<p>Joey Thurman: The Hollywood Casino has been a main staying in downtown Aurora for years now, but in most recent years they've had to make a shift, not only with COVID protocols changing the way they do business, but also bringing in online sports betting. So let's see what they've done to change the odds in their favor.</p> <p>All right, so we're in Aurora, Illinois at the Hollywood Casino. How long has this been here?</p> <p>Greg Moore: The casino's been here for over 25 years now. It's had a couple incarnations since it was built. There's still a boarding tax in Illinois. Wherever a human being that walks onto the boat, we pay about $3 in taxes that get split among the local government and the state government to fund that, whether people gamble or not. So there's still a turnstile, there's still an actual boarding tax. We still use the term boarding.</p> <p>Joey Thurman: That's fascinating. Okay. So obviously the past year and a half, two years has been a little crazy.</p> <p>Greg Moore: Absolutely.</p> <p>Joey Thurman: For obvious reasons. Your doors are still open, so how did you navigate the pandemic and where do you make shifts in business to stay afloat?</p> <p>Greg Moore: We had to do a lot of what a lot of other companies had to do. When the first one came, nobody knew what to expect and we kind of just shut everything down to the absolute barest minimums of functions, kind of waited out and seen what happened.</p> <p>Joey Thurman: Yeah.</p> <p>Greg Moore: Then we got reopened. We were able to reactivate safely in the state, following all the protocols, which meant not full staff, not every piece of the business opened on day one.</p> <p>Joey Thurman: Yeah.</p> <p>Greg Moore: Buffets still weren't legal, poker still wasn't legal, so we kind of skeleton crewed it and grew it back and brought as many team members back as we could, based on business volumes and how many people we were legally allowed to have in the building.</p> <p>Joey Thurman: Yeah.</p> <p>All right. Let's go check out the best sports bar in 20 or 30 miles. Maybe 35 miles.</p> <p>Greg Moore: I'll give it 40.</p> <p>Joey Thurman: He gives it 40. Let's go.</p> <p>Okay. And what was the partnership with Barstool like? Why choose Barstool?</p> <p>Greg Moore: I wasn't a part of that discussion, but there's definitely a synergy between Barstool, who has a very active, hardcore fan base all across the United States and my company Penn National Gaming is going to be deploying online sports betting everywhere it's legal consistently for the rest of our lives. So if you line up those two goals in life, there was really kind of a match made in heaven.</p> <p>Joey Thurman: Right. Made perfect sense. Now, obviously you guys were thinking, as far as what I can tell in reading online, is that the order was going to be extended and then you were kind of thrown a curve ball where there was only a few days for people to, well, step foot inside of the door to register. Correct?</p> <p>Greg Moore: Yep. So, like I said, the governor kept extending by 30 days and extending by 30 days and he would always make those extensions just days before they would expire.</p> <p>Joey Thurman: Right.</p> <p>Greg Moore: So that was just kind of a consistent thing.</p> <p>Joey Thurman: Yeah.</p> <p>Greg Moore: And then all of a sudden, yeah, it's time to stop. So that's where actually the partnership with Barstool really paid off in spades because at that point we were able to get the word out across all of Illinois. "Hey, you guys have 72 hours to get this done."</p> <p>Joey Thurman: Wow.</p> <p>Greg Moore: "Don't goof off. Don't delay. Once that 72 hours is passed, wherever you're from, Edwardsville or otherwise, you're driving all the way to Aurora, Illinois to finish getting one of the better sports betting apps.</p> <p>You know, I guess the easiest way to say it is we make really good offers for make it a people a part of their time to drive out here."</p>