"Keep it simple. Tell the truth. People can smell the truth"
About this Quote
Wynn’s line is a casino boss’s version of a moral commandment: don’t over-engineer the pitch, don’t gild the lily, don’t try to launder reality through cleverness. “Keep it simple” isn’t just aesthetic advice; it’s an operational philosophy for an industry built on sensory overload. In Las Vegas, complexity is often camouflage, and camouflage reads as guilt. Simplicity, by contrast, signals control.
“Tell the truth” lands like a corrective to the reflexive suspicion surrounding sales, branding, and especially gambling. Wynn made his fortune selling experiences people want to believe in: luxury, glamour, inevitability. The subtext is that you can’t run a high-stakes business on perpetual con; you can only run it on a con that doesn’t feel like one. Truth, here, is partly ethical and partly tactical: the quickest way to credibility is to stop sounding like you’re trying.
“People can smell the truth” is the shrewdest line, because it flatters the customer while warning the speaker. Wynn isn’t imagining some enlightened public; he’s pointing to instinct, the micro-signals of authenticity in voice, detail, and confidence. Audiences forgive bad news and hard terms faster than they forgive the sense they’re being handled. In a world of scripted PR and polished founder-speak, Wynn’s advice doubles as a critique: spin is expensive, fragile, and eventually detectable.
Context matters: when your business depends on trust amid temptation, “truth” becomes a risk-management tool. It’s not naïve. It’s survival.
“Tell the truth” lands like a corrective to the reflexive suspicion surrounding sales, branding, and especially gambling. Wynn made his fortune selling experiences people want to believe in: luxury, glamour, inevitability. The subtext is that you can’t run a high-stakes business on perpetual con; you can only run it on a con that doesn’t feel like one. Truth, here, is partly ethical and partly tactical: the quickest way to credibility is to stop sounding like you’re trying.
“People can smell the truth” is the shrewdest line, because it flatters the customer while warning the speaker. Wynn isn’t imagining some enlightened public; he’s pointing to instinct, the micro-signals of authenticity in voice, detail, and confidence. Audiences forgive bad news and hard terms faster than they forgive the sense they’re being handled. In a world of scripted PR and polished founder-speak, Wynn’s advice doubles as a critique: spin is expensive, fragile, and eventually detectable.
Context matters: when your business depends on trust amid temptation, “truth” becomes a risk-management tool. It’s not naïve. It’s survival.
Quote Details
| Topic | Honesty & Integrity |
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