Inside Asian Gaming

inside asian gaming FEBRUARY 2016 34 Exactly seven years ago, in anticipation of a wave of misbehavior in Macau that would follow from the global financial crisis pulling down the Chinese economy, Steve Karoul wrote a guide to successfully working with junkets. The Chinese downturn didn’t happen, and Macau’s GGR turned out to be in line for five more years of explosive growth. His advice, in fact, is much more timely now than it was then. W e need to understand what a junket is and what it is not. A casino junket is a group of individuals that “supposedly” have a propensity for gaming that are being organized by a tour leader — referred to as a junket rep — to take them on an organized trip to a casino for gaming purposes. A casino junket is not a free tour and travel vacation compliments of the host casino. It is supposed to be a gaming trip. I am one of the few casino executives that February 2009 Blast from the Past FEB 2009 The Good , The Bad and The Ugly have actually worked both sides of the fence. I have hired and fired numerous junket reps all around the world when I worked as Vice President of Casino Marketing for different large casinos. I have worked myself as a junket rep when I lived in Hong Kong. And I have worked for and with some of the biggest junket reps in the world when I also lived in Hong Kong, Bangkok and the Philippines. I am very familiar with all aspects of casino junkets and dealing with junket reps both domestically within the United States and internationally. There are many positive aspects of dealing with reputable junket reps. There are also many risks and liabilities in dealing with not so reputable junket reps. There was a very famous management textbook several years ago written by Harvey McKay, entitled “Learn to Swim with the Sharks without Getting Eaten Alive”. There are some similarities between the book and dealing with not so reputable junket reps. Therefore, I always advise casino management to proceed with caution when setting up a new junket program.