Kansas City, Mo. ? As casino revenues climb to record levels this year, Kansas Citians are closing in on the dubious milestone of losing $2 million a day at the boats.

May marked 2004’s third all-time-record revenue month as the area’s four riverboats won $57.9 million from gamblers. That surpassed the record $57.8 million set in March, which topped February’s record $57.2 million.

“Same chapter, different verse,” said Missouri Gaming Commission analyst Jim Oberkirsch.

“This growth is being driven to a large extent by marketing,” Oberkirsch said of the industry’s sharply competitive wave of advertising, promotions and cash coupon giveaways this spring, which appears to be attracting infrequent, low-budget players.

“The casinos could turn the spigot off and we could see these numbers flatten out literally overnight.”

While the average per-patron loss in May fell about 1 percent, to an average of $57.53 per casino visit, admissions were up 9 percent from May 2003 to 2.1 million turnstile spins.

Oberkirsch said Kansas City’s four casino marketing budgets were up a collective 26 percent the first quarter of this year from the same period in 2003. And that spending increase followed a 19 percent jump during the fourth quarter of 2003 compared with 2002.

Dollar amounts are not available. Casinos report their advertising and promotional spending to the commission quarterly, but the data are proprietary to each casino and not a public record.

Expected casino celebrations throughout 2004 of the 10th anniversary of casino gambling in Missouri will only further inflate marketing budgets.

Argosy Riverside Casino, for instance, is giving away four new Chrysler product cars this month. Plus there will be drawings and contests for cash and player points that can be redeemed for cash, meals and casino merchandise.

Ameristar Casino Kansas City won’t celebrate its 10th anniversary until 2007. But the casino is giving away eight cars in eight weeks anyway.

Ameristar general manager Dave Albrecht said this spring’s promotions and giveaway are less the result of a marketing war than the consequence of a chicken-and-egg equation that feeds off itself.

Albrecht said casino marketing budgets typically are pegged to revenue levels.

“If you give a certain percentage of your play back to customers, even without changing your marketing strategies, the amount of revenue will increase,” he said. “It’s just a natural thing that happens.”

The $2 million-a-day mark for gamblers has been building for seven years. It took the Kansas City market 3 1/2 years to hit the $1 million mark, surpassing that level in January 1997 when Ameristar — then Station Casino Kansas City — opened.

If the recovering national economy and past trends hold, the $2 million-a-day level could be reached during the busy summer travel season.

Kansas Citians aren’t alone in their spring gambling binge.

May revenues for Missouri’s 11 casinos were up 8.2 percent to a record $124.2 million, led by the state record $25.7 million performance by Ameristar Casino St. Charles.