Casino capital of the (Russian) east

Vladivostok, a Russian city on the Pacific, is gaining ground as a tourist destination. From the New York Times, via the International Herald Tribune:

"About 45 percent of our guests are Americans," said Alex Petrollini, of Alberta, who manages the Vlad Inn, a Canadian-owned hotel. In a parklike setting halfway between Vladivostok's airport and the city, the inn has become a favorite for American couples who come here to adopt Russian babies.

This year, three international cruise ships docked. American eco-tourism companies have started to take groups to explore the mountains, forests and nearly empty Pacific beaches of the Primorye region.

While still in its infancy, Primorye's tourism industry "is gaining strong support from the U.S. Northwest states and Alaska as the realization dawns that the majority of U.S. visitors come to the Russian Far East from the West," said William Lawton, commercial officer for the U.S. Consulate here.

But it is a wave of tourists from China that explains the new services and tourist-friendly attitudes here, down to the courteousness at Vladivostok's newly renovated international air terminal.

Every summer for the past three years, about 100,000 Chinese tourists have come to Vladivostok, largely by bus across the border; about 10 percent come on direct flights from three cities in Manchuria. The big attraction is the new casinos here, since gambling is banned in China. Judging by sauna advertisements, a fair number of Chinese

< < Back to Start of Article VLADIVOSTOK, Russia Bathed by the Sea of Japan but controlled by Moscow, Vladivostok has always presented two faces to the world.
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Its open face was that of Russia's San Francisco - a rollicking, cosmopolitan seaport that was the childhood home of the late actor Yul Brynner.
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Its unfriendly face began in the 1860s with its name, which means "To Rule the East." Planted as Russia's flag in Asia, Vladivostok was a "maritime fortress" under the czars and a closed city under the Soviets.
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But now Vladivostok, a neighbor of China, Japan and the Korean Peninsula, is regaining its natural worldliness, opening its doors to tourists and investors. Korean Air flies here four times a week from Seoul. Negotiations are under way to start flights from Tokyo and from the West Coast of the United States.
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"Our dream is to make Vladivostok a powerful international center," Victor Gorchakov, the region's deputy governor for economy, said in his office overlooking city docks where U.S. Navy ships now routinely make good- will port calls. Vladivostok's new openness can be seen up and down the hilly streets overlooking Golden Horn Bay.
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At night, the neon and twinkling lights signal new shopping centers and a lively night life, transporting the city far from the terrible power shortages of the late 1990s. By day, English-speaking guides lead tourists, largely Chinese, Japanese and Korean, through once-closed coastal artillery emplacements and into long-secret networks of catacomb defenses. Above ground, on shopping streets, where new boutiques sprout from Soviet decay, ATMs accept American bank cards and crank out rubles at the push of a PIN.
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English-Russian menus are increasingly the norm at restaurants like Nostalgia and Del Mar, which specialize in Pacific seafood cooked with New Russian flair. Now that tourism is in vogue, restorers have worked their magic on the 1912 railroad station, the stately terminus of the Trans-Siberian Railroad, whose line stretches 9,300 kilometers, or 5,800 miles, to Moscow.
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Two blocks away, at the Beaux-Arts Hotel Versailles, glossy brochures proudly boast of "our English-spoken waitress." Up a hill, at the Hyundai, a favorite hotel of business travelers, room televisions carry the BBC (marked "USA").
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"About 45 percent of our guests are Americans," said Alex Petrollini, of Alberta, who manages the Vlad Inn, a Canadian-owned hotel. In a parklike setting halfway between Vladivostok's airport and the city, the inn has become a favorite for American couples who come here to adopt Russian babies.
.
This year, three international cruise ships docked. American eco-tourism companies have started to take groups to explore the mountains, forests and nearly empty Pacific beaches of the Primorye region.
.
While still in its infancy, Primorye's tourism industry "is gaining strong support from the U.S. Northwest states and Alaska as the realization dawns that the majority of U.S. visitors come to the Russian Far East from the West," said William Lawton, commercial officer for the U.S. Consulate here.
.
But it is a wave of tourists from China that explains the new services and tourist-friendly attitudes here, down to the courteousness at Vladivostok's newly renovated international air terminal.
.
Every summer for the past three years, about 100,000 Chinese tourists have come to Vladivostok, largely by bus across the border; about 10 percent come on direct flights from three cities in Manchuria. The big attraction is the new casinos here, since gambling is banned in China. Judging by sauna advertisements, a fair number of Chinese men also come for sex.

"Chinese people are attracted by the opportunity to meet European culture on the Asian continent," said Sergei Pysin, chairman of the regional tourism committee, echoing views commonly held here that the largely Caucasian Vladivostok is the closest European city to Asia.

According to local tourism officials, 126,500 foreigners visited the city in 2003. In the first nine months of the year, 1,019 Americans visited. April through October is the busiest period for Vladivostok. The Chinese have given Vladivostok hoteliers the economic justification to upgrade Soviet-era facilities.
IHT: The fresh face of Vladivostok

As usual, gambling paves the way in the peaceful interaction of nations.
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posted by Dave at 3:21 PM

Horseshoe's Future

Harrah's will manage but not own the downtown Las Vegas Binion's Horseshoe. MTR will own the property, and ultimately Harrah's will leave the property to MTR, although they will retain the rights to the name "Horseshoe" and the World Series of Poker. From biz.yahoo:

A subsidiary of MTR Gaming Group Inc. (NasdaqNM:MNTG - News) plans to buy Binion's Horseshoe Hotel & Casino in downtown Las Vegas from Harrah's Entertainment Inc. (NYSE:HET - News) in a deal that is expected to close in early March.
In a joint press release, MTR and Las Vegas-based gaming company Harrah's said they will jointly operate Binion's after reopening it on or about April 1.

Upon closing, MTR and Harrah's will enter an agreement under which Harrah's will operate the casino on an interim day-to-day basis. Initially, the operating pact will run for one year.

Harrah's may extend the operating agreement for an additional two years, and MTR will receive certain guaranteed payments, net of all the property's operating expenses.

The companies have also established an intellectual property license agreement, under which Harrah's will retain the rights to the names "Horseshoe" and "World Series of Poker." MTR will be able to use "Binion's" in Clark County, Nevada.

When the operating deal is ended, MTR will take over operation of the property and will re-brand Binion's in compliance with the intellectual property license agreement.

MTR, Harrah's Plan To Open Binion's On Or About April 1:

So after the agreement expires, MTR will be able to use Binion's but not Horseshoe? Maybe they'll go back to "Eldorado." The good news is that the WSOP will go on as predicted, and will be in Binion's for at least one more year. Next year, though, expect to see it Harrahrized, with satellite tourneys at Harrah's throughout the nation. They could totally dump the Vegas history and let the WSOP rotate throughout the Harrah's properties, which might be good or bad. Look for something interesting.
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posted by Dave at 2:39 PM

Out of this world?

At the risk of being self-aggrandizing, I've got to put this in here. A while ago, I spoke with a Texas reporter about a company that claims to have developed a system to add pheromones to ventilation systems in stores and casinos. These pheromones would, allegedly, cause people to spent/gamble more. From the Galveston County Daily News:

Enhanced Air’s Director of Development Nigel Malkin said the company’s product, Commercaire, makes consumers feel comfortable and secure so they shop longer and spend more.

Ethicists at the University of Texas Medical Branch and the University of Houston — Clear Lake said the practice is offensive if consumers aren’t told the system is in use, and one of the country’s leading experts in pheromone research questioned the validity of the company’s scientific claims.

But Enhanced Air promises big sales boosts and spiking customer loyalty. “The compound doesn’t cause consumers to get into a spending frenzy so much as it causes them to feel more at ease in an environment and more receptive to sales messages,” said Malkin.

Malkin claimed that he originally developed the product for "a Las Vegas casino," and the reporter asked me about this possibility. I was predictably quite skeptical, pointing out that casinos go to great lengths to keep air clean. But I couldn't stop there--I had to go for broke:

Manipulating gamblers’ behavior surreptitiously would pose too great a risk for a public relations nightmare, Schwartz said.

“Something like that would seem so boldly predatory it would raise that issue — do you want to take all their money?” he said.

Schwartz also contends that rumors of casinos pumping oxygen through the vents to keep players awake at night is nothing more than urban legend. He said the idea that a casino would infuse a ventilation system with a chemical — even an organic one — was hard to believe.

“They work pretty hard to try to keep the air as clean as possible,” Schwartz said. “But who knows, there could be a giant alien base under the Strip.”
Company claims pheromones boost retail sales

That's right, a "casino expert" finally said in print what many had suspected for years--that the real alien presence in Las Vegas is not out at Area 51, but in a subterranean base underneath the Strip. I've always said that if I didn't have fun at my job, I wouldn't do it, and here's proof. I obviously didn't literally mean that I thought aliens were at work, but it's just as ridiculous as other stories I hear.

Anyway, it's all in a day's work.
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posted by Dave at 11:19 AM

100 years of Vegas

I've been involved with the Centennial Committee for about 2 years now, but I was a little surprised to see this article:
Happy 100th Birthday Las Vegas! City of Las Vegas To Throw 'The World's Biggest Birthday Party' with Yearlong Centennial Celebration in 2005
This will definitely be a big deal. There will be more news to follow.
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posted by Dave at 10:28 AM