Loto-Quebec has just spent close to $325,000 on 600 new chairs, which will be placed in front of their slot machines at their four casinos.
The leather-clad chairs were purchased from a Manitoba-based company, BetRite, which purchases its chairs from an American supplier at $540 a pop, and apparently designed with comfort in mind — the kind of comfort that keeps players in the chairs, pumping quarters and dollars into the machines.
Loto-Quebec spokesperson Patrice Lavoie says aside from the Manitoba company, four other Quebec companies were in the running to provide the new chairs — including one that filed a complaint against the gaming agency, claiming the chairs are too expensive for no reason.
But Lavoie says, the chairs were the ones that tested best with their clients.
"That was actually the most well-liked by all of our customers, and that's why at the end of the process, that's why we decided to go with that product, specifically," Lavoie says.
The Quebec company that filed the complaint, Créatech, has done business with Loto-Quebec in the past for the same types of slot-machine stools. Lavoie suggests the chair that company offered was actually four dollars cheaper than the Loto-Quebec went with.
Lavoie suggests the comfort factor was important in selecting the chairs, but insists the ones they picked aren't especially lavish.
"We are operating a casino...and it's not because it's a slot machine that we have to sit our customers on logs or on chairs of metal," he says.
The new chairs are due to make their appearance by the end of the winter.