It must be disheartening for the employees of the Golden Nugget in
Laughlin, as the sale and change of ownership seems to me mired in
lawsuits. To recap, the GN was purchased by the Poster Group in
January 2004, headed by the wiz kids of Tim and Tom with egos as
large as their bank accounts. They were interested in making the
Golden Nugget in downtown Las Vegas as a high roller place.
Laughlin? They never did come up with any kind of plan, and then in
Nov.2004 decided to sell the Laughlin property to Barrick for $31
million. Barrick is the new big owners of multiple properties in
downtown Las Vegas. They borrowed heavily, and it is now known that
they have defaulted on bonds, and are struggling financially. They
really had no business purchasing the GN Laughlin in their financial
condition. The GN-Barrick sale came unraveled recently with Barrick
claiming Poster cooked the books to make the place look better, and
Poster saying Barrick defaulted on the sale. At stake is the $1
million in deposit by Barrick, but that will probably be used up
quickly in attorney fees. The sale was suppose to be completed near
the end of the first quarter of this year.
So what will happen to the GN Laughlin? It looks like Barrick will
not be able to complete the sale, although they did receive an
infusion of cash and help from Tamares Barrick, the real estate arm
of the Barrick corporation. By default, it looks like GN Laughlin
will be sold to Landrys which is purchasing the Golden Nugget in Las
Vegas. According to the deal hammered out on the Poster-Landry sale,
Landry would purchase and assume all assets and debts of the Poster
Group. This would include the Laughlin property.
In the mean time, the employees are wondering what will happen to the
GN, and more importantly- what will happen to my job. At this stage,
no major upgrades, new exciting promotions will happen until the sale
is completed. I guess you could say GN Laughlin is treading water,
and this is not good for the customer or employees.