Atlantic City's ailing Sands hopes to drum up business by evoking a hip history.
There's a familiarity to the Sands Casino Hotel that brings back Marie Morlachetta year after year.
"It feels like home," said Morlachetta, 70, of Gibbstown, Gloucester County, as she played three-card poker Saturday.
Morlachetta, who listens to Frank Sinatra while cooking and driving, was at the Sands' opening night on Aug. 13, 1980, and has been back many times since. "Everybody's friendly."
advertisement
Party Poker
The biggest online poker room with thousands of players.
Choose one of the following games:
Texas Holdem Poker, Omaha Poker, Omaha Hi,
Seven Card Stud, Stud 8 or Better.
Receive a 20% bonus of your first deposit up to a $100!!!
Party Poker
But new competition and last year's nearly 40 percent drop in gross operating profit are forcing the small, independent casino to reinvent itself while retaining its Rat Pack heritage.
The Sands "lacks access to the Boardwalk and the general size and economies of scale you need to compete effectively in a new era," said Michael J. Pollock, publisher of Gaming Industry Observer.
Although the Atlantic City casino industry's revenue increased 3 percent last year to nearly $4.5 billion - a record - the Sands suffered huge losses despite a strategy to boost profits by increasing slot machines and phasing out table games.
Net revenue dropped $193 million to $170 million. Gross operating profit slid from more than $21.1 million to about $12.8 million.
"It was definitely a challenge for us in 2003," said William T. Cooney, senior vice president of customer development. Cooney, who had left in 2002, was rehired in February 2003 to regain some of the table-game customers the Sands lost. "We're hoping this is a turnaround year for us."
Nostalgia and personal service are the casino's trademarks. The Sands is seeking to take advantage of the legendary 1960s Rat Pack of the former Sands in Las Vegas - a gang that included Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr.
One of Sinatra's last performances was at the Copa Room, the Sands' showroom theater in Atlantic City, in 1994.
"I get a strange feeling when I go into this room," Frank Sinatra Jr. said in the dressing room his father once used. The younger Sinatra was the Sands' headliner this past weekend.
But the casino's boutique size and hemmed-in location at Indiana Avenue and Brighton Park have restricted its ability to expand like the other casinos.
Even the Resorts Casino Hotel, the city's only other independent casino that is similar in size to Sands, is building a new hotel tower with 400 rooms.
The Sands' turmoil began in the mid-1990s with mounting debt. It filed a bankruptcy petition in January 1998, which led to billionaire Carl Icahn's becoming owner in 2000. He owns three casinos in Las Vegas.
At the same time, consolidation began to take hold in the industry as operators tried to minimize costs. For instance, Bally's merged with the Claridge in December 2002.
As the Sands tried to find its place in the new gambling world order, it underwent several management changes and a drastic retooling.
Tom Davis - the third president in five years - resigned in February after one year.
In May 2002, the number of table games was pared from 72 to 24, and as tables went out the door, so did the casino's most loyal patrons.
Realizing it had made a major miscalculation, the Sands began rebuilding its table games in January 2003, going up to 40 tables and reopening the poker room. There are now 59 number in operation.
The Sands "has an opportunity with its current policy of pursuing a higher-stakes table business," Pollock said. "The Sands brand and its access to quite a few loyal table players can help it."
The Sands has been marketing itself as "the players' place" - the casino offering the best gambling value in town with the best table-game payoff percentages and highest bet limits.
In November, it hosted the "Showdown at the Sands" million-dollar poker tournment, televised on cable's Fox Sports Net.
A pit for high rollers is scheduled for completion in early June, as part of a $23.5 million capital budget this year.
Interim president George Toth said there were plans to add four more table games and expand the poker room from 16 to 20 tables.
"We give you a personal touch," said Toth, who typically roams the casino floor to gladhand with customers.
The Sands is also trying to integrate the old with the new to survive.
The old Sands logo was touched up with a triangular symbol filled with a galaxy of stars. In a major makeover last summer, the Copa Room's interior was redone in mauve, with the booths reupholstered and the room repainted. And the $3.5 million Swingers lounge - an open bar in the middle of the casino floor - debuted during the Fourth of July weekend.
"The purpose of this was really a retention tool," said Richard P. Brown, chief executive officer of the Sands, as he gave a tour of Swingers. "So when people take a break from gaming, they have a place to have a drink and socialize."
Other projects include the conversion of three dozen standard bedrooms into 17 high-end suites. The casino floor's slot machines will go fully coinless this year, and new ones are being added.
But the Sands has fewer rooms than any other Atlantic City casino, and finding land for a new hotel tower is a priority. An area at Pacific and Atlantic Avenues, directly across from the Sands' main entrance, is being considered.
"It's extremely important," Toth said. "You just have to look at the other properties to know that."
Toth can't help but look out his office window and notice Resorts' $125 million tower nearing completion. It is set to open this summer.
"We need the rooms as quickly as possible," Audrey Oswell, president and chief executive officer of Resorts, said last week. "Customers play longer and spend more of their bankroll at the property that they stay over in."
Source: Suzette Parmley, Philadelpia Inquirer
