The once-thriving gaming community of Primm, Nevada, announced the closure of its last casino, marking the end of an era and the beginning of an uncertain future.
As physical gambling hubs along the border continue to fade away, many bettors are shifting their action online, turning instead to trusted sportsbooks to place their wagers from the comfort of home.
Vegas Alternative
In 1977, Whiskey Pete’s opened its doors in Primm, turning what was once a dusty stretch of road straddling the California-Nevada border into a gambling hotbed 40 minutes south of the glitzier and more glamorous North American gambling mecca, Las Vegas.
Primm was more affordable than Sin City for locals on both sides of the state line. In 1990, Whiskey Pete’s had company in the form of Primm Valley Casino Resorts, followed by Buffalo Bill’s in 1994. Three casinos in what was formerly a tumbleweed community constituted an economic success after carving out its own unique niche as a gaming destination.
David G. Schwartz, a gaming historian and professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, said Primm’s casinos were closer to Californians than Vegas, and it was “built for an entirely different world.”
“Southern California is a huge market for Las Vegas, and, in particular, it was once very attractive for those in the Inland Empire,” Schwartz said. “It was a way to trim 45 minutes off the drive — it was a 2-hour drive. It’s different math.”
The casinos also had their fair share of kitsch to attract tourists who wanted something more than casino gambling. All of the casinos, most recently Buffalo Bill’s, have featured Bonnie and Clyde’s V-8 Ford, which is replete with more than 100 bullet holes from the famed 1934 ambush by law enforcement officers.
The Grim Tale of Primm
The beginning of the end occurred more than a quarter of a century ago when California voters passed Proposition 1-A in 2000, allowing tribal casinos to operate slot machines and eliminating limits on card games. It signaled the birth of tribal casinos in the Golden State, but it was the death knell for Primm.
Now that Southern Californians had casinos in their home state, a drive across the border to Primm was no longer necessary. It didn’t happen overnight, but over the years, more and more tribal casinos began popping up, and each one in the Southern California area took a hefty bite out of the foot traffic of Primm’s casinos.
According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Nevada’s smaller gambling destinations have struggled to compete with the rapid expansion of tribal gaming in California.
“Many of those people Primm was drawing from began to stay in Southern California, where the drives are just much shorter and the amenities much closer,” said Professor Schwartz. “You see the same issue playing out at Laughlin along the Arizona border and Reno and Tahoe in Northern California.”
Not only were the tribal casinos more convenient, but they were also modernized with amenities with which Primm’s trio of casinos was not equipped. The casino areas were larger, and the rooms were more comfortable, while the restaurants and lounges were more spacious.
Amanda Belarmino, associate professor of hospitality at UNLV, added, “The success of Native American casinos in Southern California led to a decline in visitation to the Primm casinos.”
“A lot of people used to stop there just because they were so excited to … gamble once they got over the border. But since casinos are more readily accessible, Primm lost some of that appeal,” she said.
Once COVID-19 temporarily shuttered gaming industries nationwide, Primm was already reeling from the onslaught of competition from their tribal neighbors to the north. Even when the casinos reopened, business was even slower than before, and it only delayed the inevitable.
In December 2024, Whiskey Pete’s, the first of the three casinos to open, became the first to close. Their demise was followed by Buffalo Bill’s Resort & Casino seven months later. And the final domino to fall came when Primm Valley Casino Resorts announced it would close its doors on July 4th, leaving 344 people unemployed.
