choice of games is entirely his own. Without violating any trust between himself and his subscribers Brian could choose one manufacturer’s games more often than another; identifying the manufacturer when it suits his purpose. As his popularity grows, why wouldn’t manufacturers offer to sponsor him? It would be a great way to introduce new games to an enthusiastic and dedicated base of potential players.
Casinos are the third target of Brian’s marketing. When he went that Idaho casino, it was in coordination with the casino’s management because the casino thought that Brian’s presence would help them publicize the opening. In an interview with the local press, he said he was also in discussions with other casinos to be at their openings. In one videocast, he was wearing a mask and discussing some of the social distancing and other safety measures the casino had introduced. It was a good way for the casino to show what it is using to protect customers. At the same time, Brian showed it was possible to be out playing slot machines and having a good time. And Brian wins again with yet another potential source of revenue.
Where all of this will lead is an interesting question. It might lead to relatively little – mostly evaporating into cyberspace when people return to their normal lives, once the COVID-19 crisis is over. On the other hand, the crisis may have grown the slot watching fan base and made possible a more permanent, viable institution. If Brian and the others like him do continue to gain popularity, the casinos and slot companies are certain to take more notice.
Direct connections between a would-be gambler and the game maker, and between a would-be gambler and the casino, would solve an old problem. It has always been a challenge to use advertising to show the excitement of casino gambling to prospective customers. Paid actors aren’t quite the way to do it; and it is either illegal or bad policy, or both, to film random gamblers in action.
Willing, enthusiastic gamblers with a gift for gab and a desire to be celebrities can create direct lines from manufacturers and operators to would-be gamblers. In a perfect world, Brian gets rich and famous, the casino shows off its fun atmosphere, and the slot company demonstrates the excitement of its games. And at home, quietly watching the action and seeing thrill of the spin, vicariously, are potential slot players.
Las Vegas Review-Journal
YouTube slot machine stars to help bring back Vegas tourists
by Bailey Schultz, Las Vegas Review-Journal · May 2, 2020
Casinos across the country have been shut down for weeks, but that hasn’t stopped Joshua O’Connell and others from experiencing the rush of a slot machine jackpot.
The Connecticut resident sets aside time every day to watch his favorite slot machine YouTubers, a growing niche of the internet where creators film their slot play.
“You get that authentic moment of the win (in these videos),” O’Connell said. “I watch because I get to learn what’s new (with slots) … and the personalities coming through make the channels. It’s a nice pick-me-up in the day.”
O’Connell used to watch an average of four videos every day, but his viewing time has been cut in half in recent weeks. New uploads have dropped dramatically since the YouTubers lost the ability to create more content inside casinos, resulting in a major drop in views and pay for some.
“We can empathize with those furloughed and waiting to return to work,” said Heidi Clemons, half of the husband-wife duo behind The Slot Cats channel. “Our income is down about two-thirds from where it was a year ago.”
A growing community
A growing community of slot-focused content creators have started to make a living off YouTube, posting videos of them risking — and sometimes winning — large sums of money in casinos across the U.S.
When YouTuber Brian Christopher uploaded his first slot video four years ago — a shaky video titled “’Lightning Strikes’ — HUGE WIN on Vegas Slots! $3,75/Bet” filmed inside Paris Las Vegas and Planet Hollywood casinos on the Las Vegas Strip — he expected a couple of views from friends. Instead, the video garnered Christopher thousands of views and roughly 1,000 subscribers in only one week and propelled his career as a full-time YouTuber.
“I did not expect those videos to explode the way they did,” said Christopher, a Canadian actor who had been driving for Lyft in Los Angeles before his channel took off.
He had roughly 245,000 subscribers as of February, and business had been successful enough for him to sell merchandise — including lanyards, rubber wristbands and autographed headshots — and hire five employees.
While all U.S. commercial casinos have been shut down temporarily, that hasn’t stopped Christopher and others from posting content, at least for the time being.
He said his team films up to two months in advance and can sustain his regular posting schedule until mid-May.
“We are happily working from home, as is advised, and also hosting premiere lives of prerecorded videos and streaming live online slots,” Christopher said.
Bringing in business
Even when casinos were open, finding a place to film wasn’t always easy. Casinos have a reputation for strict anti-camera policies, but Christopher said that has started to change in recent years.
“We’ve slowly been able to convince them that it’s actually a good thing for them for us to promote them,” he said. “We’re getting to the point now where casinos are now finding us and approaching us.”
The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas’ vice president of slots, Kevin Sweet, said he began working with the slot YouTube community in 2016. He has personal relationships with at least three YouTubers and encouraged them to film slot play back when casinos were open.
“It absolutely brought us new business (when the casino was open),” he said, adding that he has lost count of how many times guests have asked where to find a slot machine they saw someone playing on YouTube.
Slot manufacturers also have discovered the benefits of working with slot vloggers.
Jonathan Jossel, CEO of the Plaza, told the Review-Journal that the downtown property had embraced the slot YouTuber community. He said the Plaza saw a spike in business and gained a stronger social media presence after it started allowing them to film in the property.
He thinks they will be just as important to business once the casinos are allowed to reopen.
“We will continue to work with them for sure,” Jossel said. “Having them communicate that casinos are open, fun, and safe thanks to extra precautions and efforts is going to be important.”
Sweet agreed, saying that the industry will be able to recover faster with more people advocating that casinos have taken the necessary steps to protect employees and guests.
“Each casino will undoubtedly share with their guests the precautions they are taking, but those guests with a large social media following can only help to echo those efforts and broaden its reach,” Sweet said. “We of course look forward to welcoming (the social media influencers), along with the rest of our guests.”
$9,000 for one video
The YouTubers in this article wouldn’t disclose exactly how much money they make off their channels, but it’s lucrative enough for many to have left their day jobs, even as they regularly spend large amounts of money on casinos and travel expenses.
“It’s probably one of the most expensive channels you can run on YouTube because it’s a losing sport,” Christopher said. “You lose tens of thousands of dollars a year gambling. It took awhile before we became profitable.”
A YouTube channel needs 4,000 watch hours and 1,000 subscribers over the past 12 months before it can enter the company’s partner program and monetize videos.
While the money that videos earn per thousand ad views is fickle, some can end up being worth thousands of dollars.
Francine Maric, who runs the Lady Luck HQ channel, posted a video in January explaining how a viral slot video from September hit nearly 2 million views and made her almost $9,000.
Many YouTubers have found other income avenues. Some, like the user behind Sarah Slotlady, have a Patreon page that allows fans to pay $5 to $25 each month to suggest slot games or access behind-the-scenes videos. Others, like Maric, offer merchandise. Her fans can buy $16.99 Lady Luck HQ crew socks or a $14.99 mug with a cartoon image of her face.
She also offers a channel membership to fans, starting at $4.99 a month, that gives subscribers extra perks such as special emojis they can use when commenting on her videos.
“It’s just a more social way to connect with your audience but also turn it into a business,” Maric said.
Coronavirus impact
But many slot YouTubers’ pay has taken a hit amid the shutdowns as they have to cut back on new videos.
Heidi Clemons said she has had to reduce her posting schedule to three videos a week, instead of seven.
March views for The Slot Cats — run by Heidi Clemons and her husband, Fred Clemons — were down nearly 60 percent year over year, from 370,000 views to 150,000.
The couple face even more challenges in the coming weeks; the two were set to run out of unused videos to post last week.
Heidi Clemons said finances would be more of a concern if she hadn’t won a $20,000 jackpot the week before the shutdown.
“It was good timing,” she said.
Christopher said income from his videos has gone down about 40 percent since the shutdown. He pointed to a drop in advertising revenue for YouTube, causing a trickle-down effect that hurts his ad revenue.
According to a Wednesday regulatory filing from Alphabet, parent company of Google, YouTube ads revenue growth was “slightly offset” by a decline in revenue growth in March, driven by the effects of COVID-19.
“The marketing dollars aren’t there because no one can sell anything,” Christopher said. “I’m not going to complain, though. I’m still able to make income and pay all my employees their normal wages.”
Why so many watch
It’s been about seven years since O’Connell first started watching slot videos. A lot has changed since the early days, he said, pointing to the growing number of content creators and improved production quality.
“It’s exciting seeing how far (the channels have) come in just a few years,” he said.
A Reno-based YouTuber who goes by Diana Evoni said people are drawn to slot videos for a variety of reasons.
Some live miles from any casinos. Others don’t have the money to play themselves but still want to experience the rush of hitting a jackpot. But most are just looking for entertainment.
Las Vegas-resident Jim Hilliard watches at least one or two slot videos every day. One of his favorite channels is Evoni’s — he pays for a channel membership and said he and his wife plan to visit Reno at some point to try out some of the machines featured in her videos.
“It’s helped us identify the places we like to play,” he said. “You feel like you’re one with the game and the player (in these videos). … You learn from the videos, which really makes it fascinating when you don’t get the chance to see the game in person.”
Maric likened it to watching video games online — which get thousands of views on YouTube and Twitch — or watching an NFL game on ESPN. Viewers could play the games if they wanted to, but many think watching is just as fun.
Christopher said his subscribers are the reason he plans to be one of the first customers once casinos lift their shutdowns.
“I miss the interactions with the fans,” he said. “I need more content, but I also want to be there reporting to people, letting them know what the casinos are like and the steps they’re taking to make sure the casinos are safe for everybody.”
Others, like Evoni, plan to wait a bit longer before returning. She said she misses interacting with friends and fans but doesn’t want to risk spreading the coronavirus to her 86-year-old mother.
“There’s a lot to worry about,” she said. “If our (confirmed cases count) goes up in Reno … I’m going to have to wait a long time.”
The Spokesman-Review
‘We’re here, live in Idaho’: Well-known gambling YouTuber streams experience at reopened CdA Casino
Jared Brown, The Spokesman-Review · May 10, 2020
When well-known gambling YouTuber Brian Christopher reached out to the Coeur d’Alene Casino this month about streaming live video of him playing gaming machines at the first casino to reopen after nationwide pandemic-related closures, managers were hesitant.
The casino had never allowed anyone to film their experience inside, marketing director Yvette Matt said.
Luckily for Christopher, he had a track record with Matt from her previous job at the San Manuel Casino in California, which used his videos to promote new machines.
Allowing Christopher to film, Matt said, was a win-win, because Christopher was running out of content from several weeks of casino closures and the Coeur d’Alene Casino wanted to educate people about its safety measures.
“I feel it’s kind of like my duty to help support them during this time,” said Christopher, who has 250,000 subscribers on his main YouTube channel and has reached out to dozens of casinos. “I thought it would be a good opportunity to show everyone in the U.S. what it’s like to be in a casino right now.
“I want to kind of put them at ease,” Christopher, who is from Los Angeles, added during an interview. “We can get through this together.”
He started doing YouTube full time a few years ago in the months after videos he posted for fun of him playing slot machines in Las Vegas found a following. His viewership kept growing and now his channel sees more than a million views each week.
“It’s super rewarding to have a voice, to have a position to make a difference,” Christopher said about his job as a YouTuber. “I’m very grateful that I’m able to do something.”
Christopher arrived at the Spokane International Airport Tuesday after testing negative for COVID-19 in California right before his trip. He then drove straight to the reservation casino in a car he rented.
“It was beautiful scenery on my drive,” Christopher said, adding that he wants to return and explore more of the outdoors.
Employees followed Christopher during his videos to ensure he held to his policy of just recording himself and the machines, not other people. Matt was with him to make sure he had correct information to give YouTube viewers about casino precautions.
“His fans would say, ‘Do you feel comfortable? Are you afraid to be out in a casino?’ ” Matt remembered. “He was like, ‘No, I’m not afraid at all.’ ”
The casino reopened May 1 with strict social distancing and cleaning guidelines in place after maintaining wages and benefits for employees for weeks. The reservation and Benewah County have had no confirmed COVID-19 cases.
The facility quickly hit capacity during its first day back open and some waited in line for as long as 45 minutes to get inside due to strict limits on capacity. The casino has seen a lower volume of steady traffic since, Matt said.
Christopher made a point not to announce his travel plans, so hundreds of fans wouldn’t travel to see him, as they usually do. He also said during videos that he wouldn’t greet fans or take photos, though some people did recognize him at the casino.
Matt said she didn’t think Christopher’s presence brought a noticeable increase in traffic while he was there.
In his first video, which was streamed by more than 4,000 people, Christopher described how his temperature was checked, the mask requirements and the hand-washing stations.
“It’s amazing to be back,” he said during the video.
He also decided to donate to casino staff about $1,600 he raised from viewers who sent him money during two livestreams from Idaho. Funds from a third video went to COVID-19 research efforts, according to Christopher.
“I think it was a pretty cool experience, and I would hope that maybe moving forward we work with him again,” Matt said. “Then we could actually do a promotion with him where we encourage people to come see us.”
Christopher returned to Los Angeles on Saturday and plans to visit more casinos as they reopen in the coming weeks.
He said he reached out to Northern Quest Resort & Casino, which opened Tuesday and does not allow video on the gaming floor. He was turned down for a number of reasons, according to the facility.
Northern Quest, Coeur d’Alene and Kalispel casinos are among 14 other casinos that have opened across the country in the last week, according to the American Gaming Association. They are the only facilities open on the West Coast.
“Northern Quest has extremely limited marketing and advertising campaigns in internal markets only at this time,” Julie Holland, a casino spokesperson said in an email. “While we understand that Northern Quest is one of the only casinos currently open for business in the United States, we don’t encourage cross-country travel.”
Christopher said he’s used to being turned down, as well as being the first person to film in a casino.
“They are coming around to it because they are realizing the power of social media,” he said.
Strictly Slots Magazine
The Slot Influencer: Brian Christopher turns playing slots into a successful business
Most people play slots as a form of entertainment. They know that, while they may win from time to time, in the long run the house has got you beat. But there is another way to make money from the slots, and Brian Christopher has tapped into that rich vein. He travels from casino to casino playing his favorite games, just like so many of us. The difference is, he shares his adventures on YouTube.com—and makes money doing it.
How popular is he?
“I have quickly become the top influencer for slot machines and casinos on YouTube,” said Brian. “I average 2 million views per month—with millennials accounting for more than half of my viewers—and my videos are watched in 213 countries worldwide, with the U.S. representing 73 percent of the traffic.
“Who would have thought that watching someone else play slot machines would be so popular? But when you think of it, it makes complete sense. The #1 channel on YouTube with 57 Million subscribers is Pewdiepie – a guy who plays video games. So me playing slot machines is basically the same thing… only more elevated, because it involves money! You could say I’m like a Pewdiepie of Slots, only with G-Rated language.”
Of course, it takes a lot of hard work and dedication to get to the top—and even more to stay there.
“I upload at least one video every day, and each week I’ll throw in additional live streams either gambling in a casino or as a Q&A from home. I came up with regular daily themes like Millionaire Mondays where I play games with jackpots over a million dollars, Thousand Dollar Thursdays where I gamble with $1000 cash, or Get High Fridays where I only play High Limit Games.
“My friends are shocked by my success. I mean, all I do is play slot machines. What they don’t see is that managing a massive YouTube Channel is a full-time job and I have had to hire a talented Editor and a hard-working Social Media Manager, just to keep up! I’m not complaining though, I love what I do – I was born to be online.”
Beyond regular gambling videos, Brian often partners with casinos and slot
manufacturers to showcase new games, online apps, host special events or feature new and exciting amenities. It’s the perfect win-win scenario for all parties, because it allows the most progressive companies in this space to tap into their ideal market base—gambling millennials. “No other platform, be it TV, radio, or billboard advertising, has the ability to engage their target audience the way that I do. Everyone who watches me is a gambling and casino enthusiast, or is interested in joining in the experience,” said Brian.
If you watch his channel, don’t expect some sugar-coated video, where it’s all winning all the time. Brian takes viewers on a fun, and sometimes raucous, but realistic journey with him as he plays.
“My channel is all about keeping it real. I show all of my wins and losses and don’t hide the fact that statistically, I will lose in the long run. My fans love that they can literally see themselves in me. In fact, I treat all of my recordings as if I’m playing right beside them, with sayings like ‘I hope WE get the bonus’ or ‘WE won!’ It also helps me not feel as crazy talking to myself at a machine. And yes, I get a lot of stares.”
Most people play slots as a form of entertainment. They know that, while they may win from time to time, in the long run the house has got you beat. But there is another way to make money from the slots, and Brian Christopher has tapped into that rich vein. He travels from casino to casino playing his favorite games, just like so many of us. The difference is, he shares his adventures on YouTube.com—and makes money doing it.
How popular is he?
“I have quickly become the top influencer for slot machines and casinos on YouTube,” said Brian. “I average 2 million views per month—with millennials accounting for more than half of my viewers—and my videos are watched in 213 countries worldwide, with the U.S. representing 73 percent of the traffic.
“Who would have thought that watching someone else play slot machines would be so popular? But when you think of it, it makes complete sense. The #1 channel on YouTube with 57 Million subscribers is Pewdiepie – a guy who plays video games. So me playing slot machines is basically the same thing… only more elevated, because it involves money! You could say I’m like a Pewdiepie of Slots, only with G-Rated language.”
Of course, it takes a lot of hard work and dedication to get to the top—and even more to stay there.
“I upload at least one video every day, and each week I’ll throw in additional live streams either gambling in a casino or as a Q&A from home. I came up with regular daily themes like Millionaire Mondays where I play games with jackpots over a million dollars, Thousand Dollar Thursdays where I gamble with $1000 cash, or Get High Fridays where I only play High Limit Games.
“My friends are shocked by my success. I mean, all I do is play slot machines. What they don’t see is that managing a massive YouTube Channel is a full-time job and I have had to hire a talented Editor and a hard-working Social Media Manager, just to keep up! I’m not complaining though, I love what I do – I was born to be online.”
Beyond regular gambling videos, Brian often partners with casinos and slot
manufacturers to showcase new games, online apps, host special events or feature new and exciting amenities. It’s the perfect win-win scenario for all parties, because it allows the most progressive companies in this space to tap into their ideal market base—gambling millennials. “No other platform, be it TV, radio, or billboard advertising, has the ability to engage their target audience the way that I do. Everyone who watches me is a gambling and casino enthusiast, or is interested in joining in the experience,” said Brian.
If you watch his channel, don’t expect some sugar-coated video, where it’s all winning all the time. Brian takes viewers on a fun, and sometimes raucous, but realistic journey with him as he plays.
“My channel is all about keeping it real. I show all of my wins and losses and don’t hide the fact that statistically, I will lose in the long run. My fans love that they can literally see themselves in me. In fact, I treat all of my recordings as if I’m playing right beside them, with sayings like ‘I hope WE get the bonus’ or ‘WE won!’ It also helps me not feel as crazy talking to myself at a machine. And yes, I get a lot of stares.”
Comped Travel
Brian Christopher’s YouTube Channel takes “hand pay” to “paycheck”
Stace · July 22, 2020
For most of us who play slots, we expect to put our money into the machine and hope to get paid. Imagine, just for a second, how amazing it would be to get paid to put your money into the machine, and then get paid when you win! If that sounds like a dream, then meet the man living that dream: YouTube Channel Creator and Star and “Slot Machine Influencer,” Brian Christopher! Listen to podcast version.
URComped CEO Craig Shacklett recently had the chance to interview the YouTube Star. For Christopher, his self-described “entrepreneurial instinct” inspired him to transform his love of slot machines and take that passion and monetize it by creating YouTube gaming videos (1:52).
Christopher explains to Shacklett how it “literally took about a month” (2:08) for him to realize that his project could become something that would generate income when he began to see his YouTube subscriber numbers rapidly grow. These numbers led to an invitation to join YouTube’s partnership program. Even though Christopher says he was familiar with YouTube, this area was new to him. That partnership program enabled YouTube to attach advertisements to his videos (2:34). For Christopher, this was especially fortuitous. His YouTube channel was now making a little bit more than he had as an Uber and Lyft driver, which, as he says “was supporting my acting career” (2:45). As the YouTube channel began to take off, he says he had to put his dreams of acting on the backburner to take advantage of the incredible opportunity in front of him.
Christopher explains that he had always dreamed of making the move to Southern California from his native Canada to pursue his goal of becoming a movie star. He says he and his husband, Marco, had long planned the move, and he worked hard, wanting to make sure he had a professional enough resume before making the move to the Golden State. Christopher was forced to work for free for his first several months waiting for his work visas to come through. He says just as his acting career began to take off in Hollywood, so too did his YouTube channel. Timing, as they say, is everything!
So how does one go from acting in the Great White North to becoming an actor/slot machine influencer? For Christopher, it began with a love of gambling (5:02). The legal age for playing Bingo in Canada is 18 and playing slots is 19. Christopher says that he began with Bingo and as soon as he reached 19, he headed into the casinos and to the slot machines, where he fell in love.
While Christopher is one of the major names when it comes to slot machine influencers, he wasn’t the first. Craig wanted to know how Brian Christopher came to be the leader in the YouTube slot machine world. Shacklett was curious how Christopher took the existing concept and expanded it to the level that he is at today.
Christopher cites YouTuber Phillip DeFranco as one of his favorite personalities to watch and listen to. In addition to finding inspiration in DeFranco’s channel, Christopher says he “started seeking out classes to take and books to read, and to learn more about how it all works” (6:18). In addition, he began to attend conferences, including the G2E (the Global Gaming Expo–which Craig explains is “the biggest conference in the world where a lot of bigwigs from casinos around the world and casino vendors are all there” (7:29), where he gained confidence in the connections he had made and in what he was doing. He explains, “I was definitely confident. Because of the growth happening so quickly, there was a little buzz around the channel. So I was able to use that to get in and make some contacts at the beginning. And one of the contacts I actually made there at the beginning was a great contact. But we didn’t work together for about two-and-a-half or three years after that. But we stayed in contact the whole time. And we always knew there’s going to be some time where we would work together. And so it shows you that those little baby steps and those nudges you do at the beginning of will pay off.”
For Christopher, the red carpet is not always rolled out to meet him when he contacts a casino about recording slot play in their venues. As he explains (8:22), “most of them don’t allow recording at all. And some of them are open to the idea. But most of the time, I have to do a lot of nudging and convincing.” Christopher says he will often point out that they can “watch any one of my two thousand videos and see what I do, and you’ll notice that I’m not doing anything bad. It’s actually good for you.” The hardest thing, he says, “is just convincing people that don’t know the importance of social media, how important it really is” (8:48).
Like most of the gaming industry, Christopher says his YouTube channel’s revenues also suffered because of advertisers who pulled ads during the pandemic shutdown. He explains that his company shoots videos 2-3 months in advance, so they were able to continue to upload new content but were definitely ready to get back to work. For Christopher, that work came in the form of Coeur D’alene Casino in Idaho, which was among the first casinos to reopen. Christopher explains that the casino management wasn’t exactly excited about being put front and center of this new normal, but Christopher explained how their new safety protocols could be seen as a model, and in the end, the casino received positive feedback all around.
Christopher is not only an avid slot influencer, he is also an advocate of what he believes in. As he explains to Craig, he is an advocate of mask usage as we navigate this pandemic. Additionally, he is a staunch believer in non-smoking casinos. He says, “I’ve got dozens and dozens of emails from casinos repeatedly saying, ‘Your health is our number one priority. The health and safety of our people. And we’re doing… We’re speaking with all the health experts and everything else.’ And I’m like, ‘I want to call BS on it’ and be like, ‘If you really care about our health and safety, you would ban smoking in your casino.’ You can have outdoor patios. There are many casinos that even have outdoor patios with slot machines or… That works. But when you’re making the staff and the patrons breathe it in non-stop. That’s not really fair to everybody. So I’m loving the changes that are happening and I hope that continues. And masks need to be mandatory everywhere if you want to just flatten this curve. I keep reading that the worst is still yet to come and that’s pretty darn scary. The last thing we want is for all these things to close up again. And we’re talking about entertainment here, right? Casinos are supposed to be fun and entertaining. So if you really want to have your entertainment, then put on a darn mask already” (13:44).
While Christopher is excited about his advocacy work, it is still the slots that brought him where he is today. But lest we think that his life is hanging out in the casino dropping coins, Christopher says gaming only counts for about 5% of his work. He says most of his time is spent shipping merchandise (including masks, btw) from his offices. In addition, his time is spent negotiating on the phone with casinos as he tries to gain access into their venues so he can shoot the games we all want to play. After that, there’s also video editing, promotions, scheduling–in other words, it’s a real job (although a pretty cool one!).
Check out Brian Christopher’s amazing videos at bcslots.com–and be sure to check in with your URComped travel host to sign up for one of the URComped sailings with Brian and his “Rudies.” You never know–you just might hit the next hand pay he features in one of his videos!
VoyageLA
Meet Brian Christopher of BrianGambles.com
Editor, Contributor · August 14, 2018
Today we’d like to introduce you to Brian Christopher.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Brian. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
When I booked my first trip to Las Vegas, I looked to Youtube to find out what games to play and at which casinos. To my amazement (and shock!), there were videos of people playing slots online! Why would anyone want to watch that? Well apparently I did, and I watched a lot. It encouraged me to try my hand at it too. I only uploaded my videos for fun but spruced them up with intros and outros to make them more enjoyable. After they went viral (for my subscriber base!), I made some more and they too went viral! So I kept up with them and I suppose I did something right because I now get a million views a week!
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
A lot of what I have done has been uncharted territory. I had to figure everything out on my own. I would buy film equipment like green screens and lighting – with zero clues how to use them. I even dabbled in 360 videos for a while. The biggest hurdle is finding the time to get everything done, which is why I’m on the hunt for more staff!
BrianGambles.com – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
I upload videos daily of me playing slot machines. I also hold events all over the world like meet and greets, slot tournaments, cruises and group slot pulls. I’m super proud in how far we as a channel have come, and how our amazing ‘Rudies’ family has grown. The Rudies is my fan club, and they are just awesomely supportive and positive. They named themselves off of one of my catchphrases ‘Rude!’ (when the slots don’t quite line up how I’d like them. My channel is a bit different in that it’s all about the viewer’s experience.
They’re not literally sitting in the chair playing, but I do my best to make them feel a great part of the experience. I try and be as personal and interactive as I can which is also why I hold so many events. I absolutely LOVE getting face time with them.
What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
In June my YouTube Channel was shut down without cause. It was ONE day before my 4 week East Coast tour of 8 casinos. Rather than freak out and cancel the tour, I boarded my plane and kept my cool. It all paid off because the next day my channel was back and I was able to live stream and I hit my BIGGEST Jackpot LIVE by hitting $10,000 on Wheel of Fortune (the biggest number on the wheel)!
Contact Info:
- Website: BrianGambles.com
- Email: contact@briangambles.com
- Instagram: Instagram.com/JustBrianC
- Facebook: Facebook.com/JustBrianC
- Twitter: Twitter.com/JustBrianC
- Other: Snapchat.com/add/JustBrianC
YouTube: BCSlots.com
Forbes
YouTube Slot Controversy Shows The Perils Of Your Side Hustle
by David G. Schwartz, Contributor · June 11, 2018 at 8:58am
It happened without warning.
On June 3rd at 7:28 in the morning, Brian Christopher got an email from “The YouTube Team” telling him that his video, “Smokin' Hot Gems, BIG WIN Mammoth Power Slot Machine Pokies w Brian Christopher” had been taken down for violating content restrictions on “violent or dangerous acts that have an inherent risk of serious physical harm or death.” This was his first strike. Seconds later, he got another email telling him that “due to repeated or severe violations” of YouTube’s community guidelines, his account had been suspended. His channel, which he had been building for two years, had vanished. Hundreds of his videos, all of which feature him playing slot machines and winning jackpots, were wiped out.
Just like that, a big piece of Christopher’s life—he spends about eight to 12 hours a day on his channel, and employs three people who help him—was gone. Erased. Deleted.
Around the same time, Scott “The Raja” Richter, whose slot channel, The Big Jackpot, features videos like “Biggest Live Jackpot In History | $600 A Pull | Black Widow @ The Cosmopolitan” logged on and found that his channel, too, was gone.
Christopher and Richter had used YouTube to turn a money-losing pastime, playing slot machines, into a respectable side hustle, even a level of celebrity. Richter’s videos have clocked more than 2 million unique monthly views, and his channel has more than 115,000 subscribers. He even has a dedicated fan club, known as the Bomb Squad (after Richter’s trademark “#BOOM” graphic that accompanies each big win). Christopher has about 50 million total views and 82,000 subscribers, with his videos drawing thousands of views a day, and his own fan club, the Rudies. Bomb Squad and Rudies alike, in addition to commenting on videos and offering advice during live feeds, follow their mentors to casinos around the country and even go on cruises with them. One highlight of these events is the “group pull,” where players pool their cash and take turns pressing play on a high limit slot.
In addition to revenue generated directly from YouTube (which Richter says, for a popular channel, can reach as high as $20,000 a month) both Richter and Christopher sell a range of merchandise, from bobbleheads to coffee mugs to shot glasses. While this may have started out as a hobby, it has clearly become something bigger. Christopher, for instance, found out about his channel being removed while traveling for a planned multi-state East Coast tour.
Andy Warhol famously said back in 1968 that in the future, everyone would be world famous for fifteen minutes. Fifty years later, we’re in the future, and Warhol was half right. Everyone’s not world famous for fifteen minutes. Instead, they are famous to their fanbases of a few hundred thousand for as long as they can keep cranking out new content. Platforms like YouTube have redefined the nature of celebrity itself. It’s no longer about musical or athletic talent, looks, or even being in the right place at the right time. It’s about being able to market original content that drives clicks.
You have a good idea of what it takes to get fired from your job: punching the boss is out, as is destroying company property, showing up drunk, or doing all three. But in the side hustle economy, where you let people watch you play slots, drive them to the casino, or even write about what they do there, the rules—to the extent that there are rules—are much less transparent. Both channels had been, presumably, making good money for YouTube. As far as the creators knew, they were doing exactly what the platform wanted them to: generate and promote original content that brings clicks.
“It was like a stab in the back.” Christopher says. “I devoted my entire life to YouTube. I gave them 1,100 videos and made them a lot of money. For them to turn around and shut me down with zero explanation hurts.”
Christopher immediately filed an appeal. “I didn’t know what I was appealing,” he explains, “since I didn’t know what I did wrong.” He just told the anonymous authority that his channel was clean and promoted responsible gambling. Hours later, he got a curt email informing him his appeal was denied—again, with no explanation of what policies he had violated.
Then, without an apology or any other acknowledgement, both channels were reinstated. Christopher simply got a brief email that said that, after a re-review, it was determined that his videos did not, in fact, violate any guidelines. That’s good news for Richter, Christopher, the Bomb Squad, and the Rudies, but the entire situation shines a light on the very real dangers of the side hustle economy.
The side hustle economy is a natural reaction to the collapse of the old work economy. It’s increasingly rare to score a solid 9 to 5 job right out of school, clock a few decades, and retire with a secure pension and gold watch, all the while enjoying financial security. More and more people are turning to a variety of side hustles—freelance work, MLMs, YouTube videos, even writing—in an effort to stay ahead of the game.
The side hustles I’m thinking about are different from simply working a second job hostessing or parking cars because they usually involve a significant outlay of resources—sometimes financial but always time. This species of hustle is also dependent on what we can loosely call “tech” but is more accurately a form of digitally-assisted connectivity. YouTubers like Christopher and Richter, documenting their thousands of dollars in slot jackpots for tens of thousands of fans are at one end, with Lyft and Uber drivers and designers selling custom drawn logos on fiverr at the other.
In theory, side hustling gives creative, ambitious, or just broke and bored people a chance to turn their time and effort into money. In practice, it’s not always that easy, and with so much of the hustle dependent on impersonal, impenetrable tech, it is an incredibly unstable base on which to build a brand, let alone a future. You might cultivate a great presence as a Lyft driver, but when self-driving cars are ready to roll, it’s over, no matter how hard you've worked. Or an inoffensive piece of your content trips a digital wire somewhere, and you’re flagged, then suspended, with no clear path to appeal.
We still don’t have any idea why the channels came down: was it really part of an orchestrated harassment campaign by a rival, as some fans alleged, or was it just both channels running afoul of an algorithm? After all, with 300 hours of video uploaded to the channel every minute, no human can sit and watch them all for violations. And, remember, computers can do operations quickly and efficiently but don’t have common sense or empathy. So your passion project that you’ve been pouring your life into for the past few years with decent results and no controversy might get flagged or your channel removed, just because a machine read something into it that you never intended. There are humans involved in the policy violation process (10,000 of them at YouTube's last count), but, with about 3 million videos flagged for review each month, that’s still about 1,000 videos a day per human—if humans never took days off.
Perhaps appropriately for Richter and Christopher, the side hustle economy that we all participate in might have something in common with playing slot machines. Because even when we fear it might be a negative expectation game, when we see other people hitting the jackpot, we have no choice but to get back to the grind.
For his part, Christopher’s return to YouTube is not without issues. While his videos were restored, they were not remonetized, meaning that he can’t make any money from them. He was assured that they would be remonetized in 24 to 48 hours but, five days later, it had not happened. So, like the rest of us, it’s back to posting content, but with no guarantee that it will pay off.
Worse, the phantom violation makes brings a nagging uncertainty to his life. “It just leaves it open for them to do it again,” Christopher says. “I have zero way of getting any answers from anybody.”
There is one silver lining in all this. The night that his channel returned, Christopher was back playing slots live on YouTube. Alongside his Rudies, both in person and on livestream, Christopher hit the biggest jackpot of his life, $10,000.
The look on his face when those reels line up…that’s what we’re all chasing, and that tells us why, even if it’s a lot of work with an uncertain pay off, we’re going to keep chasing our side hustles.