How to Support a Smoke Free Option at Your Casino

I’ve been publicly advocating for smokefree casinos for years, an element that has long existed in my home country of Canada. When we’ve surveyed players, 86% of casino visitors (smokers included) agree that smokefree casinos are their preferred gambling experience.

But many casinos continue to not offer them, or offer “non-smoking” spaces that are mixed with smoking areas and have no air separation. Part of the reason is that smokers are vocal – they tell the casinos they want to smoke, and will vote with their wallet if smoking is removed from the casino floor.

As it turns out, many of us don’t use the tools at our disposal to tell the casinos what we want. But your voice counts, and many voices count even more. Casinos are very receptive to feedback, and listen carefully to their players as they make decisions, whether it’s what games are on the casino floor or whether they should go smokefree.

And it’s not just about us as players and our health – smokefree spaces are important for the health of the casinos’ workers, who otherwise are forced to breathe in bad air to earn their living. Despite only 11% of people smoking overall, 100% of those at the casino have to breathe in the smoke when visiting or working at casinos that allow smoking.

With that in mind, here’s some ideas on how you can show your support for a smokefree casino experience. At the end, I’ll also share some things that you can include to ensure they know what a smokefree experience truly means.

Respond to Customer Experience Surveys

Have you ever received one of those marketing emails after visiting a casino asking for your feedback? This is their direct ask to you to share your experience, and a great opportunity to tell them that you would prefer a smokefree experience.

Oftentimes casinos with smoking have issues with ashtrays and ash on the slots, so this tends to also flag cleanliness issues that come with smoking as well. It’s one of the easiest ways to share your feedback, and often is structured in a way to make it easier than writing a full email.

Contact the Casino via Social Media

You can reach out via message on platforms like Facebook and Instagram. Social media teams tend to be hyperfocused on feedback, whether left as a comment or submitted through their messages, as it’s one way a casino can keep the pulse of their customers. A quick message to them can make a big difference!

Visit the Players Club Desk

The players club is an important program for the casino, and because they speak with players all day, they often are a great place to provide feedback. They may have ways to submit the feedback more formally, or will confirm your feedback when discussed in meetings and such around player concerns as part of their work at the property.

Send an Email

Most casinos will list a customer service or contact option on their site, or have a Contact form you can submit (which effectively works just like an email). Similar to social media, these accounts tend to get monitored, and player feedback directly monitored.

Those of us who take the time to submit this are providing input that is often given additional weight, because they know we’re deliberately taking time out to share this feedback.

Leave Reviews on Review Sites

A lot of us don’t think twice about leaving a review when we have a bad experience at a restaurant, but casinos have Yelp and Google Reviews pages too – and your experience is then shared with others who may avoid the property if they don’t like a smoky environment either. 

Casinos say going smokefree or not is effectively a business decision, so help them understand the impact of their decision by sharing your feedback. If they realize the customers are telling them smokefree is important, you could very well see changes that make your experience better. If they do, sharing the positive feedback can also be important. 

One of our team members did this a few years ago when his then-local casino went smokefree during the pandemic. He shared his info, noting he visited more often, and spent more money, since the change. They offered a personalized response and noted the feedback for the change had been positive. Sure enough, smoking and non-smoking area signs came down quietly a few months later, with the smokefree property policy remaining in place today.

Important Things to Mention

Some casinos think they can get away with a small enclosed smokefree space with older machines. It’s important to ensure your feedback is complete and explains the issues with this. This includes:

• Smokefree spaces without good games to play intentionally sets the space up for failure, as players who want a smokefree space, but also enjoy newer games, won’t find what they like there.
• Smokefree spaces are not helpful if you have to walk through a smoky casino to get there.
• The same goes for enjoying other amenities on the property, such as when you have a smokefree place to gamble, but all the restaurants are right next to, or within, the smoking casino.

A truly smokefree experience ensures nonsmokers can get into and out of the smokefree spaces without being exposed to smoke. This isn’t to say casinos can’t accommodate smokers – there’s a variety of properties that have been able to accomplish this – but non-smokers shouldn’t have to be breathe in bad air as an acceptable compromise.

One smoker can pollute the air for dozens, or even hundreds, of other casino guests. Studies show the air in non-smoking spaces is generally poor, when sharing an open floor plan with smoking spaces. Health is important, and casinos can and should do more to protect their guests. Your feedback can help them see the light.

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