After 26 years of making 2-4 trips per year I have finally reached the point of not getting excited about a visit. I will continue to go once a year, mainly to meet a group out there as a tradition.

I burned out on poker about 4 years ago. I no longer have the patience to sit for hours waiting on the cards. I still enjoy the pit games but winning or losing a couple thousand $$ on a trip means nothing.

The food is overpriced and the bums are just annoying. I can't believe Fremont street doesn't police this more strictly.

I don't know if Vegas is at fault or if it's just me, but I'd rather spend time with a drink in hand on a beach somewhere. I do find it amazing that casinos are actually trending towards taking away perks when they should be doing the opposite, IMO.

I'm 47 and have been visiting since I turned 21. That's all....

As I've gotten older myself, I've found myself at the off-strip locals type casinos a lot more. They're cheaper, they're not nearly as crowded, and they just have a much more relaxed (and meth degen) vibe than strip casinos. Not to mention their house edge is in general a lot smaller than the strip casinos on pretty much everything (table games, VP, slots, etc).

How long before we get the “if you don’t like it, don’t come” response.

I was there a few weeks ago and I am in the same boat as you. I kinda just don't care for it anymore. I told my wife we don't need to come here again.

I was mainly just talking out loud but it would be interesting to see how many others feel the same way.

It kind of makes me sad because it has been my go-to destination my entire adult life. I had dreams of retiring and buying a condo out there to play poker every day for fun.

I hear what you're saying. I've taken 50+ trips over the last 15 or so years and the novelty is fading for me. I still really enjoy going but I don't get as excited as I once did. For me, I used to win at poker during the boom but now I rarely play so it's almost a guarantee that I will lose out there, table minimums suck during the fun times to play, the dive casinos on the strip (which were the most fun to play at) have all been redone, etc. But...on recent trips I've started playing much cheaper games like bubble craps and VP so it's something new and different for me just with even worse odds. I guess it keeps me entertained and I bleed my money a bit slower than I would at table games or poker. Once this novelty wears off, I'm guessing I'll be in the same boat as OP and have almost zero desire to go.

Similar age (49) and feelings here.


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The older I get, I find the anticipation of an upcoming Las Vegas trip is usually better than the trip itself.

I used to love to spend 10-14 days there..now my Vegas trips are usually 3-5 days..just the thought of going there for a week or longer makes my skin crawl..

I had the same feelings this year after my two trips. I felt the same as someone said, that the anticipation was more exciting than the trip itself. It’s just not the same for me anymore and I feel the value just isn’t there. It’s a weird feeeling, at least for me, but it is what it is. I’m not even sure I’ll go my annual guys trip for March madness next year. My wife laughed pretty hard when I said that a while back, but I might just prove her wrong.

Have you tried visiting one of the many casino resorts? I stopped by a couple on my last trip and had a great time. Free drinks when you play the slots!

Agreed,from someone around the same age, and living in LA, Vegas is kinda starting to wear off on me as well.

I think the small seed started with resort fees, not a big deal but a super small seed, then food prices for what you get are terrible, parking fees. Personally the buffet quality at a lot of places have gone down.

Customer service has been decent but I think overall my experience with service hasn't been what I perceive as what it used to be.

I think the biggest feeling is the overall nickel and dimeing tourists with fees and cutting cost measures makes the overall experience less valuable.

I live nearby, in Henderson. My expectations for a visit to the Strip are likely much different than yours.

That said, I understand that someone can get tired of visiting, or tired of playing poker or tired of spending time with tourists, etc, especially as they get older.

I believe the nickel and dime fees, adding "resort fees", parking fees" et cetera really have hurt the brand of the Las Vegas visit. It was simply ignorant, line item "accounting"-driven management. Like airlines, but worse because this is the "destination", the payoff, the reason why you are traveling ....

Go ahead, hit that beach somewhere and relax, Las Vegas will still be here if you feel like a visit again.

Vegas is like Taco Bell. If you eat until you're not hungry, it's cool. If you eat until you are full, you will suffer.

That's a great line. Hope you don't mind if I steal it..

I'm with you, and have been going regularly for 23 years now. The convergence of the Strip with Times Square is what's turning me off the most, and I preferred when the fleecing of visitors was done in a more subtle, artful way. The value isn't what it used to be, nor is there any real feeling of specialness anymore.

Lmao. Well said.

I think that is exactly right. Fleecing of visitors in the most obvious way. Before you were fleecing visitors, skillfully and creatively.

Is gambling revenue in decline because of all these resort fees/nickel and dime nonsense, or did the casinos start nickel and diming because of the decline in gambling revenue?

What also doesn't help is the fact that where I live in Northern San Diego County, there are about a dozen full service casinos, or poker rooms, in less than a 45 minute drive:

Full service casinos: Pechanga, Pala, Pauma, Harrahs, Valley View, Sycuan, Barona, Viejas, etc.

Poker/Card rooms only: Oceans 11, Lake Elsinore, Seven Mile, Lucky Lady, etc.

I might be forgetting a couple..I can just imagine how awesome a trip to Vegas was before the 1990's and the proliferation of Indian casinos..

Vegas is a toilet especially the strip.The novelty of it wore off quickly for me.At this point it's just a bunch of ****, annoying people who can't walk,beggers (both actual beggers and casino employees with their hands out) and overpriced garbage in the way of getting to the poker room.

I first went in 2005.I tired of it before all of the nickel and diming started but that definitely doesn't help.

Everyone has casinos close to where they live now, so they can gamble without coming to Vegas. Besides that, millennials don’t gamble anyway, they use their free time to put as many different avocado toasts as possible on their Instastory or Snapchat.

The one thing I am most excited about when it comes to going to Vegas is meeting friends I don’t see the rest of the year. That said, I skipped my regular long poker trip in May/June this year and took the family to Europe instead. When I decided not to go this summer, I thought I’d surely be back next year. Right now I doubt that will happen and it’s much more likely I am strictly in the long weekend-tourist camp from now on.

I would say yes and yes.

I guess they know what they are doing (although the marketing to families in the 90s didn't seem to work). I guess with the clubs and pool parties they are focusing on millennials which seems weird because that group hasn't reached their full earning potential yet. Us Gen X'ers and older are at or near our top earnings.

Doesn’t really matter if you make $50k/year and are willing to spend $5k on a Vegas trip or make $100k/year and spend the same $5k on your trip because you also save money for retirement.

I wonder if the nickel and diming is partially related to the massive amount of available info on the internet. Seems like there are a ton of folks out there these days who spend a lot of time optimizing vacations from a financial standpoint, so that if your giving out anything for free/cheap it’s going to immediately get gobbled up. So now safer to just charge everyone for everything instead of older model having free stuff lead to more gambling losses.

Yeah, I cancel a lot more trips than I used to. Decision point is three days before the trip when I can still cancel hotel reservations for no penalty. More than once I've just said "don't feel like it" the day before the trip and just ate the cost of the first hotel night.