Penn Entertainment Rebranding 10 of Its Sportsbooks to ESPN BET

Penn Entertainment has taken a circuitous route to establishing market share in the online sports betting industry and has recently announced that 10 of its casino sportsbooks will be rebranded to reflect its national brand, ESPN BET.

National Brand Recognition

Penn Entertainment is undertaking a rebrand of 10 of its casino sportsbooks to mirror its online sports betting brand, ESPN BET. Those retail sportsbooks include:

• Ameristar Casino Hotel Council Bluffs in Iowa
• Pennsylvania’s three Hollywood casinos in Grantville, York, and Washington
• Hollywood Gaming racinos in Ohio’s Youngstown and Dayton
• Ameristar Casino Black Hawk in Colorado
• Ameristar East Chicago
• Hollywood Lawrenceburg in Indiana
• Hollywood Casino Charles Town in West Virginia

The goal is to gain symmetry with the ESPN BET app and its retail locations, several of which have already been rebranded as ESPN BET in Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan and Ohio. Penn Entertainment launched the ESPN BET mobile app in 17 states in November 2023.

Penn’s Gamble

This came hot on the heels of an aborted attempt to roll out Barstool Sportsbook, a venture that cost the company approximately $550 million. Due to a clause in the 10-year, $1.5 billion agreement with ESPN, Penn was forced to dissolve the Barstool Sportsbook and sell the Barstool media enterprise back to the founder, Dave Portnoy, for $1 and an agreement to share in 50% of the profits should Portnoy decide to sell.

ESPN BET is currently available in 19 states and is the official sportsbook of ESPN. But a relatively recent development links the sports betting app with ESPN’s app, which was a major selling point in Penn’s desire to affiliate with the sports media giant.

While the industry duopoly of FanDuel and DraftKings controls 74% of the domestic sports betting market, gaming research firm Eilers & Krejcik estimates that ESPN Bet has roughly 3-4% of the online sports betting sector.

Penn’s Hollywood iGaming App

Aligning with ESPN was tantamount to gaining name recognition and exposure to the millions who visit the site daily. The same can now be said for the company’s standalone Hollywood Casino iGaming app that allows customers to play online slots and table games. The launch came in December 2024, earlier than anticipated, and is available on Android, iOS and desktop users.

Aaron LaBerge, PENN’s Chief Technology Officer, said in a statement: “With four Hollywood Casino properties in the state, the app leverages our trusted retail brand and creates a seamless connection between our online and retail gaming experiences.

Penn’s CEO Jay Snowden had alluded in November to symmetry in iGaming just as he had with ESPN BET in the retail sports betting realm. “What we’re doing right now is messy, because you’re marketing to your land-based casino database at Hollywood properties and telling them that they should download the ESPN bet app to play their favorite slot machine.”