Retailers hoping to cash in on national poker craze

WIStv.com Columbia, SC: Retailers hoping to cash in on national poker craze (National) Nov. 29, 2004 - From celebrities going for broke on the Bravo Network, to the pros playing on ESPN, to the world poker tour on the travel channel, poker is turning up everywhere, enjoying new life as America's game of choice. Steve Lipscomb with the World Poker Tour explains, "Without televised poker, we wouldn't be sitting around talking about how exciting it is and how the entire country is playing poker." The game most people are playing is Texas Hold 'em, where each player gets two cards face down, then fills out their hand from shared cards which are dealt face up. Poker has become so popular that jackpots are into the millions, with millions of people watching the action on TV. It's those kinds of numbers and an estimated 60 million people playing poker at least once a month that have retailers upping the ante this holiday season. The Sharper Image can barely keep its poker games in stock. How to books and DVD's are already big sellers. Even the World Poker Tour is betting on a line of licensed products from hats and T-shirts, to electronics, to underwear to chips. For casinos like the Trump Taj Mahal in Atlantic City, poker room manager Tom Gitto says the game is an ace in the hole, "There's nothing growing like poker is growing right now in the casino industry. It's by far the number one growing game that there is." Last year in Nevada's casinos, more than $1.5 billion was bet on poker. Lipscomb says there's good reason, "This is the great American card game. It's been around for a long time and if you think about it, poker is to games what jazz is to music. It's very democratic. It is very American."