Hot in Ohio, Casinos Rank Low Compared to Pittsburgh and Detroit

Sun, Oct 4, 2015

Casinos in Ohio, while profitable, are not as profitable as comparable casinos in neighboring states. In fact the Buckeye state’s racinos and casinos are at the bottom of a regional heap.

While the Horseshoe Cleveland Casino and the Rocksino in Northfield lead casinos in the Buckeye State, their revenues are not as impressive when compared to Detroit and Pittsburgh.

When compared in regional rankings 16 casinos beat the Horseshoe Cleveland, which brought in $218.6 million in gross revenues last year. By comparison, the MGM Grand Detroit brought in $572 million and MotorCity Casino, Detroit, earned $460 million.

Ohio’s top gaming venues ranked 17th to 21st in a five state area that includes 44 commercial casinos. Those included the Hollywood Columbus, Hard Rock Rocksino, Horseshoe Cincinnati and Hollywood Toledo, which earned between $188 million to $209 million.

Shortly before the 2009 election where the voters amended the state constitution to allow casinos, the state projected that the casinos would earn about twice the amount that they ended up earning.

Instead, the state, which earned $1.5 billion in both casino and racino revenue in 2014, ranks 11th among the 21 states that offer commercial gaming. Nevada was the highest ranking, at $11 billion.