Indiana casino players not rolling dice on recession; Boyd hit hardest

Northwest Indiana casinos are still down from last February, in some cases rather dramatically, according to the latest revenue numbers released Monday by the Indiana Gaming Commission.

Altogether, Northwest Indiana casinos took an $8 million revenue loss over February 2007, bringing in only $101.5 million compared with $109.6 million in February last year.

Boyd Gaming's Blue Chip Casino in Michigan City once again suffered the biggest year-over-year revenue drop with $15.1 million versus $20.6 million for February 2007, though it did bring in more than January's $14.1 million.

Gary's Majestic Star had the second biggest drop with $10.6 million, versus $12 million last February.

The increases posted by Blue Chip, Majestic Star II and Resorts did nothing to improve the numbers, which were also down last February for some reason, said Gaming INSight Editor Ed Feigenbaum.

And with Illinois' smoking ban, the decline speaks to bigger issues.

"We should've benefited from the smoking ban, but we haven't," Feigenbaum said. "But we're not the only ones; Illinois struggled last month as well. Even the state of Nevada said it had a bad month, though I kind of find that hard to believe.

"It looks like the recession is taking its toll."

Attendance numbers attest to that only slightly, however: Northwest Indiana's casinos saw 850,480 people pass through its gates last month, while 904,572 came through last year, for a 6 percent drop.

"There always seems to be a drop in attendance between January and February, and that the Majestic casinos and Resorts were able to keep their attendance numbers pretty steady is impressive," Feigenbaum said.

Horseshoe in Hammond reported $37.6 million in revenues, and Resorts brought in $27.9 million for February.

Majestic Star and Majestic Star II combined for $20.9 million in revenue, the commission reported.