Where poker chips go when they die. (1 Viewer)

[CO0LHand]

This is a pretty interesting article that is equal parts fascinating and tragic. It's all about how casinos discard of old poker chips, or at least how they used to.

http://www.vegasinc.com/business/ga...do-poker-chips-go-die-look-lake-mead-and-cas/

Pictures!!!!!: http://www.vegasinc.com/photos/galleries/2013/oct/30/102813PokerChipsLE/

Some choice quotes:

"Close to 20 years ago, Spinetti received a call from a skin diver who found white poker chips buried at the bottom of Lake Mead.

Spinetti snatched them up and learned they came from the Las Vegas Club. The casino used them for play in 1957, but it’s unclear when executives threw them overboard. The casino rolled out new chips in 1963 and 1971.

The chips weren’t originally white. They were gray, but the lake’s water sucked the color from their rims.

Spinetti also has several chunks of concrete believed to have come from the foundation of the New Frontier, which was demolished in 2007. The chunks are riddled with poker chips from the Sands and metal tokens from resorts as far away as Laughlin."

"To destroy chips, casinos must consult with a board-approved disposal company. Sometimes it’s the same company that made the chips. Gaming Partners International, which supplies most casinos with chips, for instance, often destroys them, too.

Outdated chips typically are loaded into a truck equipped with a tumbler that crushes them into dust.

Gaming regulators have to be present to run an audit and witness the destruction."

 

[ovo]

very interesting, still need to visit Spinettis

 

[Junior24xx]

Cool article, next trip to Vegas I need to make time to go to spinnetis

 

[bmichaelhorn]

Really beautiful photos. I didn't realize spinettis had so many relics. I'll definitely stop by next time I'm in Vegas.

The concrete chunks with poker chips crack me up. My dad is a brick mason and I worked with him in the summers when I was in in middle and high school. When we were tearing up old foundations or concrete slabs we would often find tons of scrap metal, tools and random junk embedded in it. People used to use these to cheaply reinforce the concrete and get rid of old things laying around. I wonder if there was a specified poker chip admix for those foundations?! "So yeah boss, we're going to need about $1000 worth of redbirds per cubic yard on this job. Uh huh...nope, the dollar chips just won't cut it, gotta be them redbirds"

 

[RussB42]

I just chunk mine in the Kitchen Trash Container.....

 

[MeridianFC]

Really cool article, thanks for the link.

 

[Lars]

This article was in a Vegas paper a while back. My dad saved it for me even though he thinks my chip collecting is weird.

 

[slisk250]

Really beautiful photos. I didn't realize spinettis had so many relics. I'll definitely stop by next time I'm in Vegas.

The concrete chunks with poker chips crack me up. My dad is a brick mason and I worked with him in the summers when I was in in middle and high school. When we were tearing up old foundations or concrete slabs we would often find tons of scrap metal, tools and random junk embedded in it. People used to use these to cheaply reinforce the concrete and get rid of old things laying around. I wonder if there was a specified poker chip admix for those foundations?! "So yeah boss, we're going to need about $1000 worth of redbirds per cubic yard on this job. Uh huh...nope, the dollar chips just won't cut it, gotta be them redbirds"

Lots of interesting things happen in construction sites. I grew up in Arizona and my dad had a plumbing business. We were on site when the earth moving contractors would expose Hohokam relics. If they were honest and reported it to the authorities, all production stopped so scientists could recover what they could. It's more likely the sites were robbed or everything destroyed in the name of progress.

 

[GenghisKhan]

Interesting, thanks! Heading to Vegas first week of March for first time ever. So far the only 100% guaranteed stop is Spinettis, lol.

 

[CO0LHand]

Yea I hadn't heard a lot about Spinettis but after seeing the pictures of the place in that story I really want to go there.

 

[brains613]

Perhaps it was my mood at the time, but I was singularly underwhelmed by Spinettis on my visit.

 

[pltrgyst]

Heading to Vegas first week of March for first time ever. So far the only 100% guaranteed stop is Spinettis, lol.

Well, if you're going to Spinetti's, you should also wander through the Gamblers' General Store, since it's right in front of Spinetti's.

 

[spikeithard]

Don't think I've ever thrown a chip out in the garbage. I've given a plastic garbage bag full of dice chips away but never has one seen the can. Then again never broke one.. (Where are you piece of wood! )

Sent using tapatalk!

 

[brains613]

Well, if you're going to Spinetti's, you should also wander through the Gamblers' General Store, since it's right in front of Spinetti's.

Hmmm. I've never seen this phrase before. Did I even go to Spinetti's?