Fontainebleau Opens

[jdog]

I guess this place might not be doing so well or they're just marketing more aggressively now. They've actually coughed up some decent offers recently. Today I got a couple comp nights... and I hardly even played there??

[Rob.Singer]

The place reported losing an avg. of $400k per day. Of course they are going to do an about-face and try to get people onto that empty casino floor. It'll be sold.

[DGenBen]

Fontainebleau. It needed the money.

[theywontpayontuesday]

I kind of liked this place from an aesthetic standpoint but didn't like the long walk from the parking garage. It's too big for me and I don't like Vegas anyway.

[MisterV]

"If you build it, they won't come."

How true that is.

[accountinquestion]

Vegas needs to stop growing anyway. I guess they'll finally get the point .. oh wait they are renovating the Mirage. Hope people really want that experience of staying in a huge guitar? But what do I know...

Have they broke ground on that yet?

[coach belly]

Vital Vegas hinting bad news is imminent.

[Rob.Singer]

Vital Vegas hinting bad news is imminent.

Anyone who's been there can easily determine it's been a losing proposition from the start. It doesn't matter how fancy and over-the-top luxurious the place is, or how many "rave reviews" come down the pike. It cannot last long.

I'm glad I stayed at the hotel and had a completely overpriced meal there while I could. Now I know true waste.

[jpfromla]

The market can only sustain so many "high end" resorts. The Strip is saturated. Wynncore. V/P, Bellagio, Aria, Cosmo, Resorts-heard they are already middle ground, Caesars-barely and every other property has its select high roller suites. Spending $30 per person for breakfast gets old.

[kewlJ]

I am not a high roller degen gambling type, nor attracted to the higher end restaurants and things. I don't go to many shows here in Vegas and I don't need or stay in rooms or suites. So all that "glitz" to attract the higher end "gambler" is lost on me.

But there is a problem with F-Bleu and always has been through all the years it sat idol, and even more obvious into the first year of operation: Location. In real estate they say "location is everything". Well so too with strip casinos.

So if you start at the next closest casino on the west side of the strip, Encore and Wynn, it is about half mile walk. Going North from F-Bleu on that same side it is about half that far to Sahara Casino. Most of the older tourist crowd that visits Vegas (on either side of a knee replacement or two), isn't going to walk that. And if someone should walk, there is nothing along the way, no other casinos and tourist attractions. Now across the street, you do have Circus Circus, but come on....It's Circus Circus. The low point of strip casinos. So that isn't much of a draw. So your options to even get there are ride the Deuce, packed shoulder to shoulder or drive, park in the garage, with no place nearby to visit. Hardly appealing.

So F-Bleu is on an island, by itself. And it just isn't a big enough resort that anyone goes there for multiple days and doesn't leave the property like you can do with some of the other bigger resorts. I was actually kind of surprised at just how small F-Bleu actually is.

Bottom line: They are a smallish Casino resort, isolated in a bad location, trying to compete with the other bigger high end properties that are surrounded by other casinos and higher end properties and tourist attractions. Just isn't going to work.

[jdog]

I don't think it's so much they're trying to attract gamblers. They're trying to attract people willing to spend big bucks on a vacation. The strip properties have figured out much of their clientele will pay through the ass for food, clubbing, rooms... etc. With so many people driving in from Cali, they're used to ridiculous prices for everything. But agreed, all properties on the North end are challenged due to location.

[accountinquestion]

I'd like to see all the projections and known revenue numbers from strip casinos. Then see the cost to open fountain Bleu? I'm surprised a case could even be made to do this but I've never researched it. Ok it does well in a great year.. is that enough?. what happened to the fancy Chinese themed place? What about the old hard rock? (I forget what it is)

What happens when the customers are not enough to keep the high-end dining going? More losses?

Why not set machines at 93% and advertise like crazy?
... our machines are set to take half the money and other machines on the strip. Basic rooms, reasonable
Food options ... but have those machines full.

Loosest slots on the strip!

People definitely notice when their slot time is doubled before their trip bankroll is depleted.

I may very well be wrong but if I was given a casino to design ....

[Dan Druff]

Here's the Vital Vegas post:

Embedded Tweet

https://twitter.com/#!/x/status/1821692939292307775


When I've visited there, it has been a ghost town. That's bad news for a large, expensive property which needs to generate big bucks daily to break even.

They really need to shape things up, and they're not doing it. They are just staying the course and hoping the people will come, which of course isn't happening. As accountingquesiton said, they need a combination of well-publicized gaming promotions and cheap room rates. Once they get the place livelier, then they can tighten up the games and raise the prices again.

It just seems like they're idly sitting by and watching themselves fail. It's like watching a sick person sit and let his body rot away, rather than visit the doctor. Strange.

[MDawg]

Actually we visited on a mid week evening when, that same day (mid week afternoon) Resorts World was pretty dead, but Fontainebleau actually seemed fairly busy (later was told that this might have been due to a specific convention's being in town).

They do need to find their "niche" which R World seems to have done or at least is trying to do. Simply trying to express that "we're luxurious so you should come here" seems to be working about as well as UNKewlJ's constant jumping up and down and whining softly about "you should listen to mee."

If there's ever been anybody more incapable of trying and trying to change other people's opinions about himself, that person hasn't been born yet.

[Keystone]

Actually we visited on a mid week evening when, that same day (mid week afternoon) Resorts World was pretty dead, but Fontainebleau actually seemed fairly busy (later was told that this might have been due to a specific convention's being in town).

They do need to find their "niche" which R World seems to have done or at least is trying to do. Simply trying to express that "we're luxurious so you should come here" seems to be working about as well as UNKewlJ's constant jumping up and down and whining softly about "you should listen to mee."

If there's ever been anybody more incapable of trying and trying to change other people's opinions about himself, that person hasn't been born yet.

Another dud. Get some new material already jerkoff. Even Tasha is a better read than you

[accountinquestion]

Actually we visited on a mid week evening when, that same day (mid week afternoon) Resorts World was pretty dead, but Fontainebleau actually seemed fairly busy (later was told that this might have been due to a specific convention's being in town).

They do need to find their "niche" which R World seems to have done or at least is trying to do. Simply trying to express that "we're luxurious so you should come here" seems to be working about as well as UNKewlJ's constant jumping up and down and whining softly about "you should listen to mee."

If there's ever been anybody more incapable of trying and trying to change other people's opinions about himself, that person hasn't been born yet.

Another dud. Get some new material already jerkoff. Even Tasha is a better read than you

The majority of his post was a well formed opinion with the gratuitous shot at kewl

[Keystone]

Actually we visited on a mid week evening when, that same day (mid week afternoon) Resorts World was pretty dead, but Fontainebleau actually seemed fairly busy (later was told that this might have been due to a specific convention's being in town).

They do need to find their "niche" which R World seems to have done or at least is trying to do. Simply trying to express that "we're luxurious so you should come here" seems to be working about as well as UNKewlJ's constant jumping up and down and whining softly about "you should listen to mee."

Another dud. Get some new material already jerkoff. Even Tasha is a better read than you

The majority of his post was a well formed opinion with the gratuitous shot at kewl

Okay

[MisterV]

Yeah, but it's his "gratuitous shots" that make him look the fool.

He's a smart guy and all: why must he attack homosexuals?

[DGenBen]

I'd like to see all the projections and known revenue numbers from strip casinos. Then see the cost to open fountain Bleu? I'm surprised a case could even be made to do this but I've never researched it. Ok it does well in a great year.. is that enough?. what happened to the fancy Chinese themed place? What about the old hard rock? (I forget what it is)

What happens when the customers are not enough to keep the high-end dining going? More losses?

Why not set machines at 93% and advertise like crazy?
... our machines are set to take half the money and other machines on the strip. Basic rooms, reasonable
Food options ... but have those machines full.

Loosest slots on the strip!

People definitely notice when their slot time is doubled before their trip bankroll is depleted.

I may very well be wrong but if I was given a casino to design ....

I had this same thought, you loosen everything up, advertise like crazy, even put in some good VP pay tables & advertise that.

The reason they are probably hesitant to do that is their model is based on being a high end place & they probably want to go after high end customers & not bring in the ugly value seeking masses.

Which is really dumb because when your ship is sinking, you bail out the water.

But as anyone whose worked for a large corporation would know, upper management of large organizations are often clueless.

There is also the possibility they have not even considered offering value as an option because the prevailing view in casino management today is that customers are too stupid and unaware to even notice slot holds or high house edge games, hence the prevalence of triple 0 roulette, 85% payback slot machines, 6/5 Jacks or better, etc.

[MisterV]

Greed trumps common sense, be it in DC or LV.

Has ANY casino in sin city ever done as is suggested above, and if so how'd it go and why aren't they still doing it?