Now that wacky Glenn Straub is out of the picture, Stockton University says it is fielding offers for the ex-Showboat. What anybody can do other than run it as a hotel (Caesars Entertainment having removed its gaming entitlement but forgotten to void a covenant that requires it to be a “first class” hotel-casino). Thwarting Stockton is probably Trump Entertainment Resorts CEO Bob Griffin‘s biggest achievement, other than closing Trump Plaza. He can congratulate himself on impeding efforts to diversify the Atlantic City economy.
Straub, meanwhile, must be sniffing glue. He’s trying to flip Revel for $200 million, far more than he paid for it and the property can hardly be said to have gained value in the interim. Straub, who claims to have fielded 50 inquiries about Revel, said it’s “worth over $200 million, minimum, period, on the worst day of its life.” What day would that be, Glenn? In the meantime, Straub shakes a rhetorical fist at “the biggest seagulls I’ve ever seen,” who have been making kamikaze attacks and dropping crabs on Revel, and is planning a second indoor water park (in addition to the Atlantic Club‘s project) for the Boardwalk. That’s probably still the best idea he’s had for Revel.
At least Straub’s long-running unpleasantness with ACR Energy Partners may soon be at an end. The power supplier is facing insolvency, which would enable Straub to take over its plant and keep the lights on at Revel, where he’s also installing solar panels on the roof of the garage.
Over at Trump, Griffin is playing whack-a-mole with Unite-Here‘s creative protest tactics. Having been barred from projecting pro-boycott messages onto the fronts of the Plaza and Trump Taj Mahal, the union has deployed weather balloons that hover between 30 and 40 feet in the air, and carry aloft the message “BOYCOTT TAJ MA HOLE.” “It’s not going to be in federal airspace, and we’re going to stay out of the airspace that the Taj Mahal owns,” said the union’s Jeremy Pollard. Whatever Griffin does, Local 54 seems to be always one step ahead. Atlantic City may not be the strongest casino market in America but it’s easily the most entertaining.
* The debut of Wild Rose Jefferson softened the blow of a down month in Iowa, where gaming revenues were off 3.5%. Biggest loser overall was Caesars, whose two properties combined for a 10.5% decline, while the biggest winner was Boyd Gaming, up 4%, mainly driven by Diamond Jo Dubuque. Pinnacle Entertainment held steady at Ameristar Council Bluffs, while the brunt of the misfortune fell on small operators like Terrible’s Lakeside (-11%) and Rhythm City Casino (-14%). The absence of a Labor Day weekend obviously hurt and the novelty factor seems to have worn off for Hard Rock Casino in Sioux City, down 8.5%.
* Visitation may have been 7% less in Missouri but customers dropped 5% more into the slots and onto the tables, keeping the August doldrums to a 2.5% decline, hardly worth remarking upon. Pinnacle was flat at River City and 8% down at Ameristar St. Charles. (Pinnacle’s 
was 2% off.) Penn National Gaming may have been down 2% at Argosy Riverside in K.C., but it gained a pretty remarkable 13% at Hollywood St. Louis. Caesars may was a bit off at Harrah’s North Kansas City (-4%) but Tropicana Entertainment is really struggling with Lumiere Place, which plunged 18%. (Tropicana also has to cope with impeded access, due to Gateway Arch renovations.) Isle of Capri Casinos‘ quartet averaged a 2.5% dip.
Now that Penn landlord Gaming & Leisure Properties proposes to acquire the assets of Pinnacle, that will leave Lumiere Place as the only non-GLPI property in the St. Louis area. Antitrust laws being what they are, this might be an opportunity for an entrepreneur like Tilman Fertitta to snap up an excess casino or two — or for Caesars to get back into a marketplace it should never have quit.
