Tribes have to regulate to satisfy new challenges — CDC Gaming

The National Indian Gaming Commission reported tribal gaming income of $43.9 billion for fiscal 12 months 2024, reflecting a 4.6%, or $2 billion, improve over $41.9 billion in 2023.

But based on a panel of specialists assembled for a CDC Gaming roundtable, there are harmful headwinds that would disrupt tribal sovereignty and the way tribes function.

Victor Rocha, Conference Chair of the Indian Gaming Association, mentioned that prediction markets, sweepstakes gaming, offshore websites and cryptocurrency are among the many points that tribes need to confront.

“Caution becomes paralysis and paralysis means you are behind,” Rocha mentioned. “Nobody’s waiting for the tribes. Tribes in California are talking about 2028. If sweepstakes gets knocked out by the end of 2025, that’s two years you’re going to have to wait, and nobody’s waiting for them. … I guess the way to frame that is that the technology is moving faster than the tribes and tribal gaming.”

While expertise has stored tribal operators striving to maintain tempo, there are different methods for them to compete. Kelli Weaver, who runs KDW Consulting, says it’s vital for tribes to mitigate their weaknesses and emphasize their strengths.

“I look at things like what is the room like,” she says. “The eating places. How simple is it to get the elevator, the gaming flooring, the convention middle. What are the facilities? What form of cleaning soap is used, what does the room or air scent like.

“You look at all these things that go into the hospitality experience and how you bring those smaller tribal properties up to speed, because they’re already struggling with the technology side of it.”

For Raving Consulting CEO Deana Scott, the primary challenge is existential. She is nervous tribes are more and more being requested to surmount hurdles their business brethren don’t have to beat.

“There have been 105 executive orders that the NIGC (National Indian Gaming Conference) has had to review,” Scott says in the course of the first sixth months of the present administration. 

Arguments that sweepstakes are authorized are one factor. But will sweepstakes operators be held to the identical requirements as tribal gaming operators?

“Are they going to play by the rules that we have?” Scott says. “Such high standards have been placed upon us and tribal gaming, and everyone needs to comply by them. When I worked in background screenings, and I did that for almost a decade, the difference in a screening that we had to conduct for tribal gaming cost three, four times as much as that for a commercial gaming operation because of all the standards that are in place.”

Scott credit Rocha with being the “canary in the coal mine,” with bringing consideration to the altering panorama.

“But most of the tribes are so inwardly focused about what they need to sustain their tribal government that they’re not really looking at what is the business going to need to be successful long term,” Scott says. “Knowing that this expertise on-line, no matter that appears like, is coming our means, it should change the enterprise. Sports betting alone is altering it. You can see the change of how individuals are connecting with our product, or what the long run demographic goes to count on.

“We’re going to have these big box buildings that aren’t going to speak to anybody, and they’re going to be like the Nordstrom downtown and the strip malls if we don’t start thinking strategically about what is the market, and what is our product going to be and look like.”

But even because the tribes face big challenges in 2025, Rocha is satisfied tribes are in a “better position to survive” than they ever have.

“Deana is absolutely right,” he mentioned.  “The smaller tribes are going to have a tough time, as a result of in the event you’re simply working your online business for jobs and stuff like that, nicely, you continue to need to be modern. Because just like the film theaters (who’ve tailored with new choices together with extra meals decisions and cozy seating), individuals want to be entertained in several methods.

“You have to let people know you’re there. You can’t rely on the old gray hairs and silver backs, because there’s not that many of them anymore, or there won’t be in the next 20 years. So, you gotta bring in the generational people. I say that as a person of silver hair, too.”

 “Business evolves and entertainment evolves, and just you have to be able to do that in general,” Scott mentioned. “It’s not even as a result of tribes are doing something incorrect. It’s simply the character of enterprise. 

“Understand your demographic,” Weaver added. “Who’s coming in and how can we cater to them?”