There's a man sitting at a slot machine at Boulder Station who makes you think, That's a man with a plan. He's covered in fans. Strapped on his left arm is a small yellow and purple fan. On his right wrist, a red and white one. A yellow and green one hangs around his neck. Beneath his strong face with its wire-rim glasses and playful eyes, his black shirt has the emblem of a yellow fan. He's Sal "The Fan Man" Pullara, the inventor of these devices and a proud entrepreneur trying to make the world a better place, one blade rotation at a time. "I just gave one to the little cocktail girl. She's pregnant. Pregnant!" he belts. "I don't want her to see her inhale smoke." The fan doesn't just cool, see, it clears the air. Hence, Sal's slogan, "There's no safe cigarette. BUT you can have your own Safe Space."
Sal, a retiree, was gambling one day when he hit the inspiration jackpot: He sat for hours next to a chain-smoking old man. Now, Sal was a smoker for 41 years, up to three packs a day. When he quit about 15 years ago, he became a reformed smoker and activist against the unhealthy stink.
"Finally, after several hours of playing and inhaling the smoke, I turn to this elderly fella and I said, 'Pal, you're killin' me. I mean you're really killin' me!'" Sal recalls, sounding a bit like George Costanza, with his New York accent and talking streak. "And he turned to me and he said, 'Move.'
"Move?," repeats Sal, loudly. "Move!" That's just what he did. Moved right over to the race book, where he began drawing.
"At this point, I didn't know what to draw. I just knew it had to be like a watch, something strong enough to clear the air, that somebody could sit there gambling for hours and feel comfortable and not have to move because of a chain smoker." He also wanted something that wouldn't slow down the gambling.
"Before I took this venture, I walked down Palace Station, Boulder Station, Sunset, looking for one thing. One thing!" he says. "How come people don't have fans?!"
Now they can. In the last year, Sal, who's always been a gambling man—from the days he bought and sold thoroughbreds to his retirement, when he'll play five or six hours a day—refocused his bets. He called on Taiwan to turn his blueprint into a working replica, and one year and $70,000 later, he's gone through three models (the first was too heavy; the second needed more air-intake holes) to find one he liked. He strapped it onto the arms of seniors in his mother-in-law's senior complex to test-market it, and they loved it.
He demonstrates. Pops the purple fan element off the wristband and points it at his face. "Locked." Does the same to the red and white one. "Locked." Then the yellow and green. "Locked." A little light goes on, and the cool breeze starts whirring. Sal smiles proudly, satisfied. He points out the Station Casinos logo on it. His fan has been in their gift shops since the end of June, retailing for $13.95. It was no easy feat getting them in there, Sal says. "I became a pest." He kept calling until they finally called back.
But that's not why he's doing this, he insists. Though it would be nice to recoup the money he's spent—and he expects to do so—his main goal is to help people gamble in the happiest, freshest-smelling of environments, no longer held hostage by the smells of the pervasive cigarettes. He plans to hire girls to go around to all casinos and hand his fans out to people with oxygen machines and other lung ailments. "I want to try to change casinos through community care," he says. And keep those nickels dropping in the process.