I've just been to this special event in Vegas, open to 7 Star Members of
Harrahs only. Some of the things were nice, but overall it seemed far less
good of an event than the Atlantic City Event, or even New Orleans. One
problem seemed to be that Harrah's didn't know what it's goal in hosting such
an event is -- is it to honor 7* players, get them to play more, or to
promote their properties in Vegas? Some things seemed to be aimed at promotion,
which didn't work too well, since almost everyone there has visited Vegas
numerous times before, and is aware of some of the properties and shows. I
would have thought a main goal would be to get people to go somewhere they
weren't planning to and to play a lot more than normal. The Atantic City
Event definitely had this goal in mind by giving everyone 7X points
throughout the event, and additional free Apple Gift points earned as you play.
As a result, the AC event had people playing huge amounts, extremely busy
high-roller areas, and huge amounts of play. No such incentives were offered
at this event.
Harrah's also doesn't seem to know who most 7* players are - take a look,
and you will find most are over 50 years old. If you are going to give
them a free big show at the Colleseum, bring in someone they have heard of to
sing, such as Celine or Cher or Barry Manilow. But most people I spoke to
never had heard of newish country & western group Lady Antebellum.
In fact, I spoke to one couple who gave up the free dinner at a Harrah's
restaurant, in order to take in the Cher show. Cher would have made a lot
more sense as a promotion people wanted to see.
Also 7* people generally have plenty of comps, so giving them a free meal
at a restaurant isn't that much of a biggie.
Harrah's also likes to spend a lot of money on extravagant invitations to
events, in this case a hardback book with your name printed in it. Nice,
but why? Also we received a bunch of confusing plastic tags to wear around
our necks for each event, and a itinerary in a useless tin container. It
probably cost over a $100 a person to print this stuff. Why not just have
1 tag or some normal tickets? I don't know. They also double-upped and
gave us both a neck tag to wear and an actual ticket for Lady Antebellum.
Why? They also spent a lot on having all sorts of greeters and people in
costumes at each event to point the way -- some of them way too early in the
evening, sending people over to events where the doors were still closed.
But as for spending money that the 7* members would actually use, this
event was lacking. Where Atlantic City paid $ for airfare for many people,
vouchers for breakfasts and lunch, 7X points, Apple cards, in addition to the
main evening events, Vegas only had the main evening events. Some people
did not come to Vegas because there just wasn't that much to this event.
If I didn't live in Vegas I wouldn't have gone.
The Friday night event was originally announced as running from 6 pm til
10. But there were too many people, so they divided this in half right
before the weekend. I'd planned to meet some friends, but now some of my
friends ended up at the late and some at the early event. The food was
excellent, with booths manned by many of the major restaurants at Vegas properties,
such as Rao's, Paris Steakhouse, Nero's, etc. The show should have been
good, with performances by Penn & Teller, George Wallace, Matt Goss, Mac
King, Elvis from Legends -- unfortunately putting a show into a ballroom
didn't work - with bad sound causing Wallace's voice to be totally garbled and
not-understandable. We felt sorry for him when no one laughed at the jokes
which we couldn't understand. Because they divided the event into two,
they didn't give us much chance to eat before the show started, which meant
people were still going around to booths and talking during the show, making
it very noisy and hard to concentrate on the show.
What they should have done -- have the dinner at 6pm, and the show in the
actual Planet Hollywood Ballroom at 8pm. If they then had to divide the
group up - put half the people in the show at 6pm and eating at 8pm.
Dinner on Saturday also caused some confusion, because you had to book it
in advance over the internet. One friend just got his 7*, so he tried to
book but didn't get the email invitation. He kept contacting hosts, over
and over, trying to book into Guy Savoy (where I booked), but not getting in,
and not getting anything definite until later. Hosts were totally clueless
in advance as to how to book the dinner, how the event on Friday would
work, or able to provide other information such as how several friends who had
booked the same meal could end up sitting together.
Since I booked quickly, we got into Guy Savoy, the most expensive
restaurant at Harrah's property. For unknown reasons, some tables were empty,
which seemed odd since this was the most wanted of all properties. The meal
was good, but only 3 courses. One thing that was very good was an excellent
selection of wines for the meal. The "signature" soup was bland (truffles
and artichokes) versus excellent foie grais terrine. The main courses were
choice of halibut or filet and they were excellent. Desert was so-so
grapefruit terrine or delicious chocolate desert. But the portions were tiny
for everything. Normally this price fixed meal costs about $190 (without
wine I believe) -- I don't recommend it if you are hungry! They included a
couple of amuse bush's (little appetizers to whet your appetite) but they
were really really tiny. They also serve dozens of different types of
breads for each course - maybe they figure if you stuff yourself with bread you
will be okay, but for the prices, I would prefer a nice-sized appetizer and
entree.
Then on Sunday came an outdoor barbeque. It was hot!!! Vegas is hot!
Don't put me outside! Please! The food was good, but it was so hot it was
hard to eat much except the cold salads and ice cream bars. Overly loud
country & western music was the entertainment. They also shipped in 1 poor
bison/buffalo to stand (or lie) in a pen -- why??? The poor thing in the heat!
Then came the Lady Antebellum concert. The odd thing here is they touted
this as a special 7* event - private performance, and so on. But actually
many Diamond members received an invitation to the show (probably got the
poorer seats at Caesars Colleseum).
There was also a drawing for about 14 prizes - which wasn't a lot when you
had about 1000 or more people trying to win them. And they were top heavy
for heavy players (you got more entries if you played more). A better
thing to do with $100,000 would have been to give everyone each $1000 in free
play or some Great GiftWrapUp points. Yes, you end up with 14 happy
people, but also about 1000 unhappy losers.
The best item people received was a huge box of deluxe chocolates in each
room. If you were a local non-lodger, however, you didn't get the goodies.
Harrah's plans to continue these event twice yearly. If they really want
people to attend, they should try to spend less on elaborate invitations,
and more on goodies that gamblers want -- free flights there, free play,
point bonuses, etc. Compared to the Atlantic City event, this one had a lot of
glitz but not a lot of substance.
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