Poker Room Charity Gambling
Published: Friday, May 13, 2005 Online-Casinos.com
GAMBLING COMBINATION
An unusual joint venture for charity between cyber and land poker rooms
It was refreshing to read about a new approach to charity tournament marketing from VIP Management Services, where a linked land and online gaming initiative for charity has been formed this week.
Through its VIPpoker brand, VIP has partnered with the Normandie Casino in Los Angeles to create a $25,000 cash-guaranteed poker tournament with proceeds benefitting the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation.
The May 15th tournament will be hosted by ESPN radio personalities Mason & Ireland, who host the number one sports talk show in Southern California. Called the "Big Show Tournament", the event will feature free food, free beer, playboy models and celebrity players.
Mike Jamerson, the event coordinator for the project, said, "We had to convince the Normandie management that there were synergies from working with an online company. People play online to hone their skills in privacy until they have the confidence to actually go play in the more aggressive games in the casino. It is a natural progression."
"This is a win/win for everybody involved. The key point to this project is running satellite tournaments online where Normandie players can go to VIPpoker and win their seat -- a $230 buy-in -- for free. That's value added for the Normandie customer and creates a new customer for VIPpoker. Additionally, the VIP customer is exposed to a quality land-based poker room."
The online satellite tournaments will run daily on VIPpoker and Southern California players can log on and play to win their seat in the Big Show Tournament. VIPpoker has been encouraging players to participate in the free satellite tournaments.
Alistair Assheton, CEO of VIP Management Services, said, "We believe the idea of bringing card club players into cyber space to qualify for land based games is an exciting and new concept."
