New ABC store ready to dazzle in Las Vegas
By Andrew Gomes
Advertiser Staff Writer
You won't find any 99-cent beach mats or fresh pineapples in ABC store No. 62, but you might need to pick up some sunblock.
That's because the store under construction and scheduled for a Nov. 19 opening is in Las Vegas, and it's going to be bright.
"There will be lots of lights," said ABC Stores Inc. President Paul Kosasa. "It's unlike any ABC store you've ever seen. Not even close. It's Las Vegas, that's why. We put a lot of dazzle into it."
The 6,500-square-foot store on Fremont Street in downtown Vegas, a block from the California Hotel, will be ABC's first location on the Mainland.
Kosasa said he'd like to open six more in the city — including locations inside megaresorts along the Strip — over the next three years. "We're in real preliminary talks (with landlords)," he said. "Just to do one store in Vegas would be too difficult."
Going to Vegas, while perhaps not a big gamble (36 million visitors spent $31 billion in Las Vegas last year), was a big step for the Honolulu-based resort convenience store operator that has concentrated about 40 of its 61 stores in Waikiki.
Kosasa said the gambling mecca nicknamed "the entertainment capital of the world" is a natural resort market in which to grow the company.
Over the years, other Hawai'i-based retailers have expanded to Mainland resorts with success, including Hilo Hattie, Waikiki Trader, Original Red Dirt Shirt Co., Crazy Shirts, The Sultan Co. and Food Pantry subsidiary Kalama Beach Corp.
For ABC, its stores will have a different look, but will follow its tried-and-true format selling core convenience items supplemented with souvenirs and gifts.
Despite the different look, the ABC name will be recognizable to Hawai'i tourists, as well as Hawai'i residents, thousands of whom travel to Vegas regularly.
Some of the items sold in the new store also will be familiar, such as aloha shirts and chocolate-covered macadamia nuts. Kosasa said selling items that say Hawai'i are part of "an experiment."
"For those people who identify ABC as a kama'aina company there is an expectation that the stores will sell Hawai'i-type goods," he said.
Most items, however, will reflect the glitter and gambling that says Vegas, such as playing cards, dice and Las Vegas-themed T-shirts.
Kosasa said he expects sales to be on par with the average Waikiki store, though he declined to give a dollar figure.
The store cost three or four times as much as a typical Waikiki store to build. It will employ roughly 30 people, all from existing ABC stores on O'ahu, the Neighbor Islands and Guam.
ABC Stores, which also operates in Saipan, is one of Hawai'i's biggest companies, with an estimated $150 million in revenue last year.
The first ABC store opened in 1965 in Waikiki, though the company's roots date back to 1949 when Kosasa's father, Sidney, a pharmacist, and his wife, Minnie, opened a drugstore in Kaimuki. After a trip to Miami Beach, Sidney hit on the idea of opening convenience stores in what would become a busy tourist spot at home.
