Caesars Entertainment Corporation has become the first operator on the Las Vegas Strip to allow Chinese visitors to pay for goods and services via WeChat.
As reported in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, tourists will now be able to use the hugely popular social and mobile payment app to buy everything from food to show tickets and souvenirs at 16 locations in Caesars properties, including Caesars Palace, the Linq and Paris.
“We want to do this for our Chinese customers to make them feel at home,” said Caesars’ Corporate VP of International Marketing Bruce Bommarito. “We have been working hard on the Chinese market for some time.”
According to the report, Caesars also plans to expand the use of WeChat Pay to more locations by the end of 2017. The plan is expected to resonate strongly with Las Vegas’ hugely important Chinese audience with WeChat boasting 938 million active monthly users. Last year, Caesars introduced an option for Chinese nationals to book rooms directly using WeChat.
“All this stuff helps, particularly with brand awareness with the Chinese community,” said Union Gaming’s John DeCree. “That said, I don’t think it materially moves the needle in terms of incremental revenue, at least not right away.”
WeChat Pay launched in the US earlier this year.
