STRIP RATES: Casinos boosting charges for rooms

Super Bowl week conventions, sports bettors lead
to triple-digit price increases by major operators

January 04, 2003 - Paris Las Vegas doorman Scot Donnelly assists a guest Thursday outside the Strip property. Visitors to Las Vegas may face triple-digit room rate increases at Strip hotels during Super Bowl week.

Major Strip operators are posting triple-digit room rate increases for Super Bowl week, but don't give all the credit to sports-betting enthusiasts.

The same week, Las Vegas will host two major conventions, including a return of the National Association of Homebuilders for the first time in nine years.

Nearly 170,000 attendees are expected at Las Vegas conventions and trade shows for the week ending Jan. 25.

"The further we get away from Sept. 11, the more the public is willing to travel," Applied Analysis spokesman Brian Gordon said. "But still, triple-digit increases are phenomenal."

The homebuilders meeting at the Las Vegas Convention Center is expected to bring in 75,000 conventioneers and the Super Show, the annual Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association convention at The Venetian, is expected to bring in another 81,000 attendees.

"The increase in attendance is primarily the result of the National Association of Homebuilders returning to Las Vegas for the first time in nine years," Bear, Stearns & Co. analyst Jason Ader said, more than the Super Bowl Jan 26.

"The top five conventions during the period represent 98.9 percent of the attendance expected for the week."

Also meeting in Las Vegas the same week will be the Let's Play Hockey International Expo (8,000), Business Objects of America (1,600) and the Las Vegas Classic Knife Show (1,500).

For the week ending Jan. 25, the average weekday room rate ($203) is up 109 percent from 2002 and 57 percent from pre-Sept. 11, 2001, according to data collected by Bear, Stearns.

The biggest weekend room rate increases over 2002 at major Strip operators were posted by Paris Las Vegas (200 percent), the Las Vegas Hilton (175 percent), Bally's (147 percent), Flamingo Hilton (136 percent) and the Stardust (111 percent).

"We expect our properties to be at capacity for Super Bowl weekend," said Debbie Munch, spokeswoman for Park Place Entertainment Corp. which operates Paris, the Hilton, Bally's, the Flamingo and Caesars Palace.

"Part of the demand comes from the convention business and part is the way we're marketing our rooms," she said.

"We're seeing a tremendous increase in online bookings through our property Web sites," Munch said. "Our most loyal customers are using our property Web sites more and more frequently."

The biggest weekday room rate increases over 2002 were posted by the Las Vegas Hilton (215 percent), Treasure Island (184 percent), Paris Las Vegas (180 percent), Luxor (153 percent) and The Mirage (152 percent).

"In our view, this week's (room rate) results (from the survey) were very positive and follow three rather successful post-New Year's weeks on the Strip," Ader said.

Analysts in November and December said a real test of the Strip's recovery would come in January when Las Vegas emerges from its usual winter slowdown.

Now, however, they remain cautious although optimistic.

"It's clear conventioneers are back and a partial economic recovery is under way," Gordon said. "Still, there are too few data points to make predictions about how 2003 as a year will shape up."

Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority spokeswoman Erika Brandvik agreed that while this January is proving to be a much more active month than a year ago, "one month does not necessarily a trend make."

"While we aren't claiming full recovery, travel patterns have returned to what we saw pre-September 11," she said.

Previously, however, casinos posted occupancy rates and gaming revenues that were fairly even with two years ago, a more effective comparison than the months following Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Room rates, however, have been recovering more slowly. While weekend rates had in many cases increased, some weekday rates had remained down, according to room rate surveys and analysts' forecasts.

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Article Copyright ©: R. Smith, Las Vegas Review-Journal