Focus on Sixteenfifty: Casinos win by making people feel special

June 4, 2021 12:00 PM
  • CDC Gaming Reports
June 4, 2021 12:00 PM
  • CDC Gaming Reports

Rob Wells holds to a tried-and-true approach for elevating resorts to a “gotta-go-there” experience.

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“Learn from the best,” says the founder of Sixteenfifty Creative Intelligence, which has been involved in more than $18 billion worth of integrated resort and hospitality projects in the past 20 years. “Honor the guest.”

Focusing on guests’ experiences can take many forms.

“It’s different in New York at Turning Stone than it is on the Vegas Strip,” he says. “Serve your audience and flex accordingly. Local audiences all like the same things: great service, care in their visit, and value. And remember, value is not in 99-cent buffets.

“Make people feel special; you will always win.”

Wells’ philosophy developed from working with several gaming visionaries.

For example, Station Casinos CEO Frank Fertitta’s emphasis on making guests welcome inspired Sixteenfifty to develop Station’s successful “We love locals” campaign.

“I haven’t met another owner who was so engaged in the smallest detail,” Wells says of his 17-year affiliation with Stations. “The thing you would hate most is when you would have had a month to dial in details and think you had every angle covered, and immediately he’s like, ‘What about this?’ “That’s how you learned each time to bring it even better,” he adds. “That’s a lot of learning from a great operator who played in every level of the business.”

Wells applauds operators for emphasizing a safe gaming environment for customers and staff in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“As we slowly come back to life as a country, left ravaged by something beyond our control, guest safety comes first. Then, slowly, I think the promotions come back,” he said.

Sixteenfifty, founded in in the early 2000s, maintains a low profile, but has worked with numerous gaming-world visionaries besides Fertitta. In Las Vegas, the list includes Peter Morton of Hard Rock, George Maloof of the Palms, Steve Wynn, and Derek Stevens of Circa, the first casino-resort built from the ground up in downtown Las Vegas in 40 years.

Beyond Las Vegas, the company helped launch Rivers Casino facilities in Des Plaines, Ill., and Pittsburgh; consulted for the Oneida Indian Nation on developing Point Place and Yellow Brick Road casinos in New York State, after being a strategic adviser for Turning Stone Casino; and did architectural consulting and concept development for Paragon Gaming on Parq Vancouver in Canada.

“We are called upon by the select few when the time is right,” Wells says. “We listen and distill the owner’s vision, and we deliver each time, learning from the last.”

Wells says the firm is working with leaders of the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation to reopen the casino at the historic Fairmont El San Juan Hotel in Puerto Rico as the Foxwoods El San Juan Casino. The casino, scheduled to open by the end of this year, will be Foxwoods’ first casino outside the continental United States.

Wells says Sixteenfifty is one of the few vertically integrated companies in its field, making it able to handle everything from overall property concepts to day-to-day needs. It offers not only naming, branding, and marketing services, but also interior design and architecture, digital design, TV and video production, operational consultation, and marketing and advertising. “Not a lot of groups can tackle solutions for owners like this,” he says.

The mission is to understand what owners and operators want from a property, then “crystallize their vision into something that becomes culturally relevant,” Wells says. “We are not rocket scientists,” he adds. “Just stay nose to the grindstone and fun stuff happens.”

He offers one other bit of advice for operators: Forget parking fees.

“It’s always been free. Why would you make it any other way?

“Taking from the guest early on is silly. Get them in the building, provide a great escape, (demonstrate) a guest-first mentality, and you really can’t lose.”