Stella's Place
Your performance · September 2026
The four numbers operators read first
Against locations your size (6+ terminals, 6,823 of them), your NTI/machine is +$7,551/mo vs the $4,988 peer median — bucketing by size keeps a small bar from being measured against a big one.
Where the money goes (September 2026)
Illinois law fixes the after-tax split at 50/50 and bans any deviation (230 ILCS 40/25(c)) — about $24,451 to you and $24,451 to your operator this month. Neither side can move that split. That's the whole point of The Gameset: with the split set by statute, operators compete for your gameset on service — games, cabinets, refresh cadence, response time.
Where your gameset stands
Strong demand and a healthy hold — your gameset is doing well on both the traffic and the margin side.
What an operator sees: An operator reads this as a proven, high-value gameset and will compete hard on service to win it.
1 peer location sits beyond the axis range and is drawn at the edge — shown, never dropped.
Each gray dot is another Carol Stream gameset for the same month, shown without identity. The dashed lines are the statewide medians — which quadrant you land in is the positioning above, drawn out.
Trend
Cycle rate is a leading indicator: when players start cycling their money fewer times, it usually shows up here before it shows up in NTI — an early read on gameset health for you and for an operator.
These are the two series a service change shows up in. Fresher titles and faster response tend to move win per unit first; hold follows the game mix. Both are your own numbers against a neutral market line — not a verdict on anyone.
A month that looks like a collapse is often just that month. Laid over the same months a year earlier, a seasonal dip and a real decline stop looking alike.
Seasonality check: August → September moved −17% this year vs +4% a year ago — so a normal seasonal dip isn't mistaken for a real decline.
Your town's market
Carol Stream's total gaming income is +12% year over year (trailing 3 months vs the same 3 a year ago).
Your own gameset is −5% over the same-month-last-year comparison — the town's tide explains part of the move; it isn't all your gameset.
A deeper operator read
The same history, cut the way a Terminal Operator cuts it when they decide how hard to compete for your gameset.
Your operator
Linked to your Location as of August 2026 — the Illinois Gaming Board publishes this each month, so a recent change may not show yet.
Year over year
Your NTI is +43% up year over year, outpacing the DuPage County market (+6%).
Takeaways
A gameset doing these numbers is the one Operators compete hardest for — and most owners never find out what that competition is worth, because they never put it out to bid.
Full September 2026 report detail
Source: Illinois Gaming Board monthly video gaming reports. This is public data about your own licensed Location, shown for informational purposes.