El Cortez CFO: ‘Rich are getting richer’ amid Las Vegas tourism swing

Given the declines in visitation that arose throughout Las Vegas in 2025, how have Downtown properties addressed concerns from the general public? 

We felt the treatment of Downtown, and Las Vegas as a whole, was overdone. The Downtown Vegas Alliance wanted to get a message out there that it's really not that bad. When you look at the 2025 numbers, we know that tourism was down 7.5%, that's been publicized by the LVCVA. But there are a lot of factors there too. With international travel, specifically, Canada was down 20%, and that was pretty significant to operators, especially on the Strip.  

There’s a lot of creativity emerging Downtown. Jeff Victor talked about Circa’s promotion of matching the value of the Canadian dollar to the US dollar; it's been a very successful program. We all have enthusiasm for Downtown, even to where some of the commentary from our audience has been ‘jeez, we couldn’t believe how enthused you guys are.’  

Was there motivation from the Alliance to showcase a sense of Downtown regularity to Las Vegas residents? 

There was definitely interest in that topic. Everybody's a little uncertain. When we talk about uncertainty about pricing and so forth – at least I communicated and Jeff Victor did also – that it's been largely overemphasized. We know prices are up, we know price increases are affecting everybody, but the geopolitical nature of things is more concerning to our customers than anything. There's just uncertainty in general as to what's happening in the world.  

In your role as Chair of the Downtown Vegas Alliance, how can properties work in unison to ensure sustained success for the area? 

I've been a part of the Alliance for over 15 years now, and it definitely allows us to do that. Any one of us can pick up the phone and call each other, just ask them how things are going or what their weekend was like. Jeff and I will talk, ‘how was your room occupancy? What'd you guys think of this?’ We're trying to get more involved with the Arts District, actually, because that's become such a centerpiece for people Downtown. We want to make sure we’re representing the whole Downtown and that includes the Arts District.  

Are there ways operator collaboration can also extend to Strip properties? 

At the LVCVA level, but that's about as close as we get to the Strip. We don't see them as competition; that's a whole different animal. We don't try to compete with the Strip at all, but we also know their occupancy affects our occupancy. If their occupancy rates are bad, ours will be reflective of that. It's just a domino effect.  

How you react and how you're affected, that's all based on your size. We have 364 rooms at the El Cortez and the international impact is not really noticeable to us. Have we lost some customers? Absolutely, but it's not hurting us.

Whereas Jeff Victor spoke up and said, ‘Absolutely, it's hurt us. We have a lot of Canadian business.’ But without question, we would be more inclined to work with off-Strip properties as opposed to any kind of collaboration with the Strip.  

Have efforts from the El Cortez such as a recent $20m expansion helped offset potential losses in occupancy or visitation? 

It's been a very good investment for us. It was really closer to $25m, and there was just so much pride and joy in being part of a historic property and doing this magnificent expansion, while still keeping our roots. That was the biggest challenge for the designers and contractors, but we had a really great six months beyond that.

Our revenues were up nicely even as our expenses were up too. More labor, more costs, you pay more for everything, but we should have done that about 10 years ago. We have higher ceilings, the roulette bar, new games and people absolutely love it.  

Having brought up how social media may be overdramatizing the issues seen in Las Vegas, could you delve deeper into how its potentially increased public concern? 

The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. People with money are not impacted. That's why your revenues are up and your visitation down, it's because those people are still coming and it's normal.

Our whole thing was about how this isn’t that out of character for any kind of big city travel. It's out of character for maybe what they were used to 5-10 years ago in Las Vegas, but there's been a trend of parking, fees and food costs going up.  

What do you do in response? You raise prices. And it doesn't matter if you go to Los Angeles, Salt Lake City or Omaha, Nebraska, the stakes are more dollars. If gas prices are $8 per gallon in Los Angeles, that has impacts to everybody. You just have less money to spend and you make different decisions.  

Are there ways El Cortez can still attract international visitors even if it may not serve as your primary focus, especially at a time where competition is as heightened as ever? 

A lot of our visitation and what we've seen since we remodeled are people coming in to see the historic nature of our business. We're not doing any real active marketing outside the country. It's probably not our strong suit, maybe we should look at it. It’s a good point, you don't want to overlook anything, and maybe the historic nature should be told overseas. But we're not doing anything towards that right now.