You play a lot of poker. You play in tournaments; you pay attention to the body language and facial expressions of your opponents. You might even notice what color the felt of the poker table is, but do you pay heed to the stack of chips in front of you?
Just like the game itself, poker chips’ origins are uncertain. The game is said to have begun in the mid 1800’s, around the same time of the San Francisco and Barkerville gold rushes.
As a result, gold nuggets and coins were used to keep track of winnings in early poker games. But with all the different sets of markers being used by players, it was hard to keep track and chips were introduced because they were easy to manage.
Early incarnations were made of material such as ivory or wood and were simple in design. This allowed many people to take advantage and produce counterfeit chips. Early casinos and poker rooms would mysteriously find themselves with more chips than they started out with.
To combat the growing number of chip counterfeiters, poker rooms began to develop chips with ornate designs. Companies started developing sets with that were unlike each other, putting numbers on each chip, and early casinos also put stickers on individual chips as well.
Fast forwarding to modern times, the most popular type of chips these days are of the clay variety, though clay might be an inaccurate description as actual clay chips, which were used in the 1800’s but broke quite easily.
What people dub clay chips are actually made up of more than just clay. According to lasvegas.com, “What is commonly referred to as a clay chip is a composite with some clay (some descriptions list kaolin instead of clay, same thing) filler mixed into a durable high impact polymer matrix.”
Metal core chips are around as well and are constructed of plastic coated metal. They weigh between 8-11.5 g and can be customized for that authentic casino feel.
Besides the rather pricey clay and metal types, people in the market for poker chips can also invest in less expensive plastic which you can find just about anywhere be it Walmart or your local toystore.
If people were willing to counterfeit chips back in the 1800’s with limited technology, you can only imagine what they would do now. To that end, casinos pay a lot of attention to detail when designing their own custom poker chips.
Generally speaking casino chips are made of synthetic polymer acrylic, but casinos are careful not to divulge all concerning make up of their chips. As lasvegas.com states, “The chips are injection molded with copyrighted designs in manufacturing facilities that have security that rivals the US mint.” Counterfeiters can manipulate any piece of information they can get their hands on and the less they know the better.
In the old Lay’s commercials former New York Ranger Mark Messier used to say, “A chips a chip.” That’s not the case for either potato or casino chips. A wide variety of choice is available to consumers, whether you want to spend a lot or a little.
