AGS’ new promotional video, which runs less than two minutes, tells you pretty much everything you need to know about the company – and there’s barely a slot machine in sight.
Employees paint on their faces and chests. CEO David Lopez dons a blue wig. CMO Julia Boguslawski waves an orange foam finger as the background music forebodes a group getting pumped up for action.
A few team members line up to spell O-B-S-E-S-S-E-D, and an AGS slot tech closes the video by firmly saying, “Around here, every day is game day.”
If you’re anywhere near the AGS booth at G2E next week, you’ll likely see the phrase: “Obsessed with the Game.” It’s the company’s new slogan, and, well, the company’s a little obsessed with it, as well as almost everything else, from slot products to new table game developments to interactive products to customer service.
“We really are obsessed. But in the right way,” Boguslawski says. “A hallmark of our brand is passion. It’s a perfect tagline. We’re obsessed with so many facets of gaming.”
Boguslawski says that the company’s culture starts with Lopez, who became CEO in 2014, as AGS began to expand beyond its Class II gaming roots. Since then, Lopez has raised AGS’ profile in nearly every facet of their business.
“It starts with the CEO, and that tone sets the temperature,” Boguslawski says. “The great thing about David is that he really walks the walk and talks the talk, and it’s very genuine. We ourselves are gamblers and our staff designs games for gamblers like themselves.”
Lopez says: “We have passion across the board, from the genesis of the idea to the creation of the product to fine-tuning production all the way down to how we sell and service each product. Perhaps even more importantly, though, we’re passionate about our people. We recruit selectively, and we take the hiring process seriously. We really obsess over it.
“We look for people with a great deal of enthusiasm and passion,” he says. “If they just say, ‘Oh, sounds like a cool job,’ they’re probably not going to be a good fit.”
But obsession, or extreme passion, as Boguslawski defines it, still leaves room for playfulness and experimentation, two traits Lopez admires.
“It doesn’t mean that we’re perfect. It doesn’t mean that we’re right every day,” he says. “But if we put the passion in, everything else falls into place.
“We’ll create great products if we obsess over having great people in R&D and game design. As the CEO, I obsess about the players on the team. Each team member’s craft is an obsession for them and each person’s work comes together to make an impact for the company and the industry.”
One example came from the development of the company’s Orion cabinet, which just won a Silver Medal in the 2017 G2E Gaming & Technology awards program organized by Global Gaming Business magazine – its second innovation award this year. Lopez said he knew the cabinet, which performs well above house average, would be a hit when so many casino operators actually uttered the word, “Wow,” upon seeing it at last year’s G2E.
“If you saw all Orion’s different iterations, it would blow your mind,” he says. “Are the lights too bright, are they bright enough? Do we want them to move? Do we want them to look like fire, like ice? What colors will evoke emotion in people?
“Our team was fixated on getting the quality of the screen, the brightness, the servicing aspect and the height of the cabinet perfect. Our team is obsessive about everything they do. They study human behavior across the board, inside and outside the gaming world,” he says.
For example, the company’s Chief Technology Officer obsesses over cars and watches, Lopez says. “The precision and details that go into certain brands in those industries are incredible, and he uses that as a benchmark,” Lopez says.
With that kind of mindset, “obsessed with the game” seems to best convey the company’s vibe.
“We can’t just say we’re obsessed with the game – it’s something you have to prove and demonstrate every day. One of the many ways we’re doing this is by engaging gaming operators in conversations about their obsessions, so we can design better products that meet their needs and we can give them what they want. And at G2E we’re doing just that by offering gaming operators a chance to win a $10,000 VIP Game Day Package by completing a survey about their obsessions. We like to make the whole experience and dialogue fun.”
“If you don’t have that dialogue, you’ll never get it right,” adds Lopez.
AGS also encourages that same kind of dialogue with its employees. Every week, the company sends out a “temperature check” survey to its more than 540 employees and responds with action to any concerns. They also spelled out their core values about a month ago, using language that is a vast departure from the H.R.-ish lingo you see on most walls. They include “Make Your Mom Proud,” “Keep it Real” and “Let Your Inner Geek Shine.”
“We can make mistakes and not have a ‘gotcha’ kind of culture,” Lopez says. “We can get after it, have some fun, and make sure that we don’t ever give up, that we’re relentless in that pursuit.”
