I used to get into some pretty heated arguments with people who harvest roulette chips Wayne. For several years my position on the subject was black-and-white clear to me, taking roulette chips was flat out wrong because it compromises the integrity of the game. The only thing that these non-denominational gaming pieces can be used for, other than placing a bet on the one table which they are in play is to tip a waitress. The lone exception to this (at least in recent American history that I'm aware of) was when the Paris Las Vegas had their French roulette table in play. All of the gaming pieces had a denomination on them. Even on that table, they protected the lower denomination chips (jetons), tried to keep as many of them as possible from leaving the table, but that was due to the very limited number of them that they had made. They encouraged people to feel free to use the higher denomination jetons to buy into other table games in the casino. Apparently few people did, because every time I took a couple of the $100 jetons and sat down at a black jack table, the dealers wouldn't take them until they cleared it with a floor person!

To this day, I consider roulette chips to be a integral part of the table game, not much unlike dice on a craps table or tiles on a Pai Gow Tiles table. They are not meant to leave that table, period. I still believe the taking of entire stacks to be wrong. It certainly is cause for great concern for the casinos due to the possibility of the chips being reintroduced at a higher value at a later time. Doing that can definitely get you arrested. ....getting caught taking roulette chips in any quantity can definitely get you thrown out of the casino, but I suspect how you are handled by security would depend on how many chips you were attempting to take. It wouldn't surprise me that if you got caught trying to lift a stack, your picture would be taken, and that picture networked to other casinos in the jurisdiction.

All of that said, here's where I can see a gray area concerning removing roulette chips from a casino.

I played many hours at the Paris French roulette table before they removed it from the casino floor. Quite a few of the croupiers and pit people moved to the London Club at the Aladdin shortly before and shortly after the French roulette table went "adios." That meant I knew quite a few people working at the London Club after they opened that room. The first couple times that I played roulette at their single zero tables, I asked the dealers as well as the pit personnel if there was any way that I could purchase a set of one of each color chip from the table to send to a friend as a gift. The dealers always referred me to the pit, vouching for me when I said I'd never do anything to compromise the integrity of the game. These dealers had witnessed my returning over-pays on wins at the Paris as well as pointing out that they had left a losing bet of mine on the table for the next spin after the table was paid (always on the zero, they'd miss it on occasion.) I wanted a set to send to a friend, the chips would leave the state of Nevada, never to return. I made my pitch to four different pit bosses. Each one believed me when I said the chips would never come back to the table, due either to knowing me from the Paris or from a dealer vouching for my honesty. Each one told me there was no way that they could sell me a set. Each one of these pit
bosses told me that IF I wanted a set, buy in five different times using a different chip color for each buy-in, and discretely remove one chip each time. It was sort of like they said take one but don't let me (or any of the other floor personnel) see it happen.

That's the gray area, at least in my mind. They don't want the chips to leave the table for obvious security reasons, but they can and do understand that there a some people who only want one chip of each color from one table. They understand that those people are collecting, period. They understand that those people aren't trying to scam the casino, nor trying to make money by removing any of their roulette chips.

Roulette collecting is more complicated than I used to believe it was....

Best advice I can give anyone pursuing this area of chip collecting is, don't get greedy (that covers all areas chip collecting come to think of it) and don't get caught. Getting caught can be WAY more than just embarrassing!

Bob