My wife Nikki has apparently created her own casino rewards program.
It doesn’t involve tier credits.
There’s no host involved.
No special line at the players club.
No secret multiplier day.
It’s tampons.
For the last year or two, every time we go to our local casino, Nikki has been quietly helping herself to the free tampons in the women’s bathroom.
And when I say helping herself, I don’t mean grabbing one because she needs it.
I mean this woman has complained before that she brought the wrong purse because it wasn’t big enough for the haul.
Apparently I’ve spent years studying casino comps while being married to somebody who created an entirely different rewards program.
Table of Contents
The Biggest Tampon Haul Yet
This whole article started on our anniversary.
If you are wondering why spending our anniversary gambling at a casino sounds completely normal for us, I already explained that in what happens when two degens get married.
Nikki and I went to the casino, had dinner, gambled for a while, and headed home.
Pretty normal night for us.
I lost $200.
Nikki won about $300.
Dinner cost me another $120.
So by the time we left, I wasn’t exactly doing cartwheels over my personal casino performance.
Then Nikki casually said something to me that completely changed the accounting for the night.
“I took my largest tampon haul ever tonight.”
Then she added:
“I almost got busted.”
Naturally, I needed the story.
Apparently she had absolutely loaded her purse with the free tampons from the bathroom. Not a couple. Not enough for an emergency.
Her purse was stuffed.
I know this because I took a picture.
And while she was still in the bathroom, she heard the woman who cleans it talking to somebody.
“I don’t know what happened. I just filled these 10 minutes ago and now it’s empty.”
Then, according to Nikki, somebody said they thought whoever did it might still be in there.
Which was technically correct.
There were three or four other women in the bathroom, so Nikki did what any seasoned casino criminal mastermind would do.
She calmly walked out like nothing happened.
With a purse full of evidence.
According to Nikki, This Is a Comp
Here’s the best part.
Nikki does not consider this stealing.
Her argument is extremely simple:
With as much money as we gamble there, she is just getting some value back.
Or, as she calls it:
“My tampon comp.”
And honestly, from a casino-comp perspective, I understand the logic.
Everything a casino gives you has some kind of value.
Free parking has value.
A soda has value.
A cocktail has value.
Free play has value.
A hotel room obviously has value.
A food comp has value.
And whether anybody has ever bothered to calculate it before or not, tampons have a value too.
That same idea is a big part of how I make my Vegas money go further without gambling more: use the offers, discounts and comps that are already available instead of spending extra just to chase them.
Nikki Actually Gets Real Casino Comps Too
The funniest thing is that Nikki isn’t doing this because the casino doesn’t give her anything.
She gets actual offers.
She gets promotional offers.
She gets free play.
She gets room offers.
Those are the kinds of benefits casino loyalty programs are actually built around. MGM Rewards, for example, offers things like FREEPLAY, room offers, promotions and other perks based on a member’s activity. You can see how MGM Rewards tier benefits work here.
She participates in the regular casino loyalty system just like everybody else.
The tampon comp is simply an additional layer.
That’s what makes the whole thing so funny to me.
I’ve spent years reading about casino loyalty programs, trying to understand theoretical loss, tracking coin-in, paying attention to offers, figuring out which perks are actually worth something, and learning how to get the most out of gambling I was going to do anyway.
Nikki’s strategy is significantly less complicated.
Use players card.
Redeem free play.
Take room offer.
Empty tampon dispenser.
Go home.
Those room offers are one of the reasons we have been able to stay at places I probably would not pay full price for, including The Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas.
She Actually Uses Them
Before anybody thinks she’s just collecting a mountain of tampons for no reason, she actually uses them.
She keeps emergency ones in her car.
She keeps some at work.
We have them in the bathroom at home.
And according to Nikki, the ones the casino supplies are actually better than a lot of the ones she buys at the store.
Which probably explains why this progressed from grabbing a couple here and there into an operation that apparently requires proper purse planning.
She has literally complained before that she didn’t bring a big enough purse.
That is a sentence I never expected to hear in connection with casino comps.
The Value of the Tampon Comp
I asked Nikki how much she thought she grabbed this time.
We didn’t count them individually, but looking at the purse, it had to be the equivalent of at least a pack or two.
I don’t even know exactly what tampons cost anymore, but they’re obviously not free at the store.
So if she uses them anyway, there’s legitimate household value there.
That’s really the larger point.
Casino comps don’t magically become more valuable because they come with a fancy name or show up in your players account.
Value is value.
If a casino gives you something you would have otherwise paid for, that saved you money.
That doesn’t mean you should gamble more to earn it.
That part matters.
Losing $100 chasing $10 in free stuff is still losing $90.
But if you were already going to gamble, eat, stay or hang out at the casino anyway, paying attention to what you get back makes sense.
And apparently Nikki has taken that philosophy to places I never considered.
Convincing yourself that losing more money is somehow worth it because you earned a comp is exactly the kind of casino logic I talk about in the biggest lies gamblers tell themselves.
The Nikki Rewards Program
My casino comp calculations usually involve things like:
How much did I gamble?
How long did I play?
What kind of offer did I get?
How much free play did they send me?
Did I get a comped room?
Did I save money on parking?
Did I get food credit?
Nikki has one additional category.
Tampons.
I’m calculating theoretical loss while she’s calculating purse capacity.
And somehow, her system might actually be easier.
There’s no complicated math.
No status chart.
No tier deadline.
No points conversion.
No figuring out whether 40,000 credits means anything.
You just walk into the bathroom and see what the market is offering.
Everybody notices different things in a casino, which became pretty obvious when I wrote about bringing a first-timer to Las Vegas and seeing the trip through somebody else’s eyes.
Our Anniversary Casino Accounting
So let’s review the night.
I lost $200 gambling.
Dinner cost me $120.
Nikki won about $300.
She also walked out with what looked like one or two retail packs worth of tampons.
And she still has whatever value she gets from future free play, promotional offers and room offers through the casino.
So once again, Nikki somehow extracted more value from the casino than I did.
I’ve spent years trying to understand casino rewards.
I track offers.
I pay attention to free play.
I care about room comps.
I think about how much gambling it takes to generate them.
Meanwhile, my wife has quietly created a completely separate rewards category nobody talks about.
The Tampon Comp.
Apparently the casino thought it was an amenity.
Nikki saw an opportunity.
And after hearing the cleaning lady say she had filled that dispenser 10 minutes earlier, I have a feeling Nikki may have finally reached the upper limit of the program.
FAQ
Are free tampons at casinos considered a casino comp?
Not officially. Casino comps usually refer to things like free play, hotel rooms, food credits, parking, and promotional offers tied to a players card. Nikki just calls the free tampons her “tampon comp” because they have real value and save money she would otherwise spend.
How much value can free casino amenities actually have?
It depends on what you use. Free drinks, soda, parking, hotel rooms, food credits, toiletries, and other amenities can all have value if they replace something you would have paid for anyway. The key is not gambling extra just to get something “free.”
Does Nikki get normal casino comps too?
Yes. Nikki also gets regular casino offers, including free play, promotional offers, and room offers. The tampon comp is just her unofficial bonus category.
Is it worth gambling more to earn casino comps?
Usually, no. Spending or losing more money just to earn a smaller-value perk defeats the purpose. The better approach is to understand what the casino gives you back for gambling you were already planning to do.
Why does Nikki take the casino tampons?
She says the ones at our local casino are actually better than many of the ones she buys at the store. She keeps them at home, in her car, and at work for emergencies.
What is the main lesson behind the “tampon comp”?
The point is that value is value. Casino rewards are not limited to what appears in your players account. If something the casino provides saves you money on something you genuinely use, that still counts as value — even if it happens to be tampons.
