Hi, I am Mike Barrett from Richland WA. I recently joined the Strikers. I had always been a chip collector, but hadn’t given strikes much thought until reading the recent article about them in Strictly Slots magazine. Then I ran into Don at the Plaza in August during your convention. He gave me his card and told me about the club. I collected about 8 strikes around the Vegas area on that trip and was hooked. I bought a strike frame to display my new finds. I recently dropped a line to Pam Martin with a few questions and told her that I was going to make a Reno run soon and she asked me to post my results on thestrikepoint. What a gracious lady!!!

I hit every spot on the Strikers list in Northern Nevada except the Red Garter in Wendover and Stockmen’s in Elko.

Interesting for me was that all of the machines were different than the ones I saw in Vegas. All were three liners where you got one strike for matching the SS symbol with Bar-Bar, two strikes for matching with the Double Bar-Bar, and three strikes for matching with Triple Bar-Bar. I hit trips twice and doubles many times.

I got strikes at Mr. B’s in Mill City (3), Sierra Sid’s in Sparks (6), Reno-Tahoe Airport (4), Eldorado (2). Harrah’s Reno (2), Bill’s Tahoe (2), Delta Saloon in Virginia City, Sands Regency, Fitzgeralds, Atlantis, Peppermill, Reno Hilton, and Silver Legacy.

I found several variances from the list on Silverstrike.com of places that had them. First, Harrah’s Reno does have them (which makes sense since our site shows the new approved strikes from the NV Gaming Comm but Harrah’s doesn’t show up on the list). Second, both John Ascuaga’s Nugget in Sparks and Caesar’s Tahoe both told me that they no longer have strike machines. Maybe someone else could verify this and we should update our list on silverstrikers.com.

I did get two red caps in my travels – one at Sierra Sid’s with a backing of “US 375 ET Highway” that has an alien on it (very cool!!) and one from Bill’s in Tahoe with “Lake Tahoe Year Round Playground” with a skier, hiker, and biker on it.

I got ten strikes at Delta Saloon (the machine showed three types) trying to get one with “the Suicide Table” on it. Not one came out. I can only assume there were none in the machine. So I sold back seven of them. I have the other two backs with V&T Railroad and St Mary’s Church.

One other thing, I had very good luck on the machines. The article in Strictly Slots said that the average cost is about $14 per strike, which makes sense since the strike is a ten dollar “jackpot” plus there are other pays and the house juice. My average cost for 28 strikes was about $6.50 each.

Last, I was a bit troubled by the response at the Nugget and Caesars. I really got the sense they thought the SS machines were a pain in the butt. They obviously aren’t a big volume machine for the casino, but they are a nice draw to get us in and are a great promotional item. I hope the hobby can grow and not get swept away by short-sighted corporate greed.

Thanks,
Mike