Size Does Matter

11 May 2021

By Frank Scoblete

I have five stores to which I go and all five sell lottery tickets; three stationary stores, a 7/11 and a liquor store (I want you to know that I only go in there for scientific purposes). I am not a big lottery player; I buy one ticket when the lottery gets to a half billion dollars. So you can see that I don’t play much.

I enjoy watching people ferociously rubbing off their scratch-off tickets. Both men and women rub them for all the tickets are worth – which isn’t much in the long term as the house edge on such tickets makes slot machines look generous.

Of course, when the BIG lotteries such as Powerball and Mega Millions get over the 200 million-dollar level, everyone comes out of the woodwork to bet it up. Some stores actually have lines of people waiting to buy tickets. And men seem to make up the majority of those people.

I am not saying my perceptions of the man/woman percentages are actually scientifically accurate but this is what I am experiencing when I hit those stores during the BIG possible wins lotteries. Men tend to dominate the players when the monster jackpots are on the line.

In casinos, some relatively small percentage of slot players will go after the big possible jackpots on progressive machines but these machines don’t seem to entrance the players as much as the BIG lotteries entrance them. Big possible jackpots are not necessarily best audience draws on the slot machines, although I must say even some of the smaller jackpots on stand-alone machines are actually quite large and they certainly do attract loyal players.

Yet, something new has entered the casino over the past few years and that is – ta da! – big slot machines. No, not the Big Berthas that would stand alone in many casinos and attract some poor sucker every so often. No, the newer big machines are physically big, as in tall. But they are not much wider; they can fit right into the normal slot aisles. They go up; not out.

Whoever came up with this idea was a genius. Going tall as opposed to going wide does not limit the number of slot machines a casino can employ. Instead, such designs attempt to play into the “bigger is better” concept that monetarily propels lotteries without the casinos having to offer more (or much more) jackpot money to attract players.

[Please note: One of the truly weirdest big slot machines is titled The Titanic. Why anyone would want to play a machine that highlights an historic event that killed so many people is beyond me. Yes, there are machines that highlight the flesh-eating zombies of The Walking Dead but at least they are fictional…I hope.]

Sometimes these big slot machines are put in small carousels where they are far more noticeable than they would be tucked in with other slot machines. Although tucking them in would not prevent them from sky-shaming the runty slot machines that shared the aisles with them. Still, positive placement might enhance the players’ desire to play them.

Are players really playing such machines? After all, that’s the bottom line of everything a casino does. In the casinos where I play, I have noticed that the slot players do seem attracted to these big machines. I also see a lot more men playing them. I guess men have bought into the idea that “bigger is better,” even if that bigger is not necessarily in terms of the jackpots.

You can get the normal range of games on the big machines; cartoons, movies, television shows and the like. I liked the Tarzan machine because I love the real Tarzan of the book.

[Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs is a great book and nothing like any of the movies made about the character. The book is adventure, a great love story and a lead character that is truly amazing. I encourage you to read the book.]

It’s the bigness of the machines that truly attracts and warrants the attention of slot players. Sitting at one of those machines makes you a part of something large and I wonder if some players don’t think of themselves as larger because they are playing such machines. “Ah, Martha, look at all those peasants down there. They look just like ants. I can crush them between my fingers.”

Our daily lives can show us that bigger is better. Manhattan would not be so popular if it did not have such towering skyscrapers. Just ask King Kong! That gorilla knew he wanted to be at the top of the world. Slot players might want that too.

Of course, machines can only go so high in most casinos. Yes, casino ceilings are somewhat high but they do limit how far up a slot machine can go. There may come a time when the entire casino is composed of ceiling-scrapping machines; a Manhattan of mechanical monsters. I wonder if such a thing happened, would the casinos be making more money because of such height.

All the best in and out of the casinos!

Frank Scoblete’s web site is www.frankscoblete.com. His books are available at smile.Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, kindle, e-books and at bookstores.