I hope they learn something from it. To be specific, I hope they learn that Max is right and the only way of ensuring that this event survives past year 3 is to market it to racing fans who may now be very keen on attending what looks like an exciting race and may be intrigued by the opportunity to dabble in the casinos whilst they are there.
To put it simply, in order for this event to survive (and then prosper), it needs to retain the support of the big casino chains and the local authorities. The big casino chains will remain supportive so long as they are making more money out of the event being held than they would without. This will not happen if the event remains priced and targeted at the rich and\or famous. Those people came this year because the event was novel. Next year, it won't be novel. And by year three, it will be practically old hat as a spectacle.
The organisers wanted it to be Monaco in the Mojave but have not considered the one major difference - Las Vegas is not Monte Carlo. Not even close. None of the history, none of the opulence, none of the glamour. There is virtually nothing high-brow about Las Vegas. This isn't meant as a criticism, as Las Vegas has its niche and its target clientele and it serves them very well and with enormous success. But what it does mean is that the outsiders that came in for the race this year were not interested in sampling everything else Vegas has to offer. There are plenty of videos floating around of empty casino floors from this past weekend. Did the casinos make more money than usual? Some did, others not. This from Atlas' man on the ground loki;
loki wrote: Around town I’m hearing it was dead. Dead, dead. Unless you were in one of the handful of upscale sponsor hotels. They did well and will post record single day revenues. Mid and down market were crushed. We would have had as many people in town, maybe more but not spending near the amount of money. Likely to register the best Nov revenue on record.
Dining demand outside of the resorts underwhelming. The shows that did decide to run lost a buttload. Don’t expect any shows to run should the GP return. Return for at least another year is likely with some change. The remote parking/commute is said to have worked well. Or about as well as could be expected. An hour or two was added to the modified commute but I’ve heard of nothing catastrophic happening.
https://forums.autosport.com/topic/2209 ... p=10448249
And as I said earlier, this is year one. Lots of those whales won't be back in year 2 because they aren't racing fans and the spectacle won't hold the same attraction "been there, done that". Not to mention those who will have been put off by the mess on Thursday night. So what happens to the record revenues that the partner casinos made this year? It won't be repeated.
So I hope the organisers understand the value of what they have got - an interesting F1 race - and they focus more on trying to get middle-income race fans into the city so that the event and the city can both make the most of it in the long term.
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