SLOT TRIVIA: How Many S-Type Slots Are Out There..?

[850mph]

I had a brief conversation with a friend of mine who has been a casino and gaming analyst at a MAJOR NY Bank since 1991…

He had a couple of interesting things to say which don’t exactly answer the question, but were surprising to me.

Basically, he said, there were only TWO major jurisdictions — Las Vegas and Atlantic City — for casino games before about 1990 when Indian Casinos became popular financing vehicles for the banks.

Yes, there were smaller jurisdiction casinos before 1990, but they were not financed by major banks, and required only a small number of modern slots, say 20,000 total.

At this time casinos were not fully using MODERN PC board type machines.

Indian casinos and smaller legal jurisdictions casinos became BIG BUSINESS IN about 1990, and the game manufacturers could not keep up with demand for a couple of years and ramped up manufacturing of modern, electronic  machines.

He said he would be surprised if there were more than 50,000 Licensed and Legal MODERN slots before 1993.

In 1993 THREE major casinos were opened in Las Vegas which kicked off a MAJOR bank-financed casino and building boom which required a whole lot of MODERN slot machines.

He estimated that Before 1993, there were about 50,000 LEGAL modern slots in the US, after 1993 they came on board about 30,000/year for US casino properties — based on the fact a single new build casino uses about 2000 machines.

By the end of the decade, say 1999, he estimated there were aprox a half million LEGAL slots in the USA, and a much smaller number abroad.

Much of these would have been modern IGT S-Type machines….

He estimates TODAY that there are aprox 1 million ACTIVE and LEGAL slots worldwide.

He told me IGT has been a public company since about 1990 or so…

And he suggested I get a copy of their early annual reports to get exact manufacturing numbers.

QUESTION

I know it’s a long shot, but considering there are some old timers on this board..

Does any one have any of these annual reports?

UPDATE Oct 24 7:40am

Forget about it….. I’ve taken a look at an IGT annual from 10 years ago and they don’t report any type of manufacturing numbers. Doubt it would be different in the early 90s.

[850mph]

Interesting….
This past post kinda confirms my friends memory:

https://newlifegames.com/nlg/index.php?topic=828.0

Nice to know there are some historians out there!

[850mph]

I had some more questions for my friend, so I mailed him this….
Which I would be interested in old timers comments on:


#### eMail Message ####

Back in the 90s

When a casino acquired 1000 or more slot machines…

Did they BUY them or LICENSE them from the manufacturer?

I would think they LICENSED them, with the option to change them out every three or four years as new models came out from the manufacturer.

I would think that as the units became unserviceable or outdated they were taken back by the manufacturer, scavenged for parts and just DESTROYED by the manufacturer…?

Considering there was no/little “home” market for the old machines back then and very few shipped abroad….

My GUESS, is there would be very few of the 90s models — 30 year old— still around…??

#### end mail ####

His Reply:

Back in the 1990s they would have bought them. Or maybe bought and financed them.

Once they became tired for the US market they would be reconditioned and sold to Eastern European and South American markets.

[off-track]

Quite a bit of info in the Wiki.  Have you seen that?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Game_Technology_(1975%E2%80%932015)

Personally, I tossed the annuals after skimming them (contemporary only).  Nothing but an effort to appease "investors" which are really no different than the people that frequent the casinos themselves.    There may be some exceptions but afaik the WOF franchise is the longest running leased theme solely owned and closely coveted by IGT as the cash cow?  I believe new iterations of machine types also run that way until the company can see how much they can get by owning them as opposed to selling to the casino outright?

The slot, video and wagering machine division is only 1/3 of IGT.  The other 2/3 is lottery/instant ticket gaming. 

[jay]

In the early days - Slots were purchased.
Purchased is a loose word as they may have been financed by mob money (very high interest rate) more legal than skimming.
That money may have come from a source like the Teamsters pension fund.
In the 80s after the mob had been eradicated from the casinos - the machines may have been leased from the manufacturer or financed by bank.
There was no licensing.

Your choices the most part were IGT, Ballys or Williams.
Aristocrat came onto the scene later. They were large in Australia for making Pokeys which could be found almost anywhere. Then they got into the Class III slot game.
Another company called Anchor coin got into the game making slot themes for all three companies. They were eventually bought I believe by IGT.

An S+ is an S+ is an S+ regardless of theme - change 2 chips, glass and reel strips and its a different machine.
There is no need to buy back or trade in a machine to change the theme.  Most of the other brands were similar.

Prior to licensing "themes" progressive jackpots were a thing. 
Basically the progressive amount starts at the top $$ award level.
Then as the game is played 1/8th of a penny (the contribution) is added to the progressive jackpot for each coin dropped.
The casino gets to write off this "contribution" as a marketing fee so when the amount is eventually won. The casino has already reaped the benefit and its practically free marketing.
The next innovation was "linked" progressives where a group of machines were wired together to a single progressive.
To garner more interest for these - prizes like Cars and exotic vacations were offered.
If you had 10x machines each with a top award of $1199 - a 10k car would have been something like a Corvette or a High end Mustang. 

Since the price of the car was much higher than the top award of any one slot machine and there was a risk that the car could be won prior to the casino having raked in enough progressive cash to cover it, insurers (also called underwriters) were brought in to insure the casino wouldn't take a loss. This opened up a whole new model to make money and everyone wanted a piece of the action.
Companies like IGT got into the game with MEGA BUCKS which was the first "wide area" progressive that spanned several casinos. It started at 1million. A unheard of amount.
This was underwritten by IGT themselves.

Following fast on the heels of the very popular Megabucks were premium themes that were licenced from Movies, and various established brands. The Hangover, Starwars, Ebay, and of course the ever popular Wheel of Fortune. The gaming company installs the theme usually at their cost, and instead of a fixed $$ amount they share in the machine profits. The deals are typically that over the course of the year they will replace the theme 4 times. Like any valued commodity scarcity drives greed, so when a hot new theme comes out AKA Barbie, the casinos line up and bid what they are willing to give up to the manufacturers so it lands in MGM but not Paris. Sometimes the casinos make no money but they know if there are 4 machines and 10 customers the other 6 will be playing something profitable.











It was until early 2000's before licensing became a thing.

[850mph]

ALL very  interesting…..

But still leaves the question:

WHERE DID THE OLD “S” SLOTS GO TO DIE?

If the casinos simply replaced the major parts and upgraded to a new theme every couple of years there  would still be very few around… a lot more than if they were destroyed… but I gotta  live 30 year old machines are not still installed in casinos..?

I would have sworn they got scavenged and rebuilt… but I guess I’m only half right…. They got re-themed but not destroyed.

Leaving very few from the early 90s actually left, very few meaning 20K or less…

But by the above post, and my friend’s eMail, it seems the machines were BOUGHT….

WHERE DID THEY ALL GO?