Resort hopes to lure Las Vegas high rollers
Bloomberg News Service
Henderson, Nev. — Henry Gluck's competitors considered him crazy and he had to help pay his tenants' construction bills when he attached a shopping mall to a Las Vegas casino in the early 1990s.The ancient Rome-themed Forum Shops at Caesars Palace is now the most profitable mall in the United States.
Bloomberg News Service
Now Gluck, who retired as chief executive of Caesars World Inc. in 1995, is building a $7 billion Italian-themed hotel, casino and housing resort around a man-made lake — all in the desert 15 miles from the Las Vegas Strip. And the doubters are out again.
Elegant homes overlook the lake and golf course at "Lake Las Vegas" in Henderson, Nev., a $7 billion Italian-themed hotel, casino and housing resort built around a man-made lake 15 miles from the Las Vegas Strip.
"Lake Las Vegas," with its white sand beaches and a replica Florentine bridge, may not succeed because it's too far from the action downtown, especially for the high-rollers Gluck is trying to attract, analysts say.
"You're not going to get folks to drive away from the Strip," said Saverio Scheri, director of gaming consulting for Pricewaterhouse-Coopers. "People on average visit three or four different casinos when they visit Las Vegas."
And it's facing another challenge: the number of Las Vegas visitors this year is expected to grow at less than half the pace of 2000 because of a slower economy.
Gluck, 73, said his project, divided into sections with names such as Monaco and PortaCielo, is what Las Vegas needs: an oasis catering to global travellers who don't want to spend 24 hours a day among the crowds and bright lights.
Lake Las Vegas, in Henderson, Nev., so far has a Hyatt Regency hotel, two golf courses and a casino on the banks of the 320-acre lake.
Up next: a replica of Florence's Pontevecchio, a condominium village styled after a European hillside town, a Ritz-Carlton hotel, and 225 houses, some costing more than $1 million. The resort is expected to be finished by 2008.
Gluck said he proved before that Nevada tourists want more than just gambling.
At Caesars, he opened Forum Shops with mall owner Simon Property Group Inc. when other Las Vegas developers thought any enticements other than betting would cut into casino profits. Gluck saw high-end stores such as Armani, Ferragamo and Versace boosting traffic by drawing both gamblers and nongamblers to his casino.
"Everyone thought we were crazy," said Randy Brant, president of Gordon Brant Ltd., a property brokerage whose job was to find tenants for the mall. "People didn't believe that gamblers shopped."
Gluck's new company, Transcontinental Corp., which has built similar projects at Lake Arrowhead in southern California and Waikaloa in Hawai'i, is working with resort developer Intrawest Corp. Texas oil heirs Sid and Lee Bass are investors.
