{"id":4116,"date":"2010-07-20T12:23:38","date_gmt":"2010-07-20T20:23:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=4116"},"modified":"2021-03-15T05:53:16","modified_gmt":"2021-03-15T13:53:16","slug":"louisiana-treads-oily-water","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/louisiana-treads-oily-water\/","title":{"rendered":"Louisiana treads (oily) water"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"It’s a rare day when one can report that a casino market was down year\/year but did better than expected. If you were looking for serious Deepwater Horizon<\/strong> spillover into June’s casino numbers, you’d be surprised. Statewide, casinos were -4.5% with Baton Rouge<\/strong> the hardest-hit market (-6%) and New Orleans<\/strong> (-2%) the least. That said, June was the weakest month of 2010 and the most anemic since November of last year, with a $185 million haul.<\/p>\n

Amelia Belle<\/em> actually posted a microscopic revenue increase whilst Pinnacle Entertainment<\/strong>‘s flagship L’Auberge du Lac<\/strong> sustained a mere 1% decline. For the first time this year, it outgrossed Harrah’s New Orleans<\/strong> (-5%, $25.5 million). Now that’s<\/em> news.<\/p>\n

Across Lake Charles<\/strong>, Isle of Capri Casinos<\/strong>‘ vessel is sinking fast, -39% and eking out $1.1 million in revenue, the smallest take in the state. Isle’s nearby Grand Palais<\/em> ($9.8 million, -6%) must be effectively subsidizing the Lake Charles<\/em> boat. Two racinos fared well, Harrah’s Lousiana Downs<\/strong> up 2.5% and Fair Grounds<\/strong> absolutely flat (yes, 0.0% deviation from 2009). Between a 13% decline at Delta Downs<\/strong> and a 9% falloff at Sam’s Town<\/strong> upstate, it was a rough month for Boyd Gaming<\/strong>. Thanks to its Horseshoe Casino & Hotel<\/strong> (-3%, $17.2 million) and Harrah’s N.O., HET had the “place” and “show” spots in the gross-revenue derby.<\/p>\n

Squishy in the Midwest<\/strong>. In the course of lowering expectations for major regional casino operators (Boyd, Pinnacle, Ameristar Casinos<\/strong>), stock analyst Joseph Greff<\/strong> wrote, “we project soft regional gaming revenue results over the next 3-6 months as we do not expect to see a significant increase in consumer spending patterns given the uncertain economic environment<\/em>,” including high unemployment. One stock Greff likes is Penn National Gaming<\/strong>, for which he projects better-than-expected results, thanks mostly to cost controls.<\/p>\n

M sets pace for Wynn<\/strong>. Possessor of the best buffet in town<\/a>, M Resort<\/strong> is ginning up some extra business with the offer to win free buffets for life. (Just what my waistline needs!) This lit a fire under Wynn Resorts<\/strong>, which quickly responded with a one-time giveaway of lifetime buffet passes to five Nevada<\/strong> residents. If you’re a red-card holder — like me — you have to be physically present for the July 29th drawing in the Encore Theatre<\/strong> (aka The House of Garth) to be eligible for complimentary line passes to Wynn’s buffet<\/a>. It’s nice to see that Steve Wynn<\/strong>‘s team isn’t too high and mighty to adapt ideas from the competition.<\/p>\n

Crazy from the heat<\/strong>. Shutting down the Strip, gay activists are blockading traffic at Las Vegas Boulevard and Tropicana Avenue today, in 106-degree weather, venting frustration<\/a> with Sen. Harry Reid<\/strong> (D-NV). The standoff lasted at least 12 minutes, although Las Vegas Metro<\/strong> appears to have brokered some form of compromise. How cruelly ironic that this should be happening between three MGM Resorts International<\/strong>-owned properties. MGM was — along with Harrah’s Entertainment<\/strong> — one of two major casino companies that risked backlash to push for passage of domestic-partner recognition in this state.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s a rare day when one can report that a casino market was down year\/year but did better than expected. If you were looking for serious Deepwater Horizon spillover into June’s casino numbers, you’d be surprised. Statewide, casinos were -4.5% … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[40,60,28,18,14,117,7,52,84,63,11,69,30,33,111,32,9,38],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4116"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4116"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4116\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29387,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4116\/revisions\/29387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}