Pressemitteilung Can't hold'em back

11.10.2004, Lesen Sie hier den Bericht über «Can't hold'em back».

Newport News resident James Brown has been searching locally for a Texas Hold'em table for months.

He's even gone online but decided that if he's going to spend $600 for a table, he wants to know the true dimensions and the quality of the table before he buys it.

"You can't get that online," Brown says. "I've been playing Texas Hold'em poker with some friends on weekends for about a year now. We've played on nice dining room tables and even pool tables. But you really need a Texas Hold'em table to play poker.

"When you play on a nice table, you run the chance of marking it with the clay chips that are thrown on the table. A table with a hard edge is also hard on the elbows. Texas Hold'em tables have a padded ring around the edge," he explains.

Five months ago, Brown could have had his pick of 10 Texas Hold'em tables sitting on the floor at Long's Billiards in Newport News, but not today.

Long's and other local retailers can't keep the tables in stock, and once they're sold, it's hard to get more, local retailers say.

In fact, Long's is still waiting for eight tables that were to be delivered in July from a Wisconsin manufacturer.

"Everybody wants these tables, because everybody and anybody is playing Texas Hold'em poker," Mitchell says. "It's the kind of game that can be learned in five minutes, but it takes a lifetime to master, because it is a game of skill."

Texas Hold'em is a poker game that began sweeping the nation about a year ago when television viewers became hooked on the game by watching poker games on ESPN or the Travel Channel.

Televised celebrity poker games also have sparked interest in the game.

As a result, retailers are claiming a pot of cash, as sales of poker chips and tables keep increasing with the popularity.

Locally, billiard retailers are ordering as many Texas Hold'em tables and kits of chips as they can get their hands on, but many continue to wait for delivery.

While many regular poker tables accommodate five to seven players and are octagonal-shaped, the Texas Hold'em tables seat eight to 10 players and tables are typically 8 feet and oval in shape. John Winter, of Amazing Entertainment in Yorktown, says he's been renting the tables to organizations and even individuals who want what they can't, yet, have - a Texas Hold'em table in their home.

"We were already in the rental business, and then one day we said, 'Let's push this. Let's make a table.' There weren't a lot of tables being sold, and people were saying they couldn't find tables, so we started making them."

Winter says he has started to make tables to sell, realizing the demand of the market. He now has five tables made to sell.

The first table took four people an entire day to make. Now he says he can make two to three tables, which sell for for between $399 to $599, a day.

"This has gone from being a game played by men in a smoky atmosphere to a game that attracts everyone from housewives to professionals," Winter says.

The possibility of becoming rich instantly is one of the attractions of the game, Mitchell says.

"The people who are making it to the big tables are average people," Mitchell says. "This is a game where all you need is $10,000 to sit down with top poker players and play the game. And if you have some luck, you could win."

And amateurs are winning.

Three amateurs recently played in the World Poker Tournament televised at 9 p.m. Wednesday on the Travel Channel.

Idaho building contractor Michael Kinney took first place and $629,469 home. All proof that it doesn't take a professional to win the game.

As a result, the game is attracting everyone from stay-at-home moms to salaried professionals and even high school students, who all want in on a weekend game.

"It's a game about bluffing," Winter says. "It's not about what I have and don't have. It's about what you think I have."

The craze of bluffing your way to a jackpot has retailers in a spin, trying to find and keep poker supplies in stock.

"We hope to get about 30 to 40 tables, plus the poker chips, at the end of the month," says Jason Knight, a salesman for East Coast Leisure Billiards in Williamsburg.

Although East Coast has not carried poker supplies in the past, Knight says his company would be missing an opportunity if it didn't start carrying poker supplies now.

More than five people have asked for tables in the Williamsburg store in the past two weeks.

"There's an enormous demand," says Jim Gurnee, assistant sales manager of East Coast's Virginia Beach store. "I bet I've had 25 to 45 people inquire about the tables, and if I had 'em, they'd be sold out. ESPN has created a monster.

"Poker's kind of a lost art. People used to get together and play poker years ago. That retail niche is back," Gurnee says.

GLD Products, a Wisconsin-based manufacturer that added the Texas Hold'em tables to its offering only a year ago, is trying to keep up with demand. The company manufacturers many inside games, including pool and air hockey tables, darts and now poker tables and chips, says Justin Voden, vice president of sales.

Voden said his company introduced the Texas Hold'em tables at a billiards show in Las Vegas this summer.

"It was a huge success, and we took lots of orders," Voden says. "We're making about 1,000 tables a day, and we're doing everything we can to keep up with demand. We've ramped up production to the point where there are no shifts that we can add."

But Voden says his company has been able to add this niche to his lineup because he saw it coming a few years ago.

"I had a hunch the demand for these tables and other poker items was coming, but I had no idea that the demand would be this strong.

Über Glücksspiele Las Vegas - Gambling in Las Vegas:

Las Vegas liegt im Westen der USA im Bundesstaat Nevada und ist das Glücksspiel-Paradies von Amerika.

Las Vegas hat rund 100 Spielcasinos. Im Bundesstaat Nevada sind sogar über 300 Spielcasinos registriert. Die grössten Casinos sind das Bellagio, Caesars Palace, Venetian / Palazzo, Wynn / Encore, MGM Grand, Mandalay Bay.

Weitere bekannte Casinos sind das Mirage, frühere Heimat von Siegfried und Roy, das Luxor in Form einer Pyramide oder das Casino Rio All-Suite Hotel and Casino, in welchem jährlich die Pokerweltmeisterschaft (World Series of Poker WSOP) durchgeführt wird.

Die bekanntesten zwei Strassen sind der Las Vegas Boulevard, welcher auch als Las Vegas Strip bezeichnet wird. Daneben ist die Fremont Street eine gut besuchte Casino-Meile, wo beispielsweise das legendäre Casino Binion's (vormals Binion's Horseshoe) seine Spiele anbietet.

Las Vegas erstreckt sich über eine Fläche von 340 km2 und hat rund 650'000 Einwohner.

--- Ende Artikel / Pressemitteilung Can't hold'em back ---


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