[Al_Capone_Junior]

Yes, shufflers are a very expensive way for the casino to earn additional profit. If utilized properly, they can make lots of extra money for the room. This means they need to be running most of the time. Too many leased shufflers sitting idle will cost more than they will earn. For this reason some rooms, especially small ones, should not have shufflers at every table. If a ten table room has 45% average occupancy, four or five shufflers is fine. These tables should obviously be opened first and closed last.

It's an interesting question whether a room with say 10 table, 45% occupancy would do better with ten shufflers or five. Would the extra hands earned when the room is full make enough to cover or exceed the cost of the idle time? My guess is no, but I don't have any evidence to prove which way is best, or to show the curves as average occupancy or rake rises or falls. **.

Keep in mind a shuffler is only good for the difference in hands dealt, not for all the hands. I've estimated that the best dealers will get one or two extra hands per hour, while the worst might get five or six, tops. Also,if the shuffler really helps a dealer that much, they are probably deathfully slow at multiple other aspects of dealing as well.

By now it's almost a novel idea, but games have been known to run just fine without shufflers at all.

** but if a room wanted to experiment, I'd be the one to analyze and graph in vivid detail. I just love making graphs :-)