Atlantic City casinos were hoping to see a rebound in revenues with the start of summer. They didn’t get it, making this month and next even more important.

Every Atlantic City casino posted a revenue decline in June, compared to the same month last year. Citywide, revenues were down nearly 13 percent.

Revel Casino
Revel's bold slots promotions in July could help Atlantic City in the next round of revenue figures. (Flickr user Grant Guarino)
loading...

Roger Gros, publisher of Global Gaming Business Magazine, blamed the sour June numbers on bad weather and the fact that June 2013 had one less weekend day than June 2012.

Now the resort town’s casinos are counting on July and August, the two most important months of the year, for a turnaround.

“If you’re not posting your highest revenues of the year in those two months, it’s going to be a bad year for you,” Gros said.

The year so far has been nothing but bad news for Atlantic City. Every month saw a double-digit revenue decline, except May. Casinos took in $240.2 million through the first six months of 2013, a 10.7 percent drop from the same period last year.

Gros expressed hope that July would post positive numbers, given the busy atmosphere witnessed over the long Independence Day weekend. At the same time, Revel is offering hard-to-beat slots promotions all month long.

“I would be very surprised if July didn’t record an increase over last year,” Gros said.

On the non-gaming side, Atlantic City experienced a 12 percent increase last month in the number of people who entered the Visitor Welcome Centers. Those visitors booked 106 room nights, a 104% increase over hotel bookings in June 2012.

More From WPG Talk Radio 95.5 FM