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Vegas without the gambling

Eve Troeh Dec 19, 2011

Jeremy Hobson: The big Las Vegas hotel casino Caesar’s Palace is about to open a new tower. But the focus will be on fancy rooms — not gambling.

And that’s something that’s happening more and more in Sin City, as Marketplace’s Eve Troeh reports.


Eve Troeh: Your room at Caesar’s Octavius Tower will have marble floors, a pillow top mattress, a velvet couch and a whirlpool tub.

Why leave all that serene luxury for this?

Casino noise

David G. Schwartz: They’re definitely appealing more to non-gamblers, especially the business travelers.

David G. Schwartz heads the Center for Gaming Research at University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He says Caesar’s is just the latest company to build a boutique hotel inside a mega-resort. Steve Wynn and MGM have done the same.

Guests don’t have to go through the casino to get to their room. But if they want to play…

Schwartz: You’re still only a few hundred feet away from the gaming tables, so it’s not like you have to leave completely and go to another property.

It’s your own private Vegas away from Vegas. Schwartz says it’s a big bet meant to lure the wealthiest customers. That’s who hotels are competing most fiercely to get, because high-rollers have proven they’ll keep coming to Vegas no matter how bad the economy gets.

I’m Eve Troeh for Marketplace.

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