FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — It’s 8:30 on a Monday night, and Claire Allen waits behind a dozen other hopefuls to swipe her Players’ Club card.

Because 30 minutes from now, someone will be very happy. And it might be her.

“Normally, I wouldn’t be here on a weeknight, but I think I’m going to win that car tonight,” says Allen, a recent Florida Atlantic University graduate who hitched a ride with a friend from Boca Raton, Fla., to the Seminole Casino Coconut Creek.

When it comes to promotions, nothing quite gets a slot player’s motor running like a car. “It’s an item you can pull out and show people,” says Michael Michaud, Seminole Coconut Creek director of marketing. “It’s not like a vacation, which people don’t understand unless they have their toes in the sand and a Mai Tai in their hand. And who doesn’t like the smell of a new car?”

The magic of a free car goes back to the game show days — remember Let’s Make a Deal? — and remains as the top booty in such events as charity golf tournaments. (Make a hole-in-one, get a car.) Even at almost $4 a gallon.

Casinos know both high rollers and penny slots players keep their eyes out for cars, so they use the giveaways to lure people into the building, or to just keep them there longer.

If there’s a car giveaway coming up, gamblers will stick around, just in case. As many as 300 other dreamers will cram around the announcer, and hope to hear their name. The drawings are usually weighted, with players getting more entries if they pump in more coin in the days leading up to the drawing. At Seminole Coconut Creek, it’s one entry for every $100 played, plus one entry for just swiping a Players’ Club card. Says Jeanne Cucich, 87, of Coconut Creek, Fla.: “I play here so much that they built this place with my money. But would I still be here at 9 p.m. if I didn’t have a chance at a car? No.”

The car or the cash?

Seminole Coconut Creek is handing out 31 Mini-Coopers, and Gulfstream Park Racing and Casino in Hallandale, Fla., has recently given away BMWs and Audis, all of which are popular with women. It’s no accident: Women ages 40 to 65 dominate the slots, and attracting them is vital.

But Steve Calabro, vice president of gaming for Gulfstream’s parent company, Magna Entertainment, says people like smaller prizes too. This Gulfstream has cash giveaways, free casino play, spa packages and jewelry.

And while a car will draw people in, there’s a twist when lightning strikes.

“We once went 21 straight weeks where the winner took a cash option instead,” Michaud said. And that’s a better deal for the casinos. Even though car dealers give casinos rock-bottom prices in exchange for promotion, casinos still have to pay for the cars.

This month Coconut Creek will offer winners $10,000 and $2,500 in casino play if they don’t want the car that lists at $22,000. Michaud and others estimate 70 percent of the winners take the cash, and six of the first eight this month have gone for the green.

But then there are people who really need a car, such as Aaron Gothelf of Hollywood, Fla., who’s 28, lives with his parents, and has borrowed Mom’s car since his died in 2006.

So when he won last month at Mardi Gras Gaming in Hallandale Beach, he pushed through the crowd, hugged everyone in sight and repeatedly kissed the hood of his $15,000 Jeep Compass.

He didn’t know at the time he’ll have to pay income tax. But he is keeping that car.

“I’m not in a high-income bracket anyway, I’m no Bill Gates,” he said. Income taxes, title and license will be about $1,700. And accountants note that if you can document you’ve lost as much as you’ve won gambling, you don’t have to count the car, or any other jackpot, as income.

At 9 p.m. on that recent Monday night at Seminole Coconut Creek, the FAU graduate, the 87-year-old woman and about 200 others silently pray to an electronic message board. Ten names pop up, but not theirs. Those chosen have five minutes to report to the announcer and claim an envelope.

Nine envelopes have cash or casino play prizes. The 10th says “CAR.”

Only six players show, so the crowd smells another shot. Everyone counts down the clock: “FIVE, FOUR, THREE, TWO, ONE!” And the message board flashes four more names. Three show.

Finally, a single name — Tho Nguyen — flashes onto the screen. He gets the last sealed envelope.

And the car.

Nguyen is a regular here, and friends congratulate him and slap him on the back. He says he’ll take the cash, thank you very much.

Claire Allen and the rest disperse into the rows of slot machines.

“Tomorrow,” Allen says. “I guess I have to come back tomorrow.”