Sands Casino leads the state in buying liquor
With drinks on the house for thousands of casino patrons each day, Sands spends $2 million a year on liquor.
Bartender Nicole MacGown serves up a beer at the Coil bar at the Sands Casino Resort Bethlehem on Thursday. (MICHAEL KUBEL, THE MORNING CALL / October 30, 2013)
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When it comes to vices, Pennsylvanians apparently like theirs in pairs.
That may explain why people who gamble at the Sands Casino Resort Bethlehem drink more liquor than patrons at any other business in Pennsylvania, and why four of the top 10 liquor buyers in the state are casinos.
With free drinks flowing 19 hours a day on a gaming floor with 3,000 slot machines and 183 table games, Sands easily outpaced the rest of the state, spending nearly $2 million last year for liquor, according to figures released by the state Liquor Control Board.
That was $840,000 more than second-place Harrah's Casino in Chester, in part because Sands has one of the state's most generous free liquor policies. At Sands, if you're gambling, drinks are on the house.
That's good news for the nearly 22,000 people who visit what is arguably Pennsylvania's most successful casino complex, but with drunken driving arrests in the city up nearly 80 percent since the casino opened in 2009, Mothers Against Drunk Driving officials are less impressed.
"Mothers Against Drunk Driving [MADD] is concerned to learn that some casinos in Pennsylvania are providing free alcoholic beverages to patrons," said Jan Withers, MADD's national president.
"We would ask these establishments to be mindful that this practice can promote excessive alcohol consumption, which may lead to drunk driving."
Sands officials said they have the state's biggest bar tab because they, in effect, have the biggest bar.
"That's just a factor of the sheer volume of people we attract," said Sands spokeswoman Julia Corwin. "Eight million people a year come through our doors. Obviously, with free drinks available to that many people, the liquor bill is going to be high."
Corwin added that Sands has a strict policy not to serve more than two drinks per hour to any patron, and all servers are trained to spot intoxicated patrons and cut off booze to them.
According to the LCB, Sands bought 116,070 bottles of liquor and wine for $2 million in 2012, followed by Harrah's Casino's $1.16 million purchase of 73,717 bottles and the $1.15 million purchase of 47,090 bottles by Del Frisco's Steakhouse, an upscale restaurant in Philadelphia.
Other casinos in the top 10 include Rivers in Pittsburgh at $1.1 million and Mohegan Sun in Wilkes-Barre at $1.1 million.
In the Lehigh Valley, Platinum Plus gentleman's club led all Lehigh County businesses with $554,000 worth of liquor purchased, while Blue Grillhouse in Bethlehem led non-casinos in Northampton County with $390,000 in liquor buys.
The Liquor Control Board only tracks the sale of wine and spirits. Beer is not included in its tally.
The first Pennsylvania casino opened in November 2006, and Sands began opening its now-$830 million casino complex in 2009. Table games like blackjack, roulette and craps were added at casinos statewide in 2010. Since then, Sands has become the second-most lucrative casino in the state — behind only Bensalem-based Parx — netting nearly $40 million in revenues per month from gamblers losses.
However, it has the state's busiest table games, pulling in $13.7 million at the tables per month, with Parx finishing second. Though casinos can deliver drinks to anyone gambling, the free drinks tend to be more plentiful in the table games areas than in the slot machine areas.
"The law basically says they can give free drinks to anyone who is actively playing," said state Gaming Control Board spokesman Richard McGarvey. "But how casinos decide to do that is a business decision. They all seem to do it a little differently."
Rivers Casino in Pittsburgh, for example, provides self-serve fountains where people can get soda for free. They also have wait staff bringing drinks to tables and slots machines, but people have to pay.
There is no free liquor on the casino floor.
Other casinos only offer free drinks in the high-limit rooms, where a single hand can be in the thousands of dollars and the slot machines start at $1. Mohegan Sun in Wilkes-Barre gives beer away to players club members, but charges for liquor.
Sands is among the state's most generous casino alcohol servers. Wait staff offer all beverages, including beer and liquor, to all gamblers, no matter how much they are betting. Patrons cannot leave the gambling floor with drinks.
Like Sands, Mount Airy Casino in Paradise Township, Monroe County, offers free drinks to anyone who is gambling.
The varying free drink policies don't fully explain why Sands leads the state in liquor purchases. Parx, in Bensalem, for example, is the only casino with higher revenues than Sands. It has the same 'free drinks for all players' policy, yet bought less than one-third the liquor, at $600,000.
Arrests in Bethlehem for driving under the influence of alcohol have spiked since the casino opened, and in particular since the table games opened. The 274 DUI offenses in the city in 2008 increased to 488 in 2012 — a 78 percent increase.
That is despite a DUI arrest rate across the rest of Lehigh and Northampton counties that has remained virtually flat over the same period.
Bethlehem Police Lt. Jeremy Alleshouse wasn't ready to draw a straight line from the increase in DUI arrests to Sands' generous liquor policies, but he was willing to draw one to the casino. The Sands brings an average of nearly 22,000 people into the city every day and virtually all of them are of drinking age.
That's equivalent to increasing the city's population by 30 percent each day, he noted. In addition, he said police across the Lehigh Valley in recent years have been better trained to spot drivers under the influence of alcohol and drugs, and thus have learned to catch more offenders.
"I believe that a combination of an increase in the number of drinking-aged tourists, combined with an increase in our enforcement capabilities has resulted in the overall increase in the number of DUI arrests made by the Bethlehem Police Department," Alleshouse said.
Corwin added that Sands' liquor license includes sales at four casino restaurants, including the pricey Emeril's Chop House.
And as is the case in every state-sanctioned casino, it also includes lots of liquor purchased at bars on the casino floor. Every casino has at least one lounge where drinks are sold. Sands has a 100-seat concert venue called Molton, a lounge where patrons can play the slots called Coil and a cocktail bar specializing in chilled fruit drinks, called Infusion.
However, the Sands Event Center concert venue, its six-restaurant food court and its buffet are on separate liquor licenses and do not figure into the casino's state-leading leading total.
"We want our patrons to enjoy their visit to Sands, but we encourage them to be responsible," Corwin said. "We have no interest in seeing anyone leave the casino that should not be driving."
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