It’s no secret that every effort is being made to restore the properties of Downtown Las Vegas to play an important role in the city’s attractions, as they did in the city’s early days. While currently eclipsed by the mega-resorts of the Strip, the Downtown market, particularly the casinos that line Fremont Street, is gaining in status and visibility. That is in part due to the efforts of the city’s leaders, including Mayor Oscar Goodman, and also to the area’s casino operators themselves.

Seeing the changes that were happening throughout the city in the ‘90s, Downtown operators like Bennie Binion, Jackie Gaughan, Sam Boyd and Steve Wynn were looking for ways to compete with the Strip, without sacrificing the historical significance and charm of the area. They ultimately settled on an open-air pedestrian mall connecting the properties and the famous canopy above, known collectively as the Fremont Street Experience, and an LLC that handles the marketing, entertainment and day-to-day operations.

The Fremont Street Experience LLC is comprised of representatives of ten Downtown casinos, as well as President Jeff Victor. With a revenue stream that comes from the member casinos, room taxes via the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, and independent operations, the Fremont Street Experience puts on concerts, shows, cultural events and more, all in an effort to increase the visibility and prosperity of the member casinos. Casino Connection Managing Editor Greg Jones recently caught up with Victor, who explained that the Downtown renaissance is more than just hype.

Casino Connection: Talk about the Fremont Street Experience and the organization’s recent successes in terms of attracting tourists to the Downtown area.

Victor: I think a little known fact is that last year, Downtown saw 18.7 million visitors, roughly half of the total visitation to all of Las Vegas. That’s a significant number for a place as small as five blocks. To put that in perspective, Disney California saw about 11.3 million, and the Magic Kingdom in Orlando saw about 16 million.

So, I think what happens down here is very special and people seek it out. Obviously, with only 7,000 rooms at the member casinos, those 18.7 million aren’t coming from the room base Downtown, they’re coming from the Strip and beyond. These are people who see Downtown and the Fremont Street Experience as a destination within a destination.

There are a large number of entertainment offerings put on by the Fremont Street Experience, and several large-scale events such as the Las Vegas Grand Prix and the biannual sales shows at the World Market Center. How do those kinds of events benefit the Downtown casinos?
Every event has a different objective. One might be to increase attendance; another might be to raise the visibility of the Fremont Street Experience and the Downtown core through televised events such as the Las Vegas Grand Prix or the New Year’s event. Some events are intended to give back to the community, as we do a variety of runs including the Race for the Cure and Las Vegas Marathon. We also do some cultural events down here that are intended to involve the locals and give back to those who support the Experience.

We’re first and foremost a marketing and entertainment company with an operations component. So in addition to all the events that we do that are supported by a variety of efforts, we take care of the cleanliness, the landscaping and the maintenance of the Fremont Street Experience.

Because of the proximity of the member casinos, do you look at the Downtown market, in terms of a single, large attraction, as of a sum of its parts?
That’s absolutely been my approach, and that’s been my approach because that’s what the customers tell us they like down here. You’ve got a variety of experiences, all within a close proximity. They often describe the feel down here as intimate and gregarious. People who come down here find it easy to find a party and mingle with others and do it in very close proximity and with a lot of ease. That’s not always the case with a lot of properties on the Strip.

We have 7,000 rooms here and that, cumulatively, is larger than the MGM Grand. We have 60 restaurants and that is more than most resorts in town. We have a large number of slots and table games and the like, and the Fremont Street Experience in the common mall that ties together all those individual properties.

When marketing the Downtown area against the Strip Resorts, what advantages do you have and what disadvantages do you face?
One of the challenges is that the Downtown area surrounding the Fremont Street Experience is undergoing a renaissance. Change will happen, but it’s just in its very early days. The public has a series of misperceptions about Downtown, and those are a challenge for us from the marketing and PR perspective.

On the good side, when people give us a try, their satisfaction ratings are through the roof and they really do enjoy the variety of options. The Viva Vision canopy is one-of-a-kind on the planet. The intimacy of these casinos is very much appreciated by the guests.

Then you’ve got the neon facades on the buildings. When a lot of people close their eyes and think about Las Vegas, this is what they see in their mind’s eye. It’s a piece of Las Vegas that exists less and less on the Strip.

Should Las Vegas land a professional sports franchise, there has been talk that the new stadium any team would require could be located on the 61 acres of land the city owns Downtown. What are your thoughts about having a new stadium built in such close proximity to the Experience?
Mayor Oscar Goodman has a tremendous vision for a Downtown core in Las Vegas. Many cities go through this when the suburbs develop in a fast-growing city. The downtown core is left unexplored for a period. Then the economics catch up and there is focus back on downtown. The first thing that Goodman did was accumulate the 61 acres and that gave him some flexibility to explore a variety of different redevelopment efforts, and the stadium is one of them. We would love to have that component down here.

As a group with 10 members, do the casinos have an interest in doing what would benefit their individual properties first? How do you work to overcome the somewhat divergent interests among the various members?
I play a bit of a mediator role on occasion, but the operators down here have been making sense of this formula for 12-plus years. The credit is really due to them. They understand that they’re the destination and that the sum of the parts is an important piece of this. Although they on occasion have some self-interest, they most often pull together and make sense of it for the group.

What is the current state of Downtown Las Vegas?
First of all, we increased attendance down here last year by 1 million people, or 6 percent. We’re very proud of that.

There is often talk about the Downtown gaming numbers being on a continued decline, but you really need to look at the individual properties before you group everyone together. When the gaming revenues come out, they include a variety of casinos in the Downtown area that extends beyond the 10 member casinos. The performance that’s reported isn’t indicative of just these ten properties.

Boyd has three properties down here; they’re publicly traded and do a good job in their financials of breaking out their Downtown performance. They’ve had just stellar performance over the last two years, in part as a result of the investment they’ve put in down here… I believe it was $22 million last year and $18 million the year before.

You’ve got the Golden Nugget owner Landry’s, which just spent $100 million in renovating their property and adding new products, and it was just reported that their numbers are up greatly. Terry Caudill has spent more money renovating the Four Queens than he spent buying it a few years ago. Although he’s not publicly traded and therefore we don’t see the numbers, it’s my sense that he’s doing very, very well. And there are other examples of that down here. There are also examples of folks who are not doing so well.

I really think that Downtown needs to be looked at more surgically when we talk about performance and fiscal achievement.

There is a pretty simple formula for Downtown: Those who work to renovate their properties and work to advertise their accomplishments are rewarded by the customers.

What is Downtown Las Vegas going to look like 10 years from now?
I think it’s going to look like a lot of other downtowns that started their revitalization process a little earlier. You’re going to see areas like the Gas Lamp District in San Diego; you’re going to see areas like 16th Street in Denver, and areas similar to what’s happened in Atlanta. There will be a huge influx of investment, it will create new businesses, it will create a new flavor, and it will draw new residents and tourists and investment from the suppliers that would cater to those folks. I think you’ll see different retailers down here. I think you’ll see different restaurateurs coming to Downtown.

The renovation and revitalization will happen; it’s just a matter of when.

By Greg Jones

Greg Jones is managing editor of Casino Connection Nevada, as well as associate editor of Global Gaming Business magazine.

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