Green Felt Journal
Green Felt Journal
In the Dining Business, the Plaza Plays Smart
October 27th, 2011
A renovated classic hotel, a veteran casino chef reaching out to locals. The Plaza’s game plan is another example of how downtown has responded to the recession with creativity and a solid instinct for the area’s identity. Read more »
Green Felt Journal
Heavyweight Hospitality
October 20th, 2011
Caesars Palace has constantly reinvented itself by adding towers, restaurants and venues, from the Colosseum to Pure nightclub. But like an aging heavyweight champion who’s lost a step, Caesars isn’t the world-beater it used to be. Iconic is great, but in a city that’s about newer and better, Caesars is often overlooked. But Ramesh Sadhwani, who in September was named the hotel’s vice president of operations, might be the man to help Caesars recapture the title. Read more »
Green Felt Journal
The Sweet Scent of the Global Gaming Expo
October 13th, 2011
Purveyors to the gaming industry have three chances a year to show off their wares: the two Global Gaming Expos and London’s International Casino Exhibition. For those after the American market, the Las Vegas expo is their big shot; if they don’t sell it here, it might remain unsold. That’s why, from the obvious (cash-sorting devices) to the whimsical (a product billed as “zero gravity fruit”), if a casino could possibly want to buy it, someone was selling it. Read more »
Green Felt Journal
Vices, Hidden and in Plain Sight
September 29th, 2011
The Marina Bay Sands is one of only two casinos in Singapore, a relatively wealthy city-state that’s about 200 miles from the nearest casino. CityCenter, on the other hand, opened on a saturated Strip that was experiencing falling visitation and revenue numbers. Those trends have since reversed, but CityCenter has nowhere near the upside of the Marina Bay Sands. Read more »
Green Felt Journal
Riviera Rebirth
September 15th, 2011
As destroy/erase/improve gives way to rework/repaint/recycle, older Las Vegas hotels that a few years ago might have been imploded have gotten new leases on life. Over the past year, both the Tropicana and Plaza have been thoroughly revamped after each had been bandied about as a possible demolition candidate. Now it is the Riviera’s turn for a makeover, and the ultimate fate of the property could reveal much about the next decade or more of Strip development. Read more »
Green Felt Journal
Stirring up the Strip
September 1st, 2011
With all due respect to artists’ renderings, the recent unveiling of plans for Caesars Entertainment’s Linq have people wondering just what the east side of the Strip will look like when the project opens in June 2013. But behind the aesthetic curiosity is another, more immediate question: How will the massive construction project affect guests and employees? Read more »
Green Felt Journal
Nightlife on the Starship Enterprise
August 18th, 2011
The first thing you see walking into McFadden’s at the Rio is William Shatner in his full late-1960s Technicolor glory on one of the wide-screens that’s usually devoted to SportsCenter. Read more »
Green Felt Journal
Staycation, All I Ever Wanted
July 14th, 2011
Not everyone has the luxury of a Malibu summer home or the accrued sick/personal leave to spend their summer crashing in the Pacific waves or touring the Continent, so Las Vegans have increasingly turned during the recession years to a marriage of convenience: the Vegas staycation, where locals stay on the Strip and act like tourists. Read more »
Poker, the Great Survivor
June 30th, 2011
A lot of folks are surprised that the World Series of Poker isn’t doing so badly this year. So far, about one-third of tournament events have had record numbers of participants. Back in April, many thought the Black Friday indictments would translate into a bummer of a summer for Caesars Entertainment’s flagship poker asset, but the tournament—like the game of poker itself—has proved to be quite resilient. Read more »
Green Felt Journal
The Quiet Pioneer
June 16th, 2011
Last month the Nevada casino industry lost one of its pioneers when William N. “Bill” Pennington died at the age of 88. He wasn’t a household name in Las Vegas, but he had a hand in the creation of today’s Las Vegas Strip by helping transform a struggling, scandal-plagued hotel-casino into the keystone of what was, for a time, the most profitable gaming company in the world. Read more »
