Las Vegas Properties Broaden Corp. Meeting Options

Las Vegas continues to add brand-name hotels, conference facilities and resort amenities that appeal to the business travel market, as its popularity as a corporate meetings and incentive destination in recent years has skyrocketed. Projects on the horizon range from a fourth hotel at the Lake Las Vegas Resort to new condominium/hotel towers on the Strip bearing such well-known flags as Trump and Hyatt.

Any new capacity promises to be quickly absorbed, given that securing space for meetings, particularly those booked in the short term, has been challenging this year. "Las Vegas is the hardest city to get into and over the past six months things have become more difficult," said Jerry Janove, director of sales for the Resort Meetings Consortium, an Orlando-based organization that assists corporations with resort negotiating. "The economy is better. People are less concerned with perception. The interest in Las Vegas just continues to grow by leaps and bounds."

Mike Burns, regional vice president of meetings management firm Conferon in Twinsburg, Ohio, said some Las Vegas corporate programs are being planned a year or two in advance. "More corporate groups are considering Las Vegas than ever before, including Fortune 100 clients who need convention space," he said.

About half of the approximately 26,000 meetings taking place in Las Vegas this year are corporate and about half the Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority sales team is devoted to that market, said LVCVA director of marketing Nancy Murphy. "We are appealing to all industries—there are no holdouts anymore," she said. "We're getting a lot of groups who didn't go to gaming destinations. Now that there is gaming in 48 states, we hardly stand out in this regard anymore."

Murphy said the city's emphasis on entertainment, rather than gaming, has improved its standing with many companies. "Our product has grown and diversified," she said. "Planners welcome Las Vegas because of the variety of experiences—dining, golf, shopping, spas—and there are more hotels in retreat-like areas such as Lake Las Vegas."

Located 17 miles from the Las Vegas Strip in Henderson, Lake Las Vegas is a planned resort complex with hotels that include a Hyatt Regency, Ritz-Carlton and Monte Lago Village Resort. The 320-acre lakeside resort also offers three golf courses, retail shopping area and a full-service marina with yacht cruises. A fourth golf course, designed by Tom Fazio, is scheduled to open in 2007.

Construction will start next year on a fourth hotel, called the Loews Lake Las Vegas Resort, the first Loews Hotel property in Nevada. The 400-room property, scheduled for completion by 2008, will feature 40,000 square feet of meeting space, two restaurants, a lobby bar, two outdoor swimming pools and a 20,000-sq.-ft. spa.

Scheduled to open at about the same time is a convention center adjacent to the Loews property with about 100,000 square feet of meeting space. The facility, available to all Lake Las Vegas hotels, will enable the resort to handle meetings requiring up to 2,000 rooms.

Cary Krukowski, director of marketing for Lake Las Vegas Resort, said the addition of the new hotel and convention center will further strengthen the resort as a destination for groups that want a taste of Las Vegas, but not necessarily a full meal. "Over the last five years, we've steadily gotten more inquiries from corporate planners who said they were tired of losing people to the casinos," she said. "We're now competing very well with places such as Scottsdale and Palm Springs."

Bruce Baltin, senior vice president of PKF Consulting in Los Angeles, agreed. "Lake Las Vegas and other outlying hotels, such as the JW Marriott, have provided a welcome alternative for corporate business," he said. "Companies who want to meet in Las Vegas, but who want a more relaxed atmosphere, are looking at Lake Las Vegas. One night out of three, they may go to the Strip."

Krukowski said Lake Las Vegas hotels also have found a steady market among business travelers drawn to the increasing number of high-tech companies based in Henderson and other local areas.

While hotel occupancies in Lake Las Vegas usually are not as tight as on the Strip, more groups are finding the need to plan further ahead, according to Scott Evans, director of sales and marketing for the Ritz-Carlton Lake Las Vegas. "Our two-year booking pace is ahead of last year, so more groups are planning long-term," he said.

Evans said corporate meetings at the two-year-old hotel continue to build and are about 60 percent of its overall business mix. "We're getting some groups that have not been to Las Vegas before and who want a true desert resort meeting," he said. "The first year, most groups planned one evening on the Strip. Now, just every other group does that."

While new development on the Strip is not as frenzied as in years past, several high-profile projects are in development, including the first major condominium hotels on the Strip.

"These properties are going in a whole new direction for Las Vegas," Baltin said. "They are larger and more residential in feel and there is less emphasis on gaming. There are also more brand-name hotels, which is good for the corporate market."

Among them is the $1.5 billion Cosmopolitan Resort & Casino, which will offer 2,700 condo-hotel units and hotel rooms on a site next to Bellagio. Operated by Hyatt Hotels Corp. and scheduled to open in 2008, the property will include more than 150,000 square feet of meeting space, up to 60 retail shops, 10 to 12 restaurants, a full-service spa, 1,800-seat theater and a five-acre pool deck overlooking the Strip.

Construction recently began on the Trump International Hotel & Tower Las Vegas. The luxury property will include 1,282 condo-hotel units, a full-service spa, a business center with meeting facilities, outdoor pool and 24-hour concierge.

Major projects in the planning stages include a second hotel from developer Steve Wynn, called Encore and located next to Wynn Las Vegas. Plans for the 2,000-room luxury resort, expected to open in mid-2008, are not yet final.

MGM Mirage has a multi-billion-dollar resort complex on the drawing board, dubbed Project City Center. The first phase of the project includes a 4,000-room hotel, three 400-room boutique hotels operated by "world-famous hoteliers not currently represented in Las Vegas," 550,000 square feet of retail shops, dining and entertainment venues and 1,650 condo units.