Inside Asian Gaming

IAG DEC 2019年12月 亞博匯 68 FEATURES T ucked away in an overtly unassuming building on a small side street in Santa Mesa, Metro Manila, is Club Tropicana – a 1,000 square meter PAGCOR-held slots club that just so happens to be the most lucrative PAGCOR club per slot machine in the country. It also provides a fascinating glimpse into the Philippines’ locals gaming market, where venues such as this – providing familiarity and comfort rather than the glitz and glamor of Manila’s IRs – saw income from the regulator’s licensed casino operations grow 19.4% in the first nine months of 2019 to Php21.11 billion. “From our market profiling, it turns out that our players are very comfortable with us because we’ve sort of developed a community go-to entertainment venue for those who want to play, so the market has become very regular,” explains Kat Regalado-Trinanes, Club Tropicana’s Marketing and Logistics Consultant. “We have seniors in the morning, we have middle aged in the afternoon and then everyone else in the evening. It has been very stable like that and I think that’s how we have maintained the revenues that we have.” Opened in March 2007, Club Tropicana – which counts Solaire Resort & Casino owner Enrique Razon Jr among its early investors – currently houses 250 slot machines which average around US$200 in revenue per machine, per day. It does so despite the increased level of competition brought to the Manila market by the emergence of