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Attracting players young and old — the ultimate challenge for the casino industry
By Katy Yam
January 21, 2016
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 Ah, the infamous Millennial crowd — the darlings of the modern commercial age of consumption and the target market for all retailers and services in Canada and around the world. Attractive due to their significant disposable income at 20 per cent of total income generated (compared to 30 per cent by Baby Boomers), this majorly underemployed, highly indebted group who live mostly with their parents prefers to spend money on unique experiences over acquiring large tangible goods like homes. They represent a quarter of the population in Canada and when looking at our southern neighbours, Millennials have actually exceeded Boomers at 83 million versus 74 million Americans, confirming them as a potentially lucrative target market.
One of the biggest challenges casino operators face today is how to bridge the entertainment gap for these two seemingly opposite target markets. With aging Baby Boomers anchoring the majority of our revenues and in decline, we are all looking for ways to regenerate our client base including the exploration of younger segments such as Millennials. Many see the needs of these two groups as being miles apart, requiring mutually exclusive investment strategies tailored to each segment for products and communications. With industry-wide casino revenues in decline, targeting two unique markets is costly; wouldn’t it be fabulous if there were a unique communication vector that resonated with both markets without sounding generic?
YOLO – The common denominator
Surprisingly, there is a common denominator, a common battle cry that unites Boomers and Millennials — it’s “You only live once” or “YOLO” for short. Anyone who has ever interacted with young adults aged 25 and less has witnessed their desire to live life to the fullest, to be adventurous and experience everything new and extreme just for the fun of it. On the other end of the age spectrum, Boomers are coming into an unprecedented age of financial and time freedom. With mortgages paid off and children who have left the nest, they are discovering a renewed fervour to finally live life fully before their health declines. With YOLO, notice how these two polar groups are increasingly overlapping to share similar experiences; with grandparents travelling the world with their grandchildren, exploding social media use to communicate with each other, attending U2 concerts or even skydiving together. They are leaving the working cohort of Generation X out of the fun and bonding around YOLO.
Finding the right mix
Understanding that YOLO is the modern version of “carpe diem” is an insight that casino operators can leverage to streamline product offers and marketing communications. By emphasising the shared desire to “seize the day” and live life fully in each moment, we can appeal to both these markets simultaneously. The challenge lies in finding the right content to hit the YOLO button simultaneously for both groups to drive behaviour and action. The key message, however, is that this proverbial sweet spot exists!
At the Société des casinos du Québec (SCQ), we have been working on creating experiences that entertain these two generations since 2008. It has been a long perilous road of continuous testing with gaming and restaurant products, multimedia environments and entertainment triggers of all nature and sizes. Before I share some of our successes and key findings, let me provide some background information to facilitate the understanding our R&D pathway. SCQ is division of Loto-Québec, a crown corporation run by the Quebec government. With four casinos and two hotel resort properties employing 4,600 employees, we generate just under $800 million in revenues where our net gains are invested back into the public sector.
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In 2007, our casinos showed initial signs of patron decline, in particular consumers under the age of 30. Increasing costs resulted in table limits starting as high as $25 a hand on weekends, making us a costly value proposition for young clients looking to experiment. As a result, we acted quickly and initiated an ambitious R&D strategy called “Le casino du futur” where we dared to imagine what the casino of the future would look like. This roadmap for renewing our clientele has been one wrought with many trials and even more errors that have proved extremely rewarding in lessons learned and improvements. We knew then that we had to start developing our future casino immediately if it was to see the light of day in 2010 and beyond.
Attracting younger players
With poker on the rise in 2008 and its relevance with younger markets, we wanted to open our first poker room with affordable price points that were both competitive and attractive to younger clients. After a series of failed initial negotiations with our dealer unions, electronic table games (ETGs) were launched instead of live dealer tables to give us the introductory price point desired by new clients. This initial foray into ETGs was an immediate success. We ordered more ETGs all while working with our unions to bring in live dealers with real cards to offer two distinct experiences. When the real card-live dealer poker finally launched, the ETGs emptied out. This taught us two valuable lessons; real cards are preferred to simulated cards if choice is given at the same price point and game experience facilitation is important; there is a need for someone to animate and interact with the clients to create a fun atmosphere. With ETGs, clients were left on their own to create the ambiance which was hit or mi
ss depending on the players present. We realized that it was better for us to play this facilitation role and offer real cards, to help break the ice and heighten the overall gaming experience.
In 2011, we worked to improve win perception for our slot patrons by building an immersive multimedia environment called the “Le Volcan.” A highly entertaining shared-win experience was created, a departure from the solitary win experience routinely encountered only by the patron at the winning machine. Clients appreciated celebrating and sharing their jackpot win with everyone playing and at the moment it occurred. Non-winning patrons felt an increased chance at winning because they witnessed first-hand the jackpot frequency and it made the environment extremely vibrant and exciting.
Expand product offerings
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In 2012, Interactive Roulette was launched to further develop the facilitator role in delivering personalized entertainment to clients. By automating the financial risks of payment and chip management through the ETG, we shifted our staff training towards a performance model. Equipping the real ball and wheel ETG with an entertainer gave us the ability to adapt the table atmosphere to the clients present, from a subtle animation to a full party with high fives all around; animators were able to manage each patron’s personal experience within the collective group. We have since launched Interactive Blackjack with the same principles of having an entertainer at the front of the table.
In 2013, we brought to life “La Zone,” our most ambitious project to date. We created an innovative immersive multimedia, multisensory and multigaming environment with 50 to 80 gaming stations hosted and managed by professionally stage-trained entertainers taught to build excitement with crowds. Equipped with intense lighting and sound systems, floor-to-ceiling screens to display game results, Instagram pictures or a live hashtag feed, each host entertains players with their unique persona and musical soundtrack on stage. With $1 roulette and $5 blackjack, clients can learn without being subject to traditional table “looks” and negative comments when making novice mistakes in game play. In addition to live game results for blackjack, roulette and baccarat generated by two entertainers, clients can try slot games, electronic blackjack, roulette and baccarat for a total of 14 live or simulated games without ever needing to leave their seat.
Motivating the Millennials
La Zone has been a hit with Millennials seeking an action-packed social experience where no evening is ever the same. Their desire for overstimulation, personalized game choice and to live unique variations of the same experience with all their friends has made La Zone a product that appeals to this fickle generation.
The short-term wins for the SCQ have been many. By physically locating La Zone with its bright lights and loud music far away from our traditional casino floors in historically dead floor space, we have been able to increase our overall profitability. Millennials get their own space away from the more tranquil environments that our core Boomer clientele prefers. La Zone has also created a favourable public awareness buzz for us, positioning the casino as a viable entertainment option for Millennials who had previously not considered us for their outings. But most importantly, La Zone has become our living, breathing in-house test laboratory for this elusive target market. Our animators get to try new gaming and entertainment ideas weekly with instant feedback, as Millennials will let you know quickly if they like or don’t like something. La Zone has removed costly guesswork out of testing new concepts which were previously estimated through surveys or focus groups that never gave us the real pulse of what the
commercial reality would be. The long-term win for us is to become a top-of-mind entertainment destination for younger generations ensuring our commercial continuation.
As the future slowly unfolds, the SCQ will continue to experiment, plan and develop the casino of the future. Our focus is to leverage YOLO whilst ensuring that our entire entertainment product offering is relevant for all segments from Baby Boomers, Gen X, Millennials (Gen Y) and the future Gen Z. Coupled with our continuous learning from La Zone and other ambitious projects, we will assuredly be launching the next big breakthrough in the coming years, so stay tuned as we continue this journey!
Katy Yam is the Manager of Slot Product Management and Business Intelligence at La société des casinos du Québec. With over 10 years of managing national brands in the consumer packaged goods industry, she has spent the last six years implementing the 4Ps marketing model within the casino framework. For more information, visit www.casinosduquebec.com or find Katy on LinkedIn at ca.linkedin.com/in/katyyam.
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