John and Kristina Mehaffey founded VegasAdvantage.com. John has authored thousands of pages of content related to the city and its tourism industry. Most of the content is gambling-related. However, some pertain to the hospitality portion of the industry.
John freelanced for years, and his work can be found on dozens of sites, though content on other sites may have become dated. Part of that experience is why VegasAdvantage.com was launched, to keep information fresh and contained under a single virtual roof.
This site’s always-growing content has become a full-time job. That means we must accept advertising to pay the bills.
Vegas Advantage is supported through memberships, sponsors, and advertisements. If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER.
Vegas Advantage in the news
Vegas Advantage has been quoted and featured by many media outlets, including the Wall Street Journal, Las Vegas Review-Journal (three times), ABC News, Fox Sports Radio, NPR, Fortune, Business Insider, Seattle Times, Los Angeles Daily News, Orange County Register, and The Daily Mail. We have also been guests on podcasts and videos dedicated to Las Vegas, like Plaza’s On the Corner of Main Street, Straight to the Point, Cheapskate Vegas, Pennys4Vegas, Jackpot Gents, and Knup Sports.
In 2023, we visited a record 93 casinos in 24 hours
We celebrated our 21st wedding anniversary on October 5, 2023. We had the crazy idea of breaking the record for the number of casinos visited in 24 hours. At 5 p.m. on October 4, we started at Golden Gate. At about 1:15 p.m., we ended the adventure at Circa. That was our 93rd casino visit in less than 24 hours. Our journey was covered by the Las Vegas ABC, Fox, and NBC stations.
About John Mehaffey
John is 50 and happily married to his best friend, Kristina. They go to shows about once per week during normal times. The shows are typically at comedy clubs, though they may venture off that genre from time to time. It depends on what special deals are out there.
John started as a prop player at online poker sites. One of those was the infamous Absolute Poker. John played online poker, often for a living, from 2001 to 2005. He played home games before that, supplementing that income with a restaurant job. Prop-playing burned him out, though, and it was time for him to do something other than play poker.
First, in 2004, John created a site that served as a directory for an online poker promotional method known as rakeback. He sold that site in 2006 and moved his family from Atlanta to Rapid City, SD to work for a similar company. They later moved to Las Vegas in 2010.
In 2024, John became editor-in-chief at OnlineUnitedStatesCasinos.com. That was his last full-time job. He left in 2018 to start Vegas Advantage. They stayed in touch over the years and several former coworkers are still with OnlineUnitedStatesCasinos.com. He reviewed the site before accepting the job. Its content is just as great as when he left. They agreed to my return as editor-in-chief.
They share the same content goals. His duties include keeping the site updated, editing, auditing, and creating casino content. It is a perfect match with my skills.
About three years ago, we visited dozens of casinos outside Nevada and built table game surveys. One possible future content project is revisiting those casinos and publishing them on OnlineUnitedStatesCasinos.com.
This partnership does not affect Vegas Advantage’s ownership or goals. It helps us keep Vegas Advantage going. We will promote our newsletter on OnlineUnitedStatesCasinos.com, which will expand its reach and improve our revenue. It gives us a consistent revenue stream that will allow us to spend more time on Vegas Advantage.
John’s favorite casino games
John’s favorite game is full-pay video poker. He finds 100%-payback games and plays them as a hobby. His favorite table game is Ultimate Texas Hold’em, though he would rather play it in video form. These games returned to Las Vegas in 2022, but have since disappeared. John may be best known for compiling blackjack data including all Las Vegas and Clark County casinos. He rarely plays blackjack, though.
John plays live poker once or twice a year. He does not play on the internet anymore because Nevada online poker is — as he describes it — a trainwreck. Mehaffey’s bad experiences playing online poker on Nevada’s legal site led him to move on to ventures like this.
About Kristina Mehaffey
Kristina was a math teacher for the Clark County School District before joining John in the business in 2020. She is not much of a gambler, though she enjoys Fortune Pai Gow Poker, Ultimate Texas Hold’em, and Deuces Wild. She prefers the aesthetics of casinos, something shown in the details of the pictures on our sites.
Vegas Advantage sister sites
A family of four websites features the Advantage branding. Other regional sites include Atlantic City Advantage and West Virginia Advantage. These sites cover gambling and related amenities at all licensed retail casinos in Atlantic City and West Virginia. US Casino Advantage includes information about gambling across the United States.
Contact us
If you would like to advertise on Vegas Advantage or have any inquiries or updates, please contact us at admin@vegasadvantage.com. We do not publish sponsored posts.
Ways to support Vegas Advantage
Do you enjoy the content found here or on another Advantage site? Find our information useful on your casino trip(s)? Looking for a way to support our work?
Las Vegas Blackjack and Table Game Survey
Enjoy a visit to Las Vegas? Let us take some of the guesswork out of your next trip.
Now offered as a membership subscription, our latest survey has blackjack and table game data, including electronic table games. Information includes locations, minimum bets, blackjack rules, craps odds and payouts, pai gow poker variants, and the number of zeros on roulette wheels. Side bet information is included for ETGs and live craps tables.
Vegas Advantage subscriptions are now available through Patreon. Files are found in post-style format.
Monthly memberships start at $5 for one month. Discounted rates are available for annual members.
There are two monthly plans available. Annual memberships receive 16% off.
- Total Access Club $5/month
Blackjack and table game surveys listed by casino, with at least six, up to nine, Strip casino profiles updated per month, additional access to our blackjack and table surveys by game type, and at least three exclusive articles each month. - Vegas Advantage Super Fan $25/month
This VIP package includes the previously listed features, a quarterly Vegas Advantage gift, and exclusive support access to answer all your Las Vegas questions.
Get some Vegas Advantage merchandise
We first launched a merchandise campaign to support our Vegas Advantage website after catching our work being plagiarized repeatedly.
Items available in our store include:
- T-shirts
- Playing cards
- Can coolers
- Beer coolers
- Shot glasses
- Drinking glasses
Please gamble responsibly by knowing your limits before you start. If you or someone you know needs help, contact the National Council on Problem Gambling‘s 24-hour helpline at 1-800-522-4700.
Last Updated on October 7, 2024 by John Mehaffey