I received this question recently as a comment on one of my posts about Caesars:
Is this just happening to me (likely because my ADT has reduced in the past three months compared with prior activity), or is it that Caesar’s in general has become more stingy with respect to comp’d room offers?
I used to routinely get local offers for a couple of comp’d nights per week at my local Caesar’s properties, but the past three months I’ve seen the comp’d offer decrease from 2 nights/wk to 1 night/wk to now no comp’d rooms. If this is a general trend and not my fault for less coin in than in the past, then that is disappointing.
Offers are always a complicated topic, but let’s take any difference in play out of the equation for a second.
Short Term Factors
Right now, casinos are seeing surging demand as everything has been reopening. They’re also struggling to staff back up in many cases. This combination means some are easing up on comps because they don’t have to try as hard.
Offers are designed to drive demand, and if the demand is already there, they will understandably throttle back the offers. And if they don’t have a full staff, it can also be hard to have as much capacity open.
Another factor that is still unknown in terms of total impact is the fact that Caesars was acquired by Eldorado, and Eldorado has a history of cutting comps. Some believe this is part of it, but it’s unusual times so it’s truly hard to compare apples to apples right now. If the offers don’t rebound when things start getting back to normal, we’ll have a better idea of why.
Two Ways to Get Comped at Caesars
But the big takeaway and part of why I wanted to post about this question specifically, is many players don’t know that there’s a difference between Caesars’ offers and Caesars’ booking calendar rates.
Many times the offer they send you won’t necessarily be the best room offer. I get offers for two nights and $20 free play for Vegas, but if I log in and check the calendar I can many times get a 4-5 night string of nights together if I’m willing to forego the $20 free play (which I definitely will for more nights).
So you can put in the code, and it will restrict you to the number of nights the offer supports, the properties includes, and so on. Or you can just log in to your account, search (I prefer to use the flexible dates so I can see all properties at once in a market and what rate I qualify for at each) and see what it offers as comped rooms.
Weekdays are almost always easier to get then weekends, of course, but the calendar usually offers something. I have noticed it’s harder to get a room in places like Las Vegas right now, but I’ve also seen reports that demand there is high right now, particularly on weekends, so that can be pushing the rates up out of comp territory in many cases.
I also see these numbers updating constantly, and strings of dates I couldn’t get comped one week, I was able to a couple of weeks later. So it’s also worth checking back in regularly as people can/do cancel and it can change things quickly. I’ve more than once been able to improve my room situation after booking because a better hotel opened up as comped, for instance. So just watching the calendar can have a benefit.
