The former Horseshoe Cincinnati Casino reopened last week as Jack Cincinnati Casino after being closed for nearly two days to rebrand and replace. The same thing happened several weeks ago at the former Horseshoe casino in Cleveland.
The largest casino in the region closed while workers swarmed over the property replace old Horseshoe logos on machines, gaming tables, dice and signage. This is time consuming because 13,000 dice and 50,000 packs of cards must be individually inspected before being put into play.
The changeover was announced early this year by Dan Gilbert, as Caesars Entertainment was phased out. Gilbert owns the Cleveland Cavaliers and founded Quicken Loans. He bought out Caesars, which was his original partner in founding the casinos after they jointly funded the election campaign of 2009 that amended the state constitution to allow Las Vegas style gaming.
Jack Entertainment is spending an estimated $40 million to rebrand all of its casinos, which include Thistledown Racino, the Horseshoe Cleveland and the Greektown in Detroit, Michigan.
His competition in the state is owned by Penn National Gaming, which operates Hollywood brand casinos.
Jack Cincinnati Casino General Manager Chad Barnhill predicted last week that the casino would make $20 million a month after the rebranding. The casino reached $21 million during its first month of operation three years ago, but hasn’t duplicated that since.
Barnhill wouldn’t speculate how long that would take. “That’s the real question mark,” he told WCPO “It takes time to change consumer behavior. We’re making a lot of changes that our customers are going to love.”
One such change is to switch from the Horseshoe’s Total Rewards program to a new customer loyalty program to be called Club Jack.
According to Barnhill, We’re going to have a Las Vegas partner, a Caribbean partner, a cruise line partner. So, all the things they love about the previous loyalty-card programs they’re going to get with Jack as well. Plus, they’ll enjoy all the benefits of earning points faster as it relates to free slot play and other amenities.”
In a separate but related development, the Buckeye State’s seven racinos continue to Bogart the largest share of the state’s gaming market, accounting for 20 percent more in revenue than the casinos in Cincinnati, Toledo, Cleveland and Columbus.
The racinos, which only have slot machines and no table games, brought in $78.2 million for May, 6 percent higher than last year. This compares to $66.5 million for the four casinos, according to the Ohio Casino Control Commission.
The four casinos reporter revenues lower in May of this year compared to 2015.
The Toledo Hollywood Casino made $16.5 million for May 2016 compared to $16.9 million for the same period last year.
Cleveland’s new Jack casino lost 15 percent, but it was closed for nearly two days to accomplish its rebrand. The casino brought in $16 million last month.
The new Jack in Cincinnati saw its revenues fall to $16.2 million in May, 3 percent down from 2015
The Hollywood Casino Columbus revenues dropped 3 percent to $17.8 million.
