Round One to Adelson; Berman honored; Atlantic City winning in polls

Sands China has been getting mad props for its handling of the Parisian rollout last week. Compared to Wynn Palace‘s “passive” approach to the market (and despite a hailstorm of Sheldon pashaupbeat verbiage from Steve Wynn), analyst Christopher Jones wrote, “The awareness of the Parisian among gamblers was high, with Sands having blanketed the region with social media impressions of the new property over the last couple months. “This is in contrast to the recent Wynn Palace opening that took a more passive strategy relative to marketing, prior to opening. We believe that Wynn is looking to address this, as it adjusts to the operating environment in Cotai.” Not only was Parisian doing strong business, it was drawing off players from luckless Studio City, a project taken in haste by Melco Crown Entertainment, to be repented at leisure. Parisian is also said to have benefited from being more fully completed than previous Sheldon Adelson offerings in Macao.

“The bottom line is that Parisian seems to be significantly more compelling than Studio City from a mass-market consumer perspective, and should these trends be maintained, Parisian could prove less of a benefit and more of a headwind for Studio City,” wrote Union Gaming Group analyst Grant Govertsen. Evidently casino operators have decided that the customer base is finite and that they must ‘acquire’ players from the competition, but haven’t quite figured out how to do it. Wrote Deutsche Bank’s Carlo Santarelli, “While the theme of player acquisition was repetitive, we didn’t sense a concrete strategy amongst the operators to achieve the goal and hence, we think ultimately product quality leads the way, with customer reinvestment following.”

* Lyle Berman, the founder of Grand Casinos and the father of Gulf Coast gaming in Mississippi will be inducted into the Gaming Hall of Fame in a few weeks. Having been in the Midwest during Grand’s formative years, I can say that it is difficult to understate Grand’s role in the expansion of riverboat and tribal gaming. “I learned more from Lyle lyleBermanthan I did from anyone else since I’ve been in the business. He had great vision. He was always three to four steps ahead of everyone else around him. A lot of my management style I can attribute to his success,” remarked Berman’s Silver Slipper Casino rival John Ferrucci. Berman came a-cropper when he attempted to bring his business acumen to the Las Vegas Strip, going in with Bob Stupak on the ill-fated Stratosphere (a financial disaster that subsequently proved a windfall for Carl Icahn). Still, Berman turned a three-person casino outfit into Fortune Magazine‘s fastest-growing company of 1995. Grand was bought up by Hilton Gaming, absorbed into its newly created Park Place Entertainment and eventually subsumed by Caesars Entertainment. Still, Berman wasn’t one to feel sorry for himself, as befits at three-time World Series of Poker champion.

* Buy your tickets for nonstop service from Beijing to Las Vegas today. Hainan Airlines has begun selling fares, culminated a two-decade quest by Nevada tourism boosters to strengthen ties between China and the Silver State. Said Executive Director of United States Operations Joel Chusid, “I’ve been dealing with opening airport routes for years, American Airlines for 25 years and Hainan for almost 10, and cities are excited when we come in, but I have never seen the red carpet rolled out as it has in Las Vegas.” And, at $600 for a round-trip fare, those tickets are priced to move. Boeing 787 “Dreamliner” jets that seat 213 will be the vehicle of choice, three days a week. Hainan will be lobbying for more flights but it’s an uphill battle, due to bilateral trade constraints.

* Things are looking up for Atlantic City at the ballot box: Eagleton Center for Public Interest Polling reports that 58% of Garden State voters oppose lifting the Boardwalk’s casino monopoly, while only 35% are in favor. “This is something that cuts across all demographics. It’s not a partisan issue. It’s not a gender issue. There really is just not a desire to expand casinos farther in the state,” said Eagleton Center Interim Director Ashley Korning, noting that it’s a trend that dates back to 1979.

* Photographer Christian Lutz‘s new Las Vegas photo book, Insert Coins, tells it like it is.

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