A longtime Elgin hair salon has cleared a major hurdle in its quest to add a bar and video gambling terminals for customers waiting on haircuts, after the city council unanimously approved a parking variation that had been rejected months earlier by the city's own zoning board. Casa de Estilos, operating at 301 Dundee Ave. since 1988, sought the variation to convert part of its building into a bar with six video gambling terminals intended strictly as an amenity for salon customers.
The council's vote reverses a July decision by the Elgin Planning and Zoning Commission, which rejected the parking variation in a 4-3 vote despite city staff recommending approval, according to the Chicago Tribune. City staff had determined that the salon's application met all eight applicable zoning requirements and standards, a split that set up the appeal heard by the full council on October 14. The petition, filed as Petition 28-26, sought an off-street parking variation necessary to establish a Drinking Place Use classification inside the existing salon, according to official City of Elgin council records.
A Parking Fight Over an 18-Spot Need
At the heart of the dispute was Elgin's zoning code, which requires 30 parking spaces for any business that includes a bar. Casa de Estilos has just 14 spaces in its own lot plus nine nearby on-street spaces, well short of that threshold. Owner Oscar Zamudio submitted a parking analysis estimating peak demand would never exceed 18 spaces, even on the salon's busiest late Friday afternoons, per the same Tribune account.
Elgin Community Development Director Marc Mylott told the council the salon wanted the added amenities to distinguish itself from competing shops, and that the bar would only operate during salon hours and carry no exterior signage. That detail lines up with Illinois law: Section 18 of the Illinois Video Gaming Act bars licensed establishments from displaying exterior physical gaming signs or off-premises billboards unless permanently affixed to the building.
No Football Games, No Hard Liquor
Zamudio told the council the proposed bar would pour a small selection of beer, wine and coffee drinks, but no hard liquor, and that it likely would not draw anyone beyond existing salon customers. Casa de Estilos is open seven days a week and takes appointments from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. most days. Zamudio said the bar might not even serve beer during the day and would not be a place where someone sits down to watch a three-hour football game.
To address the shortfall, Zamudio noted the salon could add eight more parking spaces by expanding into an adjacent empty lot it already owns. The council made that expansion a condition of its approval, directing Zamudio to add the spaces if available parking becomes a problem down the line. Council member Corey Dixon thanked Zamudio for persisting through the lengthy appeal process before the unanimous vote.
State Hurdles Still Ahead
Winning the council appeal only clears a local land-use obstacle. The salon still needs approval for a liquor license from city officials and for the gambling terminals themselves, two separate processes that remain unresolved. Under the Illinois Video Gaming Act, non-truck-stop retail establishments like Casa de Estilos are capped at six video gaming terminals and must first hold a valid local on-premises retailer's liquor license before applying for a state establishment license from the Illinois Gaming Board, according to the law as explained by Rise2Shine Gaming.
Once a liquor license is secured, the Illinois Gaming Board requires mandatory annual criminal background checks, fingerprinting, and financial audits for anyone holding more than a 5% ownership stake, with state licensing typically taking 60 to 90 days to complete, per the same gaming-law guidance. Locally, Elgin's own Ordinance No. G17-26, enacted in May, caps the total number of authorized video gaming terminals across all city businesses at 187 machines, meaning the salon's eventual allocation depends on how much room remains under that municipal ceiling, according to City of Elgin records.
Why Salons Add Slot Machines
Casa de Estilos is not the first non-traditional business to pursue video gambling as a side revenue stream. Industry analysis from gaming operator Accel Entertainment notes that service shops and beauty salons benefit from steady existing foot traffic and face fewer regulatory obstacles than standalone slot parlors, which must clear strict non-gaming revenue thresholds. The appeal also fits a broader state trend: video gaming terminals generated more than $3.086 billion in net terminal income in Illinois during fiscal year 2025, delivering roughly $159 million in tax revenue to local municipalities and over $921 million to the state's Capital Projects Fund, according to data reported by Capitol Fax.
Elgin's relationship with video gambling has shifted considerably since the practice was legalized statewide in 2009. The city originally banned local terminals to protect tax revenue flowing to its Grand Victoria Casino, before local business owners successfully lobbied the council to allow video gaming on a case-by-case basis, according to historical reporting from the Courier-News. Statewide, Illinois' regulated video gaming network has since grown to 9,441 licensed locations and nearly 49,000 operating terminals, the largest distributed video gaming network in the world, according to the Illinois Gaming Board's 2025 Annual Report.
