Notes About Games

There is an old saying that goes something like this, “the man who invented gambling was smart, though the man who invented poker chips was a genius.” Over the years, poker chips have gained an allure that cold hard cash can’t match. Let’s take a quick look at the history of these little round marvels.

The history of poker chips is a cloudy one. There is no one defined moment where the first poker chip was created. Beginning in the 1800’s, “chips” of varying substances and shapes started showing up at card games and gambling halls. These chips were made from bone, wood, ivory, and eventually were made of a composite of clay materials.

From the late 1800’s and into the early 1900’s, clay poker chips become the norm. Just a handful of companies in the USA emerged to become the source of these chips. The name that most people associate with clay poker chips is Paulson. Paulson continues to make chips and is the current market leader for casino poker chips, supplying casinos worldwide. There are currently several other clay poker chip manufacturers, including companies outside the USA.

In the late 1900’s a new ceramic poker chip was introduced to the market. The benefits of these chips is that they provided full customization. The entire face on both sides of the chips can be customized with full color images. Also, the edges can be customized with regular stripes, diagonal stripes, text, or anything else you can think up. Ceramic poker chips are currently used in dozens of casinos worldwide.

Back to the old saying about the inventor of the poker chip. How is that guy a “genius”? When gambling, if someone can push a pile of chips into a pot or towards a dealer it does not have the same “feeling” as pushing a stack of cash. Since the chips themselves are worth close to nothing relative to the value they represent, it can be easy to push around piles of poker chips without really thinking about what they are truly worth.

Sean Pratch is a accomplished poker player and designer of custom ceramic poker chips. Sean has assisted with the design of hundreds of chips for games held throughout the world. Take a look at a free exhibit of custom poker chips