Treasure Island Resort and Casino - July 7 & 8, 2007

Her perspective: C+
His perspective: C

After having a bad experience at Grand Casino, Hinckley, we decided to try Treasure Island. We signed up right away for their membership program, Passport Club, and spent some time walking around to get familiar with the layout and find our favorite games. After playing for a couple of hours, we were rapidly running out of money.

We went back the following day because they were giving out quintuple points.

At one point I had $50 on me and decided I wanted to play Blackjack. I sat down at a $5 table and was doing quite well at first. I went through three dealers, and I was doing better than I had at Hinckley, but I walked away from the table with only $25. I think I'd stick to Blackjack at Treasure Island, though. They have the tightest slots of any casino we've been to.

One thing that was pretty nice is that you are allowed to walk around the floor with alcoholic drinks. At Hinckley, you have to stay in their lounge or at the rail of the bar if you have alcohol and at Mystic Lake, they only sell N/A beer and wine. Treasure Island did have complimentary soft drinks and coffee, like everywhere else, but they had a very nice nightclub at the front entrance and three other bars throughout. There's also a non-smoking gaming room.

We might go back for promotions, but probably not make it our regular place. We were hemorrhaging money there.

Grand Casino, Hinckley - July 7, 2007

Her perspective: C
His perspective: D

We have gone up to Hinckley several times in the last few weeks. Usually we lose money or break even. We've only won a couple of times.

The particular visit that I am reviewing was on Saturday, July 7. Being that the date was 7/7/07, they were having a special drawing and anyone who was a Grand Rewards member won something. We got there about an hour and a half before the drawing to find a line from the kiosks where you swipe your card winding halfway through the casino. We got in line and started to wait. After about a half hour, an employee came around saying that they were cutting off the line quite a bit ahead of us. There just wouldn't be enough time for everyone to get their ticket for the drawing. So, we got out of line and started playing some slots. A little while later, we heard over the PA system that due to the overwhelming response, they were going to pick 14 names instead of 7 to win $777 and that the line was still open. We went back to the line where there was another employee telling everyone that the line had been cut off. She also told us that the employee that had cut off the line earlier had been giving wrong information and we were not allowed back in line - not even for our other swipe. Part of the problem is that there are only 6 kiosks in the entire casino and one of them was down.

We were quite angry by this time since we were not allowed to participate in the promotion at all. We grabbed one comment card a piece and sat down in the bar to fill them out while having a cocktail. On our comment cards, we expressed how angry we were and both put in something about having more kiosks in more locations throughout the casino, especially when they have these kinds of special promotions.

We did still have the chance to swipe our cards for another promotion they are running this month, so we went back to the line and waited to use the kiosks. After we got our tickets we left.
We will probably go back for the next drawing, but we have decided to try out other casinos for a little while.