In slot play, Stratosphere execs get more from less
Executives at the Stratosphere hotel-casino are getting more from less on their casino floor.
By arranging the casino floor with clusters of slot machines instead of rows — Strat officials call them “end caps” — the floor becomes more inviting, leading to longer play and better results.
Today, the Stratosphere casino floor has 700 machines compared with 1,200 a decade ago, yet slot revenue has climbed 19 percent since then.
Slot results were generally positive in December for markets with properties owned by American Casino & Entertainment, parent company of the the city’s two Arizona Charlies’ properties, Laughlin’s Aquarius and the Stratosphere.
The state Gaming Control Board on Tuesday reported that statewide gaming win fell 2.7 percent from a year ago to $956.1 million in December, but three-month trends continued to show slow, steady growth in Nevada’s dominant industry.
The board also said Strip win was off 1.7 percent to $590.7 million for the month, but quarterly win rose 2.5 percent in that market.
Downtown Las Vegas continued its impressive run with win down 2.2 percent to $42.5 million for December, but the three-month trend running up 6.6 percent. 
TOUGH COMPARISON
Michael Lawton, senior research analyst for the Control Board’s Tax and License Division, said Strip win was up against a tough comparison to last year so the fact that win was only down $10 million, or 1.7 percent, wasn’t disappointing.
“Baccarat continues to lag, down $8 million on volumes which were down 11.1 percent or $133 million,” Lawton said. “Baccarat volumes have only increased once this calendar year and only four times during the last 25 months.”
The Control Board on Tuesday also issued a calendar year analysis of gaming win that showed the state won $11.26 billion in 2016, a 1.3 percent increase over the previous year and the third straight year of growth. It’s increased six times in the last seven years.
In Clark County, win was up 1 percent to $9.71 billion in 2016 with the Strip up 0.4 percent to $6.38 billion and downtown Las Vegas up 4.2 percent to $564.6 million.
Downtown showed the highest percentage growth of any of the 15 markets monitored in the state.
“I think the most impressive item of note for calendar year 2016 is the fact that all seven markets in Clark County posted increases during the year and only one major market statewide posted a decrease,” Lawton said. “That being said, the growth we experienced this calendar year was widespread and was accomplished in spite of baccarat’s continued declines.”
MORE END ROWS
Richard Fitzhugh, corporate vice president of slot strategy for American Casino & Entertainment, said he and Bill Boswell, vice president of slot operations at the Stratosphere, determined that slot machines on the ends of rows of slots seemed to perform better than those in the interior. The obvious takeaway: create more ends of rows.
“People are curious about what’s going on around them so when we had all these end caps, it gave people the ability to look around close to them to see what was going on at nearby machines,” Fitzhugh said.
By increasing the spacing of machines, another aesthetic was accomplished — wider aisles and walkways to other parts of the casino.
Fitzhugh, who has more than two decades of casino floor strategy experience at several Las Vegas properties and a tribal operation, doesn’t claim to be the inventor of better spaced casino floors, but he and Boswell embrace experimenting with floor space to generate higher revenue levels.
They’ve found that game producers become more competitive when it comes to negotiating positioning on the floor.
Fitzhugh and Boswell also noted that multicolored mood lighting on ribbons in light soffits have produced a pleasant and inviting atmosphere. They’re also sticklers for replacing seating in front of the slot machines to provide maximum comfort.
RELOCATING POKER
One of the Stratosphere’s next floor moves will be relocating the property’s poker room from the north end of the casino near restaurants to the south end, near the race and sports book.
“I think the poker players will be happy with that,” Boswell said, “because some of the players didn’t like all the noise the slot machines were making and wanted us to turn the sound down.”
Boswell and Fitzhugh say they believe their efforts are validated by the fact that representatives from rival companies have toured the Stratosphere’s floor in recent months.
“I don’t think they’d be here if we weren’t onto something,” Fitzhugh said.
Contact Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Follow @RickVelotta on Twitter.
It's official: 43.9M Las Vegas visitors in '16
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority closed the book on 2016's visitation statistics, verifying record numbers for visitors and tourists.
The authority on Tuesday confirmed 3.3 million visitors in December, pushing the 2016 total to 42.9 million. Authority officials first reported the record at its Jan. 10 board of directors meeting.
December convention attendance was up 6.1 percent to 248,984, making the total 6.3 million for 2016, 7.1 percent ahead of last year and just edging the previous record set in 2006.
In 2016, there were 2.6 percent more conventions and trade shows staged than in 2015, a total of 21,864.
The 7 percent increase in average daily room rate to $114.66 pushed the 2016 average to $125.96, the highest level since 2007 when the average was $132.09.
Citywide occupancy for December was 1.1 percentage points higher than in 2015 to 79.6 percent taking the year-long average to 89.1 percent, 1.4 points ahead of 2015. That was the highest rate since 2007's 90.4 percent level.
— RICHARD N. VELOTTA
