NIGA Tradeshow “knocks it out of the park”

July 23, 2021 6:02 PM
  • Rege Behe, CDC Gaming Reports
July 23, 2021 6:02 PM
  • Rege Behe, CDC Gaming Reports

Ernie Stevens, Jr., and Victor Rocha were on a business trip in Europe early in 2020 when the COVID pandemic started to spread. Stevens, chairman of the National Indian Gaming Association, and Rocha, conference chairman for the annual Indian Gaming Tradeshow & Convention, were initially concerned about the health of their people. They also worried about the pandemic’s affect on tribal gaming properties.

Story continues below

The annual Indian Gaming Tradeshow & Convention, an important gathering for tribal gaming operators, was also on their minds. After 2020’s event scheduled for San Diego was postponed, they considered holding it later in the year.

Instead, they canceled 2020’s event entirely and scheduled this year’s conference for July in Las Vegas. On Thursday at the Closing Keynote Speech , Rocha estimated attendance for the four-day event at Caesars Forum was approximately 7,000.

“This is something we did not expect,” Rocha said. “We created this session during the pandemic and we didn’t know if was going to be successful. The fact that we just knocked it out of the park is incredible.”

On the spur of the moment, Rocha asked Stevens and Gary Green, a strategist and host of the television show “Casino Rescue,” to join him on stage. The half-hour keynote speech turned into an off-the-cuff event that was by turns hilarious – imagine Stevens and Rocha as a tribal version of Penn & Teller – and gracious, as the tribal leaders expressed gratitude for the event’s success.

Stevens said one of the keys for collective tribal re-emergence after the worst of the pandemic passed – tribal operators were among the first to re-open casinos – were the Zoom meetings and phone calls he made over the last year.

“That helped me to get through this thing,” Stevens said. “That helped me to learn about this thing. It helped tribes to keep talking and communicating to help one another. Communication is an amazing thing – it’s all we had at that time.”

Stevens said it was a great relief to finally see people in person at the tradeshow, although he still resorts to fists pumps instead of handshakes, and some people remain reluctant to hug him.

Both men thanked numerous tribal leaders in attendance who worked tirelessly behind the scenes to make sure the tradeshow took place. They also singled out former NBA star A.C. Green, who is of Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma ancestry. Green serves on the board of the Native American Basketball Invitational and helps out at the annual NABI tournament in Phoenix.

This past week, Green attended numerous events at the tradeshow with Stevens, who praised the former Los Angeles Laker as one of the nicest guys he’s ever met.

“We’ve been throughout the country on many reservations, working together on the different causes that we have,” Green said of Stevens. “It’s a sports-driven relationship, and we just banter back and forth and spend a lot of time together.”

Next year’s Indian Gaming & Tradeshow Convention is scheduled for April 19-22 in Anaheim, California.