Bolstered in part by the return of international visitors, the Global Gaming Expo in Las Vegas is expected to approach pre-pandemic attendance levels when the final tally is completed on Thursday.
COVID-19 shuttered the show in 2020. When it returned in 2021, 13,000 people attended, less than half of a typical show of about 27,000 at the Venetian Expo on the Strip.
Speaking to reporters Monday morning as the show kicked off, Korbi Carrison, event vice president of G2E, said more than 350 companies are exhibiting during the tradeshow portion that starts Tuesday and runs through Thursday.
“The excitement on the Expo floor where they’re continuing to set up today has been unbelievable,” Carrison said, “This looks a lot like 2019 did, but one difference is the energy, which is off the charts compared to 2019.”
Carrison talked about the lobby of the Expo center packed with people registering on Monday, which makes it too early to predict the final attendance. “We know it’s going to far exceed last year’s attendance and it’s getting close to 2019 numbers,” Carrison said, who added that the number of exhibitors is getting close to 2019 totals as well.
“We’re not hearing about people not coming,” Carrison said. “We’re hearing about people coming. From the exhibition standpoint, we’re seeing exhibitors we haven’t seen before coming across from Europe, especially in the igaming realm. The participation there is very enthusiastic.”
Casey Clark, senior vice president of the American Gaming Association, said a record number of media is attending this year’s show. In taking media questions, he talked about the strength of the industry and the number of new properties that have been “hugely successful,” such as MGM Resorts International’s National Harbor in Maryland. He said there’s an appetite for growth in land-based operations beyond igaming. “There are untapped markets with no casinos. Tennessee is showing there’s an appetite with their online sports betting. There are a lot of untapped markets and people like to hypothesize about Texas, for example.”
Christopher Justice, president of Global Payments Gaming Solutions, said he has high expectations for this year’s G2E. Last year, the company conducted about 88 percent of the booth meetings it had in 2019. This year’s pre-show bookings indicate that “we are going to blow away 2019 by a wide margin. It speaks to me that G2E is going to be incredibly well attended.”
Carrison said they expect exhibitors to debut a wide range of products and the biggest trends are slots and cabinets, igaming and sports betting, and digital payments.
