All existing reservations will be honored, irrespective of price, says Westgate Resorts CEO David Siegel. Westgate took possession of the property on July 1 and, although Siegel says some hotel nights were being sold for less than it cost to clean the rooms, those bookings will not be canceled or otherwise changed. As for the $150 million Siegel reportedly spent to acquire the hotel, he says that will be dwarfed by what spends on bringing it up to par. "I’ve got the other 27 resorts to look after but this is my baby and I want to bring it to maturity. We don’t have another property that has the look, the impact of this."
Siegel’s aspiration, obviously, is to bring the former Las Vegas Hilton back to the glory it once enjoyed. "This will become an icon like it was once. I love the location. I like it better than being on the Strip," he says, recalling being stuck in traffic at Flamingo Road and Las Vegas Boulevard for nine vexing minutes.
"Elvis’s suite will probably end up being some kind of attraction. I don’t want anybody to get the idea that this is a timeshare resort," he adds. That business, starting with roughly a hundred units, "isn’t even going to make a dent for many, many years. I don’t want people to think, Oh God, it’s a timeshare, we can’t book a room there." (Even the timeshares will be included in the hotel-room inventory.)
However, "there isn’t an inch of this property we won’t touch. We’re going to start with the worst rooms and make them the best rooms. This hotel has some very good bones [but] it needs a lot of work." The gift shop has also already been moved, and a coffee shop called Sid’s (after Siegel’s father) and a branch of Edge -- a Park City, Utah, steakhouse -- will open here.
The famous sports book is also not sacrosanct. Siegel doesn’t think it compares to The Venetian’s. "Our sports book is embarrassing," he says, adding that he plans to bring in new chairs and new displays. The seating will also be redone in the big showroom and Siegel’s looking for a name performer to topline Raiding the Rock Vault, although he says, "I never saw a show where [the cast] worked so hard."
The Shimmer Cabaret, however, will be partially demolished in favor of a lobby bar and an open stage. "I think we can fit several acts in the showroom," including Elvis Presley impersonator Trent Carlini, for whom Siegel has great enthusiasm. The future of Quark’s Bar remains unknown but the 80,000 square feet which were devoted to Star Trek: The Experience will be come and a night- and day-club. Sixty-two undeveloped acres provide the potential to expand to an eventual 10,000 units. "The newer area [of the Strip] is starting to move north," Siegel notes.
Out front, the ‘Westgate’ that was on the Planet Hollywood tower (before it became a Hilton-branded Elara) will be re-hoisted onto the giant marquee. They’re the largest such letters in Las Vegas. Siegel found out that Donald Trump’s T-R-U-M-P on Trump International was 20 feet vertical, so he had his sign made 20 feet, 1 inch high.
"I don’t gamble in casinos," Siegel confesses. "The house always seems to win." Consequently, he’s leaving the casino operation in the hands of Navegante Group, which "provides a pass-through," giving Westgate a good return via the terms of its lease, in lieu of gaming revenue. Instead, timeshare business "will dwarf everything else here at this property. We did that at our other property for five years. People love timesharing." After 9/11, Siegel says, travelers opted upward for luxury, space, privacy and luxury, not bargains. We came through [the Great Recession] and 2012 was the best year in our history.
"This is like a hobby to me. I like to take people who work for me and make their lives better." Siegel says that he had six rival bidders and/or joint venture partners but they all wanted to close the hotel. "I didn’t want> to put 2,000 families out of work." For three years, the Westgate Foundation gave free vacations to active-duty servicemen and their families and it launched the Central Florida Coalition for the Homeless. "I like changing people’s lives."
Siegel’s notorious wife Jackie (The Queen of Versailles) may be more famous than he. Jackie Siegel has just inked a deal to do an E! channel reality show. Of her, her CEO husband says, "She’s a shopaholic and I’m sure she’ll find all the malls here very appealing."
