Per S&G‘s prediction, Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear (D) wasted little time after winning reelection before resuming his push for casino legalization. You’d never think that he beat opponent state Senate President David Williams (R) like a drum at the ballot box. Beshear has done a post-electoral flip-flop and now speaks of going the long route, putting casinos to a popular vote, which was Williams’ stance. In other words, he covets the tax moolah but he doesn’t want to take the lead — or the heat — on what’s guaranteed to be a contentious issue. In his first term, Beshear talked a good game regarding casinos during the early months but didn’t take long to lose interest. Whether a whomping 2011 mandate gives him more intestinal fortitude this time around remains to be seen, although this initial augury isn’t very promising.
Add the superlative Mexican restaurant Dos Caminos to the lengthening list of casualties brought on by the cash-hungry policies of Las Vegas Sands COO Michael Leven, the Grinch Who Stole Comps. On Nov. 14, Dos Caminos folded its last tamale and vacated Palazzo, leaving a conspicuous gap on the casino floor. According the the restaurant’s owners, “in late 2008 the Venetian negotiated and granted to Two Roads a long term cash flow rental agreement,” to tide them through the recession. However, the statement continues, Sands welshed on the arrangement and — in time-honored Sheldon Adelson fashion — filed a lawsuit against the restaurant.
$2 Million Mike has hired for the express purpose of cutting costs at Adelson HQ, at a time when the company was undergoing 
a severe liquidity crisis. Mike’s pricey prescription has been a scorched-earth policy that saw Sands Bethlehem being finished in cheap, fugly style (not the handsome civic adornment Sands once promised), and has sent Jersey Boys and Blue Man Group running into the arms of Paris-Las Vegas and Monte Carlo, respectively. Retailer Max Mara has closed and Ice Jewelry is looking around for other, non-Venelazzo space. High rents have been cited as the cause in both instances. While the latter pair of defections should probably be blamed on General Growth Properties, there’s no mistaking a sudden exodus of tenants. The $2 Million Man’s philosophy is clearly that two birds in a bush are much more valuable than one in the hand.
Speaking of strategies, those at Station Casinos remain as constant as a wind vane. When times were good, company bosses Frank Fertitta III and Lorenzo Fertitta prided themselves on their decision to buy out Green Valley Ranch restaurateurs and run things in-house. Then, during the tailspin caused by the company’s LBO (a shift of fortune Las Vegas Sun cub reporter Delen Goldberg generously attributes to the recession), the mantra became ‘outsource, outsource, outsource.’ Now, in a move that has “economies of scale” writ large and in block letters, Station is reverting to DIY restaurant operation once more.
The obvious bottom-line virtues include standardization of F&B product, which leads to streamlined buying in (even bulkier) bulk, all of which should save no small amount of money. It also enables Station to market a smaller number of F&B brands across a greater number of properties. That’s what the high-tech boys like to call, “Leveraging content across multiple platforms.” Goldberg’s article, however, begs the question of what will happen to the Station-owned-and-operated restaurants at Aliante Station, from whose management Station was recently given the heave-ho by new ownership … although the Fertittas and CFO Marc Falcone could have as long as until June 2013 to solve that problem.
