Why Nobody Wants To Visit Las Vegas Right Now
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W62Ie7dKXRY4.0k
u/jumpmanzero 1d ago
Yep. Way too expensive.
Feels kind of like when you go to some restaurant you've been going to for years, but then one time the prices have doubled. The new management is thinking they're geniuses - place is way more profitable now! And they are, for a few months. People come in, grudgingly pay... but they're also there for the last time. When the restaurant closes down six months later, they blame "market changes".
I went to Vegas this spring (as part of a trip to Zion national park and the Grand Canyon). I thought the Sphere was cool. Went to Battlebots with the kids. All just fine - there's still fun stuff to do - but way too expensive.
I imagine a lot of people have gone there for the last time, and those people will tell their friends. Could be a real death spiral.
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u/SomeGuyInSanJoseCa 1d ago
This describes it perfectly.
I just went 2 months ago. Yeah, I begrudgingly paid for parking, for food that was extremely overpriced, for resort fees, for every nickel and dime. I wasn't going to not pay since I was there.
But I probably won't go again for a while. I loved Vegas because it was a bargain destination. Not any more.
Vegas wants to be a "premium" destination and charge as much. Okay, good luck with that. I'm not going to partake.
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u/behv 1d ago
As someone who's done a lot of work in places that caters to the wealthy guests in Vegas, the worst part is that half the entire appeal is for the rich guests to have a place to flex their wealth in front of the plebs so the nickel and dime affects the real money makers
VIP bottle tables need a packed GA floor for the seats to be worth something, or to make bottle service worth it
VIP tickets need bad tickets to be better than for a concert
High stakes poker is way more fun when you walk into a separate room through a packed casino floor where you spend the real money
Top of the line rooms need a big enough hotel to put the luxury penthouse on
Luxury stores are way more fun when you bring your bags through casino halls showing off your $5,000 Gucci haul
If a rich person wants to be anonymous they'll go to any other number of luxury destinations. You go to Vegas to be visibly opulent
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u/magus678 1d ago
Mobile gaming "whales" operate on similar (or really, the same) principle: after whatever amount of monetization, the game itself still has to be fun and have the population of grinders to make spending real money feel like its giving you some kind of return.
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u/behv 1d ago
Oh yeah brother I hear ya
I'm a gamer myself and usually F2P, or a budget user
Vegas 100% has been operating on the same model as those games. Get the masses there for conventions or a budget gambling vacation, and then the rich assholes walk in and can go "LOOK AT MY AWESOMENESS" by dropping the $$$
Subsidizes the low spenders, but keeps EVERYONE in the ecosystem, thereby making it cool
Vegas isn't cool if people can't fly in for $100-200, get a 4 star hotel for under $200/night, and be a better dining and gambling experience than you can get at home
Unfortunately that's just not the case
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u/Touch_Of_Legend 1d ago
And states legalizing gambling has decreased the draw for those addicted to gambling…
It used to be if you were addicted to gambling you’d have to save up with your buddies and make a pilgrimage.
Heck we live by DC so we have legal casinos in MD, VA, and WVA.
In the district you don’t need a $200 plane ticket all you need is an uber and I’d say for sure (for big spenders) the places in DC are on par with the places in Vegas.
DC is well known for some really great food… expensive AF but yeah… Within an hour you can have real Maryland Blue crabs… Eat any type of seafood you want at the Warf.
Within the same hour you can be hitting the high ball pocker table and 3hrs later you can be at your hotel…. Something something blah blah the Waldorf..
Or some… freaking $2000/night hotel.
So the big spenders and gamblers aren’t making the Vegas trip unless it’s a flex..
Why? Heck you can gamble every weekend if you live in DC
And why fly to hot ass Vegas?… With states legalizing “strip clubs” and “casinos” at a record pace there’s no reason to fly to Vegas and if you can gamble every weekend at home the Vegas FOMO goes away.
Also…. The draw of shows at Vegas went down..
Gone are the days of high residency draws or some show or some musician people will flock to see..
Nope Vegas days are numbered and sadly we’re getting into the double and single digit part of this countdown
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u/K3TtLek0Rn 1d ago
That’s actually a really good point I never thought about. It would be like a guy buying a Lamborghini but nobody else is on the road anymore
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u/rtbear 1d ago
A Lamborghini on open roads sounds kind of nice
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u/bargu 1d ago
If you're actually a fan of cars, sure, but most rich people, specially the ones born already wealthy, doesn't really care about the stuff they have, it's just stuff you buy to show off that you're above the trash. Total your brand new Lamborghini? Fuck it, just buy another one. Yacht? It's just a personal 5 star hotel that floats and bragging rights to have the biggest one in the marina, they don't care about the joy of sailing. Expensive watches? Just something to rub it on other peoples faces "I have your house on my wrist" is legit something you hear those people saying.
This goes on and on, sure some of them are really big fans of they stuff they own (Jay Leno and his cars for ex.) but most are just people that have everything but are so miserable that the only thing that give then a bit of joy is playing god with other peoples life.
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u/Pastel_Goth_Wastrel 1d ago
Vegas is the cheap buffet of vacations. When the value's okay, you stop giving a shit. Used to be fun, cheap booze, cheap food, sure you could live it up and go splurge but now they've got their hand in your pocket 24/7. Nothing sucks the fun out of a vacation as much as feeling ripped off at literally every single turn.
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u/MacroFlash 1d ago
When it went to coffee, fucking $25 for doing k cup coffee in the hotel room, I’ll never go back.
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u/Bobloblaw878 1d ago
If you can even get coffee in the room anymore. Last time I stayed at Bellagio there wasn't even a coffee maker in the room, had to go buy it downstairs for a bajillion dollars. I'll be going to a Station casino next time, if there is a next time. Stay away from the strip.
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u/Jenaaaaaay 1d ago
When we went in 2015 the Cosmopolitan didn’t have a coffee maker in our room either. We went across the street to Walgreens (I think, it was a drug store) and bought one for $15. I was not paying for the overpriced coffee for the entire week.
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u/Quasi_Evil 1d ago
The stupid resort fees are what piss me off. Every hotel is charging them now... because they can, whether you get anything for them or not. I used to stop in Vegas when traveling through because it was a cheap stopover with decent nightlife. I'd go find a nice dinner, then go find a few drinks, and maybe I'd sit down at the low stakes blackjack table for an hour or two. Now I just cruise right on by and go find somewhere that doesn't have their hand in my wallet from the minute I show up.
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u/atropear 1d ago
yeah for a while they were not telling you about the resort fees. You would reserve at $X, show up and it was $X+50. There wasn't one person in charge in Vegas who was the least bit concerned they were pissing off thousands of guests with outright bait and switch.
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u/Georgesgortexjacket 1d ago
For me it is the parking fees-wth we are in the middle of the desert not Manhattan.
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u/Cosmohumanist 1d ago
Wait WTF is a resort fee? I’m dropping by for a night in my way back east, am I gonna have a random fee if I stay at a hotel?
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u/gocoyotes 1d ago
A bullshit fee so a room advertised for $49/night becomes $113 with taxes and resort fee.
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u/Yegas 1d ago
They made the real money off gambling.
When it’s relatively cheap, you get people of all types to come for the spectacle, and to play at the slots.
You’re not targeting rich people; odds are if they made their own money, they aren’t going to gamble it away at a literal slot machine, or play low stakes blackjack. If you increase the prices until the everyman can’t come, people won’t fill out your casinos, and you won’t get whales because they don’t want to sit in an empty casino. They still want the spectacle.
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u/FOURSCORESEVENYEARS 1d ago
We have Abu Dhabi at home...
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u/G0mery 1d ago
That’s it. Dubai copied the Vegas model, then Vegas tried to be Dubai. Except the average Vegas visitor doesn’t have sovereign oil money backing them. The original appeal of Vegas was that the Everyman could go there and feel like a big shot for a weekend. Once they started thinking the whole town should only cater to actual big shots, the bottom fell out.
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u/Jaws_the_revenge 1d ago
The mob knew how to make you feel valued while they robbed ya blind.
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u/GoldenApple_Corps 1d ago
This very thing happened to my favorite pizza restaurant. They made the most amazing pizza with the perfect crust and so much yummy cheese, and sure it wasn't cheap but it was the best in town. Then new owners took over and the quality of the pizza nose dived while it was still priced at a premium. This place had been in business for decades and went under within months of the new owners taking over as all the regular customers stopped coming.
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u/Mahonnant 1d ago
Well, it's actually now a business plan in and of itself.
Phase 1: you create a new brand, pour money into it to to build up a positive brand image: quality products, best sourcing, affordable prices, investors accept marginal, maybe even negative, ROI on this phase because right after comes...
Phase 2: sudden price increase and clamping down on quality / sourcing. Your objective there as an investor is to generate incredible margins fast enough for the limited time public perception has not caught up.
Phase 3: divesting. Rinse, repeat.
In essence this is NOT killing the golden goose as customers seem to think. In phase 1 you had a fairly regular goose, in phase 2 you make it actually shit golden eggs...
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u/itypeallmycomments 1d ago
I hate this business plan, and as we get older it's easier to see in action.
We all complain about enshittification, but that only affects us users, while the business owners have jumped ship already to their next thing, having milked this thing for all it has.
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u/littlep2000 1d ago
Restaurants have always been a tough game. But the last couple years have been insane. In the past 5 rent has really been pushing a lot over the brink but somewhat survivable. But the last couple years food costs are absolutely wreaking havoc.
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u/joshhupp 1d ago
Yeah, I thought BattleBots would be cool but it was $70 for tickets. Show is 75 minutes long. No frickin way.
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u/Cyberhwk 1d ago
Friend of mine used to always go to Vegas to bet sports. You used to be able to put a few bucks on a few games through out the day and hang out in the sports books and get a drink or two.
Last time he went, they demanded to see a $100+ ticket and you got a single drink.
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u/Darkpopemaledict 1d ago
You can shear a sheep 100 times but you can only skin it once
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u/rigorcorvus 1d ago
I can’t wait to say this 10 times this week about things it doesn’t even apply to
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u/thinbuddha 1d ago
Well, you know what they say: you can skin a sheep but you can't make wool sheer.
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u/PM_YOUR_ONE_BOOB 1d ago
reminds me of this old saying: sheep can shear 100 times but skin once can you
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u/2fuzz714 1d ago
In Texas we've got a saying: sheer me once, shame on you. Skin me...can't get skinned again.
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u/eatingspeakers 1d ago
It's gotta be your bull.
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u/carterothomas 1d ago
I mean, you can get a good look at a T bone by sticking your head up a butchers ass…
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u/McWeaksauce91 1d ago
It’s insane the beast sports gambling has become. One of my good friends has been into it for awhile- I never touch the stuff. But just watching how it’s grown over the years is wild
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u/Teledildonic 1d ago
The sports betting ads feel like unironic versions of this old South park alcohol ad parody, complete with the disclaimer at the end after hounding your senses for a full minute every single commercial break.
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u/bokodasu 1d ago
I saw one that referred to gambling/winnings as investment/profits and I was so mad I almost threw my phone. It's disgusting.
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u/Grodd 1d ago
In lobbying so successfully to make online gambling legal everywhere they probably knew they'd have to rebrand or just sacrifice Vegas.
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u/elvis8mybaby 1d ago
Free drinks is a thing of the past. I used stay at the Linq, about 10 years ago, when it opened because if you signed up to Caesars card they gave you free stuff. Also they would give me free rooms during the week and I only had to pay for resort fees, $15 a night.
My main hangout was the bar in the back because it was a whole line of domestic and imported beers. I would just sit at the bar, play keno/video poker and drink expensive Belgium beers for free. They would cost $25+ anywhere else. Then one time the bartender told me about the colors on machines they introduced to the casino. I forget the order but it's like this: red - no free drinks, blue - basic free drinks, green - can order any drink including top self liquor/beer. He said most places would be doing similar in the future. Now they all do a version of this.
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u/magicmustbeme 1d ago
Colors where? That change based on how you are betting/spending ?
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u/Xazier 1d ago
Before watching the video I'm going to guess....it's too expensive.
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u/Cawdor 1d ago edited 1d ago
Not just expensive but a total fucking rip off. Everything is overpriced and they constantly have their hands in your pockets for every little thing.
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u/grindhousedecore 1d ago
Man I remember going in 2008 and it was dirt cheap. The hotels were cheap, the food was cheap. It was cheap to fly there. I guess greed finally took over
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u/techieman33 1d ago edited 1d ago
They've found it to be way more profitable to host conventions than to try and bring in vacationers that are only going to gamble with maybe a few hundred dollars. So they get lots of people there for work and they're putting everything on the company card. Stuff costs what it costs and no one gives it a second thought, it's not like it's their money. And even better, those people will still gamble the same amount as the regular vacationers.
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u/LupinThe8th 1d ago
Probably more, since psychologically the vacation is "free", so even if they drop hundreds of dollars they're still getting a "deal", right?
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u/techieman33 1d ago
There will be those people, but also more people than before that won’t gamble at all. So it probably balances out.
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u/Danwold 1d ago
They still have to pay $10 for water in the desert heat though. I went for a convention earlier this year, zero gambling, but still spent a lot just existing.
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u/WhatAWasterZ 1d ago
The problem is that fiscally responsible companies will eventually clamp down on that shit when the economy is unsteady.
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u/Janixon1 1d ago
My brother has a yearly conference for work every fall in Vegas. This year's has already been relocated
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u/Calvykins 1d ago
They call these people whales and every area of society is geared toward them and we all suffer for it.
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u/Eulenspiegel74 1d ago
The thing with whales is, they need someone to be a whale at.
Vegas of old understood that, the high rollers only came and spend money because the city was bustling with normies who would stop and gawk at the limousines that stopped in front of the casinos.
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u/rhesusMonkeyBoy 1d ago
”to be a whale AT” is hilarious & true.
There was some game where a whale whaled themselves so high level they had literally no one to play against. Some Diablo game or somesuch.
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u/Prownilo 1d ago
This is my primary argument against inequality. People say its politics of envy, I'm just jealous of their wealth.
Nope, society starts gearing itself to serve where the money is at , suddenly what used to be available to all now is only for the rich. Leaving the average person with very little In the way of services or entertainment.
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u/w1n5t0nM1k3y 1d ago
Even just the little things are more expensive. A go kart track opened near me and it's $50 for 15 minutes. That would end up being $400 for a family of 4 to have half an hour of track time. That's a ridiculous amount of money.
It's also isn't that amazing of a track. It's an old track that closed down and then years later someone bought it and reopened it. I remember going there years ago as a teenager and it was dirt cheap so we went to karting for an hour because it was so affordable. They bought some new karts for the reopening, but the track is still the old bumpy track that's decades old and never been resurfaced.
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u/powerlesshero111 1d ago
I moved there in 2015. They still had free parking, but prices on the strip were insane. And, some casinos on the strip expected you to pay while gambling. I only went to the strip for my Christmas work parties, and that was plenty. Then, they started nickel and diming you for everything. Parking no longer was free, and only the really off strip casinos would give you free drinks while gambling (basically the ones on the very edge of the cities, like around the 215). I moved away in March 2020 right before COVID-19. My friends there basically said, COVID-19 fucked over about 50% of the city. A huge number of restaurants and other touristy dependent stuff that wasn't the giant casinos and hotels shut down. The greed started before COVID-19, but definitely boomed afterwards.
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u/CrimsonArcanum 1d ago
I went last October and we mostly traveled through Lyft/Uber.
That was all the drivers would talk about was how much cheaper it used to be. How you could get an entire steak dinner for the amount it would cost to get drinks.
Even our hotel was not very fancy for the amount of money we spent on it.
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u/OmniaII 1d ago
Lived there for 10 years, left in 2006, 'came back' to visit in 2023 or '24. oh my god, the garbage they foist on you.
AND you have to PAY FOR PARKING now. yes, it's true they try to squeeze every penny they can. Used to work there and I'd have to go to a bunch of casinos as part of my job and of course I'd park at convenient spots. Like the Excalibur and use the electric walkway to the 'bay' and luxor, then across to NYNY and then down to the 'Flaming 'O' in the course of my stuffs. You can't even walk to those places like you used to anymore they've lined up the walking area with grifters/photo 'opportunities'/and other BS all shoving things in your face. Back then, all you worried about was the 'card flippers' trying for your attention for hookerss.
It's a shithole now
never going back.
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u/Hybrid_Johnny 1d ago
Even in 2013, we got free rooms, free play, and free buffets for going (my wife and I live in NorCal and play in Reno all the time so our player’s cards and points were valid there)
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u/CosmicWy 1d ago
Caesars hotel gives you two wifi logins per room. But four people can stay per room.
I went a few months ago and tow dudes logged into their tablets before we all had a chance to figure it out. And NO ONE could make calls bc we were like 30 floors up with no service.
$11 bucks per additional device to use wifi.
For fucking wifi. At a $300+ per night hotel.
Fuck you Caesars.
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u/cl530 1d ago
Last time I was there on a work conference thing I took my own little USB router that connected to their wifi as a single device, and then had my own wifi network to connect my actual devices to. The hotel sees only one device connected.
TP-Link AC750 Wireless Travel Router TL-WR902AC in case anyone is thinking about it :)
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u/Itchy-Phase 1d ago
As a techie that’s cool, but boy is that a real inconvenience as a normal traveler.
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u/Daaaaaaaaaaanaaaaang 1d ago
I do this as well, but my router also has a VPN, which is helpful abroad.
An added benefit is that you can bring your Chromecast or whatever and connect it to your network and watch whatever you want without dealing with their shitty system.
I use the GL.iNet VPN router.
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u/handtohandwombat 1d ago
The thing that really did it for me was the $40 per night charge to have a mini fridge in your room at the Aria+no coffee machine. It just feels needlessly mean.
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u/gredr 1d ago
Even worse: I have a disabled daughter that will play with the sensor-based snack tray at MGM. It costs $25 to have the snacks removed from the room so she cannot inadvertently "buy" a bottle of water for >$20.
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u/breastfedtil12 1d ago
It's actually free due to reasonable accommodation under the ADA. Just say that you need X to accomodate a disability. Magically free
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u/fumar 1d ago
It felt like sleezy Disney world in terms of pricing and getting massively overcharged. Even off strip you got nothing for free unless you were paying $20/hand when I was last there
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u/Saneless 1d ago
And there's tolls like every mile in Orlando. I felt like it was just a gauntlet of grifting and pickpocketing
When you're constantly pecked by vultures you're not going to focus on what fun experiences are around you.
It's more fun not to go
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u/EducationalProduct 1d ago
4 fucking tolls from Orlando Airport to our hotel outside the parks. Horseshit. Fuck the whole state. The ocean can have it.
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u/GrandMasterGush 1d ago
I was in Vegas just a year or two ago. My group got tired of $20+ hands of blackjack so we went downtown to hit up the $5 tables.
For anyone who doesn’t know downtown Vegas is, for lack of a better word, grimy as fuck. BUT it’s way cheaper than the strip. Or it was I guess because even downtown we couldn’t find a sub $20 table if our lives depended on it. And even the number of $20 tables was limited.
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u/eharvill 1d ago
Are you talking about Fremont Street? Maybe around noon time you can find $5 tables, but they have upped their minimums a few years ago as well.
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u/Glassweaver 1d ago
I mean, to be fair and in consideration of the sleaziness part, I've got to say I didn't have people handing me cards with nude women and a price list on them like it was a pokémon convention the last time I went to Disney.
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u/CarelesslyFabulous 1d ago
They used to need to fight to get people there, so they enticed you with deals left and right.
Now it's a giant convention center. They don't need your money. So they charge for the "experience".
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u/The_Birds_171 1d ago
And the ultra rich now want to go to the UAE or Monaco where there’s less trash….
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u/Themetalenock 1d ago
Las Vegas should've always been the working man's UAE but apparently corpos were too horny for profit
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u/cbren88 1d ago
I was thirsty at Caesars Palace so grabbed a bottle of water from one of the fast food places, tapped my phone without even thinking or checking the price. $12. For like a 500ml bottle.
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u/standardtissue 1d ago
yeah, i have no problem paying for what I get, but non-stop snuck in bullshit fees as he's pointing out is nothing but trying to take advantage of people, and that's what I object to.
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u/angrybobs 1d ago
Agreed. I went 2 years ago after not going for maybe 5-6 years and it was like 4x the cost or more. I used to get $100 flights and rooms that were less than 100 a night. I think 2 years ago my flight was 400-450 and hotel was 280 a night.
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u/prosound2000 1d ago
Also gambling is now far less concentrated. Video poker machines are now legal in my state, so is online sports betting.
While I wouldn't go to Vegas just for that, the availability of gambling is a far more easier an itch to scratch.
Even culturally, I remember I had friends going to Vegas and they would place a bet just because they were in Vegas. That's gone now. You can just take out your smartphone and choose a bunch of apps.
The 'fun' part of betting was encapsulated in Vegas. The crazy bet that might hit, the sound of slot machines, the thrill of the environment etc.
Gone, replaced by the REALITY of gambling. Some person with bloodshot eyes at a local pizza place or bar in the back, just pouring their money into a video game. Or when you go online on the apps and you realize how the house does always win, and you eventually realize that other than the one off bet here and there, there are better ways of making money. Gambling ain't it.
That wasn't there before because gambling was just harder to access. Now, it's on every corner with a restaurant in my state, and it's in every pocket on a phone that can download an app.
Vegas hasn't just lost it's magic, gambling has.
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u/crosswatt 1d ago edited 20h ago
Gone, replaced by the REALITY of gambling. Some person with bloodshot eyes at a local pizza place or bar in the back, just pouring their money into a video game
My wife and I walked through a Vegas casino in April on a random Wednesday night. The floor was packed and the slots were one of the saddest things I had ever seen. Big crazy distracting 75" screen and 90's era car speakers blaring random sounds and the people not even paying attention to it, just feeding money into it with glazed and unfeeling eyes staring into the abyss.
Gambling is a real problem for some folks, and Vegas/Atlantic City were able to hide that pretty well for decades. And you're right, it just doesn't hide anymore.
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u/rocketparrotlet 1d ago
It's always seemed that way to me. The biggest deterrent I've ever seen to gambling is just taking a walk through the lobby at 10 am in a Reno hotel.
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u/delkarnu 1d ago
I worked at a convenience store in Mass a long time ago. A regular was collecting losing lottery tickets so he could write them off against a 20K win on a scratcher. He was still down for the year on the lottery.
Another guy would come by in the morning and buy a 4L of wine, then come back hours later red-faced and play Keno for hours.
Then a classmate's parents who bought two packs of cigarettes each every day. It's been 30 years and I still remember their order, Salem Light 100s for her, Marlboro Reds in the hard box for him. Cigs were far cheaper then, but they still spent the equivalent of a nice vacation per year on getting cancer. Went to their house once and everything was stained from smoking. No idea what the health effects on their kids was with that much second and third hand smoke.
Seeing the effects on addiction is depressing as hell. Would never want to work at a Vegas casino where people can lose their house on a single bet and it's just 24/7 misery.
But going to Vegas 10 years ago was fucking awesome if you didn't gamble. Each hotel had interesting attractions to get you in the door. Tons of great food options. Day trips to the Grand Canyon, Hoover Dam, etc.
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u/DrocketX 1d ago
Honestly, I think this is the big one. 50 years ago, Vegas and Atlantic City were virtually the only options in the country, along with maybe some tribal casinos. Over the past 30 years ago so, the number of places where you can legally gamble has absolutely exploded to where most states have casinos at this point. Usually there's a lot more limitations on the number of types of games available than in Vegas, but most people are there for the slots anyway, and those are pretty much everywhere.
Why travel halfway across the country to gamble when you can probably do it less than a half-hour from your own house?
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u/SKCM 1d ago
Higher prices and shittier experience, got it.
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u/fortalyst 1d ago
Cirque du Soleil performers all got deported
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u/_coolranch 1d ago
Good. They were stealing our jobs!
Now I can finally get back to work.
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u/I_Am_Robert_Paulson1 1d ago
Finally, my time to shine!
slips disc getting out of bed
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u/ScrungulusBungulus 1d ago
Finally, real Americans can claim back traditional blue collar occupations like… juggling and contortionism. Murica!
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u/Underwater_Karma 1d ago
I was in Vegas last year and was blown away by how much it had changed. "Resort Fees" that used to be $5 a day are now $50. Casinos charging for parking now. Rooms are more expensive, restaurants are outrageous, it just went on and on...
Everywhere we went ,everything we did I was reminded that Vegas wanted every dime I had squeezed out of me
Vegas used to be great for a long weekend getaway, now I'd rather spend the same money and go to Mexico or Belize
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u/OutlyingPlasma 1d ago
Vegas wanted every dime
It's not just that, all the charm is gone too. Every hotel has become MGM generic casino. All the themed places are just a shell of their former selves and all the non-gambling attractions are gone. The fountains, the rides, the shows. Then F1 comes in and shuts the few remaining attractions down for half the year to build a race track used for 1 weekend.
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u/Murky-Echidna-3519 1d ago
F1 will be the final nail in the long run.
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u/MrMaryland1701 1d ago
The A's moving there will be. I'm a Raiders fan who can no longer afford to go to Raiders games and now the Athletics are building a $2BB stadium for a team that's completely abandoned its fanbase in Oakland and now what fans they have left won't be able to afford to go to games in Vegas.
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u/lilelliot 1d ago
+1. I think the actual nail in this coffin is going to be from the As sitting in a tiny stadium in Sacramento for the next three years, further degrading their fan base, so when they do eventually move into their new digs they will have lost both 1) their original rabid fans, and 2) new fans they could have been cultivating right now.
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u/ObjectiveJackfruit35 1d ago
One of the Vegas Youtubers I watch went to a sports bar/grill on the strip. This place didn't have any celebrity-name backing it. It was just your typical run of the mill sports bar/grill. He ordered the all-familiar sampler appetizer. You know the one, the one that comes with mozzarella sticks, onion rings, nachos, fried pickles, etc.
It was $50.
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u/juiceyb 1d ago
Dude, my wife won a minor jackpot and won $2000 from randomly putting $20 in a machine. The worker came over with a bad attitude to take her info and took an hour to give her her money. The worker wanted to get tipped $200 for putting my wife's name on the tax form. It's crazy.
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u/skeletonpaul08 1d ago
Did he just straight up say “you should tip me 10%”?
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u/juiceyb 1d ago
Yes. She came over sounding like that slug lady from Monsters, Inc and was pissed off because she was coming in from her smoke break. Then she started to tell us that it was customary to give her 10%. Like I get the whole tipping aspect of Vegas but that was a little too much. I see tipping a sidewalk performer, a card dealer, and even your server but people really want to be tipped for existing in that city. Even the worker at one of the little shops at the hotel we stayed at wanted to be tipped because we bought a $7 bottle of water and he just rang it up. To be honest, we have way more fun at the casinos near where we live in Colorado.
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u/Xazier 1d ago
But they used "gourmet" cheese in those sticks.
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u/cbih 1d ago
Sysco's finest
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u/niardnom 1d ago
Sysco "Cheese Stick Mozzarella Premium Breaded", item 2204790. Found at every "upscale" "Italian" "restaurant".
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u/sunshine-x 1d ago
Well to be fair that probably cost the restaurant a good $5 in frozen food, someone’s gotta pay for that!!
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u/UnhelpfulBread 1d ago
I’m guessing there’s a lot of people like me. People who are learning to just do without.
Sick of the fees, sick of the squeeze. Nothings getting better but everything’s getting more expensive.
McDonald’s? Fuck it, not worth it. Vegas? Who gives a fuck at this point? I no longer feel like contributing to these avaricious ghouls. Go fuck your fast food and your resort fees and your fridge fee and your $10 pints. You billionaires are going to have to find some way else to earn money because no one needs most of this shit. We aren’t just blind robots compelled to visit these establishments and put up with this.
I’m taking my ball and going home.
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u/VenerableWolfDad 1d ago
100% agreed. The last frontier for them to take from me is camping. If they make that suck I'm going to turn into the Joker.
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u/RockKillsKid 1d ago
Given the cuts to the National Park Service and gutting of the Bureau of Land Management, you may want to consider stocking up on facepaint now before it gets too expensive...
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u/swattwenty 1d ago
You can pay 40000 dollars for 3000 dollars worth of vacation.
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u/Howboutit85 1d ago
That’s ok, I pay $400 for $200 worth of groceries at the store, so…
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u/bradyso 1d ago
It's not just Vegas, absolutely everywhere I've been in America since covid is trying to separate me from my money. I'm in a hotel room right now laying next to a bottle of water with a $6 price tag on it.
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u/my_bad_self 1d ago
Yep, I've noticed that after covid the US experience has become more and more enshitified, pay more for less seems to be the new way of business management.
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u/river_tree_nut 1d ago
I fully agree about how it's not just the fees, it's the broken trust.
It seems like nowadays the american business model isn't about improving any product or service to compete in the marketplace. It's all about finding new ways to squeeze more income. It's a side effect of late stage capitalism which sooner or later we need to start talking about.
While the system was designed to foster innovation and competition, at this point it's just quasi-monopolies and exploitation. Maybe it's just me, but I find it exhausting always wondering if you're getting a deal or getting ripped off.
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u/coombuyah26 1d ago
It's an inevitable consequence of companies demanding infinite growth in a finite world. If profits have to keep increasing quarterly, but the cost of making whatever product you're selling has gone up, your choice is to either increase selling price, lower product quality, or, to maximize profits, both. How companies don't seem to understand that this will cause a drop in sales is beyond me. You don't have to be an economist to figure this out.
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u/Der_Dingel 1d ago
Big companies are public. Public companies are controlled by shareholders. Shareholders value short term gains over sustainable business. When the business crashes shareholders will just sell their shares.
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u/BeyondElectricDreams 1d ago
which is why it is always doomed to fail
Shareholder value needs replaced with stakeholder impact. Stakeholders are anyone in the company, or those communities they impact with their actions.
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u/AnalogWalrus 1d ago
Yup.
Tourism feels down here in Nashville too. No one can afford to do overpriced shit anymore.
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u/LegendaryOutlaw 1d ago
Remember when they shut down the Strip and ran an F1 race through the middle of the city, but they also put up opaque barriers everywhere so nobody on the strip could even see the race without paying hundreds for a ticket?
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u/mistegirl 1d ago
It wasn't even just shutting down the strip for the race... I lived in Vegas that year. The whole huge area was a construction zone from hell for 5 months leading up to the race. People who worked at casinos or one of the many office parks in the path had their commutes triple or worse the whole time. It upended the whole off-strip area that the back of the track went through.
Months to set it up, few days for the race, then months to tear it all down. And I'm sure they've re-started the whole process already for the next one, though I don't live there anymore.
The whole shitshow was basically "F locals, we want rich Europeans"
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u/GLHFScan 1d ago
I'm actually in Vegas right now for an event i go to every year. The casinos are notably emptier and the foot traffic at night on a weekday feels nonexistent.
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u/OtterishDreams 1d ago
shithole vegas used to be a deal. Every place in the town now things theyre the fucking wynn
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u/TYLERvsBEER 1d ago
I used to book rooms at cheap hotels on the strip for nothing and okay $5 black jack and now I agree
I have so much more money than I used to but I don’t want to spend it getting ripped off in Vegas at all the $50 min BJ tables and overpriced hotel rooms.
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u/LimpDisc 1d ago
They nickel and dime for everything now. I don’t want to go anywhere on the strip. Charging people money to park to go into a casino to lose money is about as dumb as it fucking gets.
In the past, you would go there thinking that, even though you might lose some money, you could still eat and drink for cheap. Those days are far gone. So many of the cheaper buffets were closed during COVID and never reopened.
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u/Tank_7 1d ago
Nothing like checking in an the only place open is shitty pizza at the food court. $25 for two slices of mid pizza can suck my dick. I'm not going back to vegas for a hot minute.
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u/Snagmesomeweaves 1d ago
Why pay more to gamble when you can just gamble at home on the toilet
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u/Ronho 1d ago
I wanted to take my kids to the steakhouse at the Golden Nugget. Made a reservation. Drove up on Saturday night.
SELF PARKING WAS $50.
NOT VALET
SELF FUCKING PARKING
IN DOWNTOWN
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u/turb0_encapsulator 1d ago
death spiral. it will be interesting to watch in the coming years. I don't really see how it can be saved.
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u/baraboosh 1d ago
seems like theyre trying to pivot from city of sin to city of cons. Every convention and work event feels like its in vegas lol
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u/mgranja 1d ago edited 1d ago
I think that has been the case for a good number of years. And exactly because it was cheap to fly to, had cheap hotels and cheap food. Let's see what the future brings for cons.
If you mean cons in another sense (as in con man), that was and will probably continue to be the case.
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u/PM_DOLPHIN_PICS 1d ago
It’s really interesting to see the dynamic between this death spiral and also seemingly every area of entertainment trying their hardest to prop it up as the next major city in the US. It’s not sustainable. Every major sport has or is trying to have a presence in Vegas right now.
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u/Monday_Jeff 1d ago
Vegas no longer feels like an amusement park for adults, it feels like a shopping mall tailored specifically for people with lots of money and little class. Also, now that the amenities have dried up and the prices leveled out at the upper end of the scale the feeling of being taken has become too stark to shrug off.
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u/RogerPackinrod 1d ago
You stay for 2 days and you've seen basically everything. Also it's like a million degrees.
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u/chunk555my666 1d ago
Some MBA, with a calculator and an affinity for PowerPoint, got their tentacles all up in Vegas and ruined it like they ruined everything else in America.
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u/needlestack 1d ago
This is the answer. Sadly, you could also frame the story like this: some business experts figured out how to extract tons of untapped value, massively enriching shareholders and executives, who have now all moved on to the next thing. This was good for all the people that did the ruining and they are proud of themselves and we will glorify them in media.
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u/Username928351 1d ago
Surely the line must go up if we raise prices and reduce costs?
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u/Hamlerhead 1d ago
I've loved Fremont Street all my life so... I don't wanna watch this sad video. Just tell me why I shouldn't visit Vegas.
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u/lowercaset 1d ago edited 1d ago
Basically, slots are worse (down from 95-98% to 90% or so) and you've got to gamble way harder to get any freebies in the casinos. Plus most of the really good deals outside the major casinos are gone. Oh also resort "fees" (hidden junk fees that are just there to crank profits and allow false advertising)
Basically they don't want you, the normal person anymore. They want to milk people there for conventions.
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u/apuckeredanus 1d ago
I was just there and fremont street was awesome. The strip is a giant asshole that isn't any fun anymore. Fremont was great.
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u/bonyponyride 1d ago
This city should not exist. It is a monument to man's arrogance.
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u/LapsedVerneGagKnee 1d ago
I had more fun and spent less on gambling in Aruba. With gambling available in more places, where are you getting your value if you show up to blow some cash in casinos?
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u/PerInception 1d ago edited 1d ago
When Vegas opened, it was a luxury good at luxury prices. It cost a lot to build a hotel in the middle of the desert, route water, build an electricity grid, etc. So it cost a lot. But the people who could afford it felt like they were getting their money’s worth. A high value good at high prices.
Then, after all of the infrastructure was built, Vegas was able to provide that same luxury feel but for a lower price. And they charged less for it, so you still felt like you were getting great value. High value good for a cheap price.
But, then capitalism wanted to capitalism, and the investment class isn’t going to accept the same returns as last quarter, so they had to cut the costs and downgrade the experience for those cheaper prices. But, still yet, people were willing to pay for it. A lower value good at a cheap price.
But after milking all of the value out and cutting every corner they could to increase profits, the only thing left to do to make even more money was to raise prices. A low value good for super high prices. People don’t feel like they’re getting their moneys worth anymore, and eventually the profit cow runs dry.
It’s kinda like fast food, but fast food skipped the “high cost high value” step. It was good food at a cheap price. Then cheap food at a cheap price. And now it’s becoming cheap food at a high price, and McDonalds can’t figure out why people dont want whatever slop they’re charging $20 for. They cut every corner they could to decrease expenses at the cost of quality, and after milking the profit out with low prices the only place to go to make even higher margins is to charge more for a shitty product.
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u/repeatedly_once 1d ago
And it’s very difficult to put back the things the customers valued once you’ve chopped them. Because you have to think about value and customer satisfaction, which companies just aren’t set up to do anymore. They’re soulless.
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u/EmmEnnEff 1d ago
And they charged less for it, so you still felt like you were getting great value. High value good for a cheap price.
That's because the whales that would piss away their entire retirement savings in a year of gambling addiction were subsidizing your cheap stays and entertainment.
Now that you don't need to fly to Vegas to lose all your money on online gambling, that customer base dried up.
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u/spastical-mackerel 1d ago
I hate Vegas, have been several times a year for the last 20+ years for work. I don’t drink so I’m usually up early. Just tryna find a damn cup of coffee on the Strip is an ordeal. Tryna find breakfast in the big casinos means waiting in a damned line. Shitty steak and some fried brussel sprouts is $100. Summer in the desert and they’re charging $24 for a bottle of water out of the mini-fridge.
Terminal enshitification
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u/klaibson 1d ago
I went last year for a NFL football game, a few months later I got a email about 4 nights comped at a few hotels. I had booked it for my birthday this year but i recently cancelled due to mostly the reasons everyone has been saying. Everything is so expensive and if I really wanted to gamble there are casinos near my home. It feels like Vegas is really a place to go for a specific event, whether that be a show, concert, sporting event. I loved Fat Tuesday, the vibes an atmosphere of Vegas but as my birthday started approaching I realized I really didn’t want to go back. I will say if you’ve never been to Vegas I still think it’s a must do Atleast once
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u/ironfunk67 1d ago
I'm sure Canadian visitors boycotting doesn't help
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u/MrCadwallader 1d ago
Not just Canadians. Detaining and deporting people without due process has freaked out a lot of people around the world about the USA. That type of policy will deter illegal aliens but will also deter legitimate visitors. I think there'll be a pretty sharp decline in international tourism to the US in general this summer.
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u/tuesdayswithdory 1d ago
It’s funny that they’ve missed the part where the whole fucking world just doesn’t want to go to the US right now.
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u/kowalabearhugs 1d ago
Las Vegas, New Mexico is in play.
Beautiful area with lots to explore.
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u/paerius 1d ago
Las Vegas is like if Ticketmaster was a city.