The casino landscape is evolving dramatically in gaming destinations across the South. Along with significant hotel expansion and new meeting and entertainment venues, racinos (casinos at racetracks) are cropping up in states from Florida to Oklahoma.
Just two years after hurricanes devastated the Gulf Coast, the casino industries in Mississippi and Louisiana are thriving. For Mississippi, 2007 is on track to be the best year ever in casino revenues, topping $3 billion for the first time. And Louisiana is seeing plenty of new commercial and tribal casino resort expansion.
Mississippi
The Gulf Coast is moving ahead with its goal of becoming a “tier one” destination, offering 30,000 hotel rooms. Legislation allowing land-based casinos within 800 feet of the shore has fueled a deluge of proposed casino resorts.
“It’s phenomenal. Everything is coming together. We never thought we’d be this far along,” says Stephen Richer, executive director of the Mississippi Gulf Coast CVB, adding that the coast needs more meeting space. “The demand is there.”
Pre-Katrina, the 26-mile coast had 17,340 hotel rooms and 12 riverboat casinos, almost all with hotels and most with meeting and event space. As of July 2007 it had about 10,800 rooms and 11 casinos.
With a spa, five restaurants and a 1,400-seat entertainment venue, the new 318-room Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Biloxi opened in July. Biloxi’s Treasure Bay Casino is planning a late summer opening of its 249-room hotel tower, new restaurants and 3,600 square feet of meeting space.
In May, Harrah’s Entertainment and songwriter Jimmy Buffet announced plans for a $700 million Margaritaville Casino & Resort, scheduled for completion in spring 2010. The development at the company’s Grand Casino and the adjoining former Casino Magic site will include a casino, 66,000 square feet of meeting space, 420 new hotel rooms, and 378 renovated rooms.
Recovery in the region began in late 2005 with the reopening of three casinos, IP Hotel and Casino (formerly the Imperial Palace), the Palace Casino Resort, and the Isle of Capri Casino Resort. Both the IP and Palace are planning expansions, and the Isle has a $180 million expansion under way that includes a new land-based casino and 45,000 square feet of convention space.
Beau Rivage Resort & Casino, the area’s largest resort meetings property with 50,000 square feet of space, reopened Aug. 29, 2006—Katrina’s one-year anniversary—following a $550 million renovation.
Other casino resorts operating are the 291-room Hollywood Casino Bay St. Louis (formerly Casino Magic), the 500-room Grand Biloxi Casino Hotel & Spa and Gulfport’s 562-room Island View Casino Resort (formerly the Grand Casino Oasis).
In addition to Margaritaville, proposed casino projects include the $600 million, 638-sute Bacaran Bay Casino Resort; Bayview Casino with a 500-room hotel; the $1 billion Broadwater with 1,900 hotel rooms and 104,000 square feet of convention space; Pine Hills, a $250 million-plus, 500-room project near I-10; and the 400-room Royal D’Iberville Casino & Hotel.
Tunica’s nine Mississippi riverboat casinos make up the South’s largest casino market and the country’s sixth largest. Six of its nine casinos have hotels and substantial meeting space.
Last year Tunica’s gross casino revenues spiked with a 9 percent increase as the Gulf Coast began recovery. Its casino hotels ran an 85.4 percent average occupancy in the first quarter of 2007, according to the Mississippi Gaming Commission.
“We were fortunate that we were able to keep the business within the state and we got exposure. Meeting planners were able to see not only our gaming but a lot more,” says Webster Franklin, president and CEO of the Tunica CVB.
Of the casinos, the 1,076-room Sam’s Town boasts the most meeting space with 50,000 square feet. The 1,160-room Gold Strike Casino Resort and the 1,356-room Grand Casino each provide 30,000 square feet.
In addition, the 494-room Hollywood Casino offers 14,000 square feet of meeting space; the 200-room Resorts Tunica, 13,464 square feet of function space; and the 507-room Fitzgeralds Casino Hotel, 9,650 square feet of meeting space.
A new casino resort is planned. Myriad Entertainment has purchased 500 acres for the Myriad Botanical Resort, which is to include 1,200 rooms in three hotels, a 400,000-square-foot convention center, golf, and waterpark and observatory attractions.
Southeast of Tunica along the Mississippi are seven casino riverboat operations at Greenville, Vicksburg, and Natchez.
Shovels hit the earth recently for the 80-room Riverwalk Casino, Vicksburg’s fifth casino. In addition, Ameristar Vicksburg has a $98 million expansion under way that will bring additional casino space, restaurants and parking in March 2008.
The Magnolia State has one tribal casino, Pearl River Resort near Philadelphia, which is one of the country’s largest gaming operations.The Mississippi Choctaws property boasts 1,100 rooms in two hotels, 40,000 square feet of meeting space, 36 holes of golf, 16 restaurants, a spa, a beach club, and a waterpark. A third hotel, a 140-room Hilton Garden Inn with meeting space, is scheduled to open this winter adjacent to the Dancing Rabbit Golf Club.
Louisiana
The Pelican State has 13 riverboat casinos and one land-based facility (Harrah’s New Orleans), plus three tribal casinos and three racinos.
On I-10 two hours from metro Houston, Lake Charles offers several riverboat properties and one racino. Its Isle of Capri has 400 guest rooms, 14,000 square feet of meeting space and two riverboat casinos.
Lake Charles’ newest casino is already expanding. Pinnacle Entertainment’s $365 million, 745-room L’Auberge, which opened in May 2005, will unveil a 250-room addition later this year. L’Auberge has 28,000 square feet of meeting space, a spa and a Tom Fazio-designed 18-hole golf course.
In Vinton, west of Lake Charles, Boyd Gaming operates Delta Downs Racetrack & Casino, which expanded in 2005 with a 203-room hotel and an 850-seat events center.
“The casinos have a significant impact on our economy,” says Shelley Johnson, executive director of the Southwest Louisiana/Lake Charles CVB. “They bring in big name entertainment and 200,000 people every weekend, and have helped in our recovery. And with casino expansion, it’s an exciting time for us.”
Last November, voters approved plans for a second Pinnacle casino resort.
While Isle and L’Auberge soon reopened, Harrah’s two riverboats adjacent to L’Auberge were severely damaged by Rita. Pinnacle bought Harrah’s assets and plans to build a $350 million, 400-room resort called Sugarcane Bay Casino.
Along the Red River, Shreveport-Bossier City, the South’s second-largest casino market, has five riverboat casinos, all with hotels and meeting space.
Shreveport has the 514-room Sam’s Town with 18,000 square feet of meeting and event space, and the 403-room Eldorado with 6,200 square feet. The Bossier City side of the river offers the 188-room Boomtown with 2,400 square feet of meeting space, the 600-room Horseshoe with 3,797 square feet and the 570-room DiamondJacks with 20,000 square feet.
The two Shreveport casinos are within walking distance of the new 365,000-square-foot Shreveport Convention Center, opened in January last year, and a new 313-room Hilton headquarters hotel unveiled in June.
“Many cities offer upscale, Vegas-style gaming on riverboat casinos with outstanding meeting space. What makes us different is that we have so much more than gaming,” says Jessica Hawkins, spokeswoman for the Shreveport-Bossier Convention & Tourist Bureau.
Activities, she says, range from riverfront dining and live entertainment and river cruises to outlet shopping at Louisiana Boardwalk and world-class golfing.
Home to two riverboat casinos, Baton Rouge, Louisiana’s capital, also benefits from gaming attractions close to its primary convention facility and a new nearby Hilton.
Adjacent to its River Center convention center is the 300-room Sheraton Baton Rouge Convention Center Hotel and the Belle of Baton Rouge Casino (the former Argosy), both acquired by Columbia Sussex in 2005.
Within walking distance is the 293-room Hilton Baton Rouge Capitol Center, a restoration of the Capitol House hotel, opened in August 2006.
Across from the capitol building farther upriver, the former Casino Rouge, owned by Penn National Gaming, became the Hollywood Casino in February following an $8.5 million renovation that included an entertainment venue expansion.
In April, Pinnacle filed plans to build a casino on 500 acres across the Mississippi in East Baton Rouge using one of the two riverboat licenses from the Harrah’s Lake Charles purchase. Phase two calls for a 300-room hotel and a golf course.
In New Orleans, the state’s only land-based commercial casino, Harrah’s New Orleans, reopened in February 2006. Harrah’s opened an adjacent 450-room hotel the following June.
“They’ve been great, tremendous partners helping us to get back quickly and in promoting that we were up and running,” says Jeff Anding, director of convention marketing at the New Orleans Metropolitan CVB.
The metro area has two riverboat casinos: Treasure Chest, adjacent to Kenner’s Pontchartrain Center, which has more than 46, 000 square feet of exhibit space; and Boomtown New Orleans at Harvey on the West Bank, which has 4,000 square feet of meeting space.
Pinnacle plans a $145 million Boomtown expansion that includes a 200-room hotel, a new riverboat casino and additional meeting space.
Louisiana has three land-based Indian casinos.
The Coushatta tribe’s 500-room Grand Casino Coushatta in Kinder, 25 miles northeast of Lake Charles, delivers a 2,800-slot casino, 57,000 square feet of meeting space, including a 3,500-seat arena, and an 18-hole championship golf course.
In Charenton, the Chitimacha Tribe operates the 1,350-slot Cypress Bayou Casino, which last year added Shorty’s, a complex with poker, a nightclub and three new dining outlets.
In Marksville, the Tunica-Biloxi tribe’s 2,000-slot Paragon Casino Resort, with a 335-room hotel and an 18-hole golf course, is expanding. In late May it opened the Mari Center, a meetings facility with a 30,000-square foot-ballroom, and will open a second hotel with 250 rooms this fall.
Florida
Three years ago, the Seminole Tribe of Florida opened its two Hard Rock casinos hotels at Hollywood and Tampa, both AAA Four Diamond-rated.
The 250-room Seminole Tampa Hard Rock, with 10,000 square feet of meeting space and a 90,000-square-foot casino, is undergoing a $120 million expansion. Additional gaming space and dining options are set to open this fall.
Its casino will be larger than the 130,000-square-foot facility at the 500-room Seminole Hollywood Hard Rock, which boasts more than 60,000 square feet of meeting space, a 20,000-square-foot spa and a 5,000-seat entertainment venue.
The Miccosukee tribe operates the 302-room Miccosukee Resort west of Miami, which boasts 1,000 video pull-tab machines, 46,000 square feet of meeting space, and 27 holes of golf.
The Sunshine State became a racino state late last year with the unveiling of the first two of four casinos approved at pari-mutuel facilities by Broward County voters in 2004.
A mile apart at Hallandale Beach, Gulfstream Park, a thoroughbred track, opened a 1,200-slot casino and new entertainment venues in November, and Mardi Gras Racetrack opened a 1,100-slot facility in December.
Isle of Capri followed in May, opening a $140 million, 1,500-slot casino at Pompano Park harness track.
In March, Boyd Gaming Corp completed the purchase of the Dania Jai Alai at Dania Beach and is planning to begin construction later this year on a casino slated to open in late 2008.
Oklahoma
Almost three years ago, the Sooner State got its first gaming destination resort with the opening of the 150-room Cherokee Casino & Resort at Catoosa outside Tulsa. It has more than 1,700 gaming machines, 7,500 square feet of meeting space and an 18-hole championship course.
The Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma recently began a $125 million expansion of the property that includes 200 more guest rooms and additional meeting and gaming space.
“The expansion will open up a new meetings market for us. We have lots of golf and four casinos, but we don’t have a major golf resort with the capacity for larger corporate groups,” says Suzann Stewart, senior vice president at the Tulsa CVB.
Stewart adds that the new addition’s debut will coincide with the completion of an expanded Tulsa Convention Center and a new 18,000-seat arena in fall 2008.
The Quapaw Tribe recently opened a new $200 million, 2,000-slot, 240-room casino hotel in Joplin near the Kansas-Missouri border.
Featuring 2,200 gaming machines and a 1,500-seat theater, the state’s largest gaming complex is the Chickasaw’s Riverwind, at Norman, opened in July 2006.
Last year was Oklahoma’s first full year as a racino state. It has three, one at each at the state’s three racetracks, all opened in late 2005. They are at Remington Park in Oklahoma City, the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma’s Blue Ribbon Downs in Sallisaw and the Cherokee Nation’s Will Rogers Downs in Claremore.
West Virginia
Of the racino states, the Mountain State is tops by a wide margin. Its four racinos pulled in $976 million in gross revenues last year, according to the American Gaming Association.
In a move that is likely to spur more racino development, West Virginia passed legislation in March allowing racetracks to offer table games, subject to approval by county voters.
Two racinos in the state’s northern panhandle include hotels and meeting space.
The 151-room Wheeling Island Racetrack & Gaming Center offers a 550-seat showroom and a 2,400-slot casino; Mountaineer Race Track and Gaming Resort in Chester has two hotels, 27,000 square feet of meeting space and 3,200 slots.
The eastern panhandle offers Penn National’s Charles Town Races & Slots; the country’s top revenue-producing racino, and metro Charleston, the Tri-State Racetrack & Gaming Center.
Charles Town unveiled phase one of an expansion in April, which added more gaming machines. A second phase includes a 153-room hotel and more gaming space.
North Carolina,br>
North Carolina’s one gaming property is Harrah’s Cherokee Casino & Hotel in Cherokee, 50 miles west of Asheville at the entrance of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
Expanded in 2005 with a second hotel tower, it features 576 guest rooms, a 15,000-square-foot conference facility; a 1,400-seat pavilion theater, and 2,700 gaming machines. This fall, the Eastern Band of Cherokees will begin a five-year, $650 million expansion that will add a third hotel tower (almost doubling the room count), a 3,000-seat showroom and additional gaming, restaurant and retail space.
Caribbean
With gaming in almost 20 destinations, the Caribbean has more than 100 casinos spread throughout the islands, many at luxury hotels. New casinos are opening, and existing ones are being expanded and renovated.
In the Bahamas, the Sheraton Cable Beach Resort (the former Radisson) opened in June following major renovations. Together with Wyndham Nassau Resort, the two properties have 1,244 rooms and are part of Cable Beach Resort, which includes the 35,000-square-foot Crystal Palace Casino. The Wyndham and casino have already undergone improvements.
They are the first step in owner Baha Mar Resort Holdings’ proposed $2.3 billion Cable Beach Resort expansion. Work on a Caesars’-brand casino and hotel is expected to start this year with an anticipated early 2011 opening.
Pinnacle Entertainment opened the first casino on Great Exuma in May last year. The Casino at Emerald Bay adjoins the Four Seasons Resort.
On Aruba, the 358-room Radisson Aruba Resort & Casino opened a $5.2 million, 13,000-square-foot oceanfront spa last October.
The 481-room Aruba Resort Spa & Casino was reflagged The Westin Aruba Resort last December after the property completed the first phase of a $24 million renovation; and the 360-room Hyatt Regency Aruba Resort and Casino Aruba recently completed a $20 million renovation.
In Puerto Rico, the 248-room Renaissance La Concha Hotel & Casino is expected to open this fall with 15,000 square feet of meeting space and a 15,000-square-foot casino.
In October, Hilton Ponce Golf & Casino Resort debuted its $900,000, 11,600-square-foot expanded casino.
Then, in November, Four Points by Sheraton Caguas Real Hotel opened a new $15 million, 10,000-square foot casino.
The 600-room Rio Mar Beach Golf Resort & Spa, reflagged as a Wyndham in May, plans a complete overhaul of its casino this year as part of a $36 million capital improvements program.
At Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic, Palace Resorts will open the new Moon Palace Casino, Golf & Spa Resort in two phases beginning this winter. The all-inclusive resort will include 1,743 rooms and 60,000 square feet of meeting space, a theater and a spa.
