So it came as a surprise when Mount Airy, which lies almost equidistant between Philadelphia and New York City, recently lifted its smoking ban without explanation. The C3 Gaming report included results from Pennsylvania where the Mount Airy Casino Resort maintained a smoking ban and revenue increased slightly, while its competitor, Mohegan Sun Pocono, permitted smoking and revenue showed a slight decline. 'The fear that business would drop was quickly dispelled as gaming volume quickly achieved pre-pandemic levels.' 'About 160 Indian gaming casinos chose to keep smoking bans in place,' Klebanow said.
'Quite simply, COVID changed everything (related to smoking and casinos),' said Andrew Klebanow, a co-founder of C3 Gaming, a casino consulting consortium in Las Vegas.Ĭ3 Gaming released a report this year showing customers returned to casinos after smoking bans primarily because they enjoy gambling.
When commercial and tribal casinos began re-opening after the coronavirus pandemic shutdown of 2020, smoking bans proliferated, and the sky did not fall. Casinos and smoking have always been joined at the hip, but one of the many legacies of the COVID-19 pandemic could be the eradication of smoke-filled gambling dens.
