The company traces its roots to 1987, when its predecessor was formed to service the
slot machines at the
Terrible Herbst gas stations. It was operated by brothers Ed, Tim, and Troy Herbst, whose father, Jerry Herbst, owned the gas stations. Their company later became a
slot route operator, maintaining slot machines at other businesses such as taverns and laundromats. The Herbsts opened their first casino, the Terrible's Town Casino in
Pahrump, Nevada, in 1996. This was followed by Terrible's Town Casino and Bowl in
Henderson, Nevada; Terrible's Lakeside Casino in Pahrump in 1999; and
Terrible's Hotel and Casino (formerly the Continental Hotel and Casino) in 2000 near the
Las Vegas Strip. In 2000, the Herbsts' slot company, E-T-T Inc., doubled its size by acquiring the slot route operation of
Jackpot Enterprises for $41 million, bringing it to a total of 6,000 machines under management. In 2001, the Herbst brothers' gaming interests were reorganized as Herbst Gaming, Inc., in connection with a $170-million
bond offering. The company opened its fifth casino, Terrible's Searchlight Casino in
Searchlight, Nevada, in 2002. In 2003, Herbst became the largest slot route operator in Nevada by acquiring
Anchor Coin and its 1,100 machines from
International Game Technology for $61 million. In 2005, Herbst expanded to the Midwest by acquiring three casinos in Missouri and Iowa from
W.M. Grace Entertainment for $287 million. In 2006, a statewide smoking ban was
enacted in Nevada at taverns and convenience stores, which was expected to hurt the revenues of slot route operators such as Herbst. In response, the company began to diversify by acquiring more casinos. In January 2007, Herbst purchased
Sands Regent, a company with four Northern Nevada casinos, including the
Sands Regency and the
Rail City Casino, for $119 million. Later that year, it also acquired the
Primm Valley Casino Resorts, a group of three casinos at the Nevada–California state line, from
MGM Mirage for $400 million. In early 2008, the company revealed that it was considering a sale or bankruptcy, because of poor financial results stemming from the
economic slowdown and the smoking ban. Analysts said that the company was also suffering from having overpaid for the Primm casinos, which faced increasing competition from expanding
tribal casinos in Southern California. After objections from bondholders, the plan was revised to give full ownership of the slot route operation to the creditors, leaving the Herbsts with no role in the business. The company, reorganized as Herbst Gaming LLC, emerged from bankruptcy at the end of 2010, owned by a group of approximately 140 investment companies and banks. The company changed its name to Affinity Gaming in May 2011, to avoid confusion as the Herbst family planned to rejoin the gaming industry. Some properties continued to use the Terrible's name and logo under license from Terrible Herbst, while others were reverted to their previous names. The last Affinity property bearing the name, Terrible's Hotel and Casino, was rebranded as the Silver Sevens in 2013. In 2012 and 2013, Affinity sold off several "non-core assets". The slot route was sold to
Golden Gaming and
JETT Gaming (a new company formed by Jerry Herbst). The two casinos in Pahrump were also sold to Golden Gaming, and the Searchlight casino to JETT. Meanwhile, Affinity expanded to Colorado by buying three casinos in
Black Hawk from Golden Gaming. In October 2018, Z Capital proposed to acquire competing casino operator
Full House Resorts and merge it into Affinity, but the offer was rejected by Full House executives. Affinity sold its three Colorado casinos in January 2020 to
Twin River Worldwide Holdings for $51 million. In March 2020, Affinity established a
special-purpose acquisition company, Gaming & Hospitality Acquisition Corp. (GHAC), through which it planned to become a publicly traded company and merge with a to-be-determined company in the gaming industry. GHAC completed an
initial public offering in February 2021, raising $200 million. Z Capital later announced that it would merge Affinity with a sister company, Sports Information Group, the parent company of the
Daily Racing Form. The combined company would be named Affinity Interactive, and would continue to seek an acquisition target with GHAC. ==Gaming operations==