In a lose-lose scenario, Caesars Entertainment is losing its management contracts at Horseshoe Cincinnati, Horseshoe 
Cleveland and Thistledown Racino. Even with the valuable Horseshoe brand, all three had been losing business in recent months. Caesars had long ago sold its minority share of the three properties to Rock Gaming owner Dan Gilbert. Now it will lose the revenue stream that came with running them on Gilbert’s behalf. It’s a tragic end for Caesars, which sold lucrative Harrah’s Maryland Heights to get into Ohio and now has nothing to show for it.
The real losers may be players, who will no longer have access to Total Rewards. Rock Gaming CEO Matt Cullen‘s statement that “We view this as an opportunity to leverage our unique culture and vast network of companies to grow the business and further connect 
the casinos to the downtown areas where they reside” is hardly an answer to the problem. Total Rewards accruals will be rolled into a new, Rock Gaming loyalty program. Today’s news doesn’t constitute a complete divorce between Gilbert and Caesars. His company still partners with Caesars in Horseshoe Baltimore, although who can say how long that will endure, given this surprising turn of event and Caesars CEO Mark Frissora‘s reputation for cutting costs? (In case you missed it, The Rio’s seafood buffet fell victim to Frissora’s frugality.)
* Parking fees on the Strip are already standard at Vdara and Mandarin Oriental. Now MGM Resorts International is starting to sneak them at other casinos under the premise of special events. Non-hotel guests had to pay $30 to park their cars in the Excalibur garage for the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight and during the Route 91 country-music festival. You don’t have to have a Ph.D to realize that MGM is testing customer resistance at The Ex and, depending on how remunerative parking fees are, will expand them to other Strip garages as the MGM/AEG Arena comes on line.
Jim Murren, meanwhile, explains why Bellagio, MGM Grand and Circus Circus got left out of the company’s planned REIT conversion. He also waxes conciliatory toward Macao‘s government, lining up with Adelson and James Packer, and more or less against Steve Wynn, Angela Leong and Lawrence Ho.
* We congratulate Station Casinos for giving students from UNLV‘s Center for Gaming Innovation a chance to field-test their games at Red Rock Resort. We hope it was a good learning experience for the students and that some of the games tested may find their way onto a Station casino floor on a permanent basis.
If MGM Resorts International charges a parking fee at all of their casinos this would obviously benefit the Tropicana and Hooters at the south end of the Strip. Both properties would get a lot more customers in their parking lot/garages and possibly in their casino. Now if MGM Resorts International charges for parking will Caesars Entertainment also charge for parking? I think the answer is yes and yes and both companies will charge $20 per day for parking. I don’t think this is a good idea and it would be interesting to see what the LVCVA thinks about this idea.