New Wildfire Casino starts Red Rock’s latest building boom – The Nevada Independent

The newly opened Wildfire Fremont Casino near downtown Las Vegas will not tip Red Rock Resorts’ bottom line.

The company’s big new revenue driver lands later this year when the $750 million Durango Station begins operations.

Still, CEO Frank Fertitta III said the 21,000-square-foot Wildfire, the seventh of the company’s properties with no hotel component, has its place in Red Rock’s portfolio as a launch pad for efforts to double the company’s size in southern Nevada by 2030.

“They’re a little more local in their customer footprint,” Fertitta said on the company’s conference call with analysts Feb. 7, as she described the small standalone casino that’s five times smaller than one of the company’s flagship Red Rock Resorts in Summerlin and Green Valley Ranch Resort in Henderson.

“They’re a little more convenient to get in and out of, and they offer a little more personalized service than our big-box operations,” Fertitta said.

Red Rock saw a 3 percent year-over-year increase in revenue at its southern Nevada casinos, bringing in $1.65 billion last year. Fertitta said the big casino resorts and Wildfire attract different customer markets.

CBRE gaming analyst John DeCree told investors that the small casino “should offer some incremental growth [to the company] in 2023 and 2024.”

By then, the Durango project, Red Rock’s first all-new casino development since 2008, could be operational from its location in the southwest portion of the valley at 215 Beltway and Durango Drive.

Once the hotel-casino opens, Red Rock executives said they will be able to determine the next resort.

Construction crews completed the 200-room hotel-casino in October, and the building should be fully enclosed by April. Red Rock’s chief financial officer Steve Cootey said the opening is still slated for sometime in the last three months of this year.

Fertitta told analysts that the company wants to see continued stability in the Las Vegas gaming market and evaluate Durango’s performance before embarking on any other development. However, he appeared to point to the 45 acres the company owns in the Inspirada development in Henderson as its next target, which was also discussed in previous conference calls.

“We’re working on being able to have a project that’s ready to go,” Fertitta said. “But to give the project the green light, we have to prove to Durango.”

Steven Wieczynski, gaming analyst at Stifel Financial, said that the local Las Vegas gaming market, which hit a record $2.9 billion in revenue in 2022, “remains one of the most resilient/healthy gaming markets in the US ‘ he wrote, however, in a study noting that investors are worried about ‘how much more there is to be getting out of this market’.

Go where there is development

Fertitta said the company will continue to focus on locations in southern Nevada “where rooftops will be built but gaming entertainment will remain somewhat minimal.”

“Once Red Rock’s Durango project is fully operational and this asset generates better than expected returns, then we believe [the stock price] could erupt considering how many more undeveloped land banks the company controls,” Wieczynski wrote.

Red Rock owns more than 522 acres in southern Nevada for future development in Henderson, North Las Vegas and the south end of Las Vegas Boulevard at Cactus Avenue.

Cootey told analysts at least 120 acres are up for sale, including the former Texas Station site in North Las Vegas that has been demolished and the land associated with the Wild Wild West Casino on Tropicana Avenue west of Interstate 15 and closed last year.

In 2022, Red Rock sold 21 acres of the Durango site for $23.8 million to a multi-family developer who plans to build an apartment complex behind the resort. In addition, the 35-acre Henderson site that housed the since-demolished Fiesta Henderson site was sold for $33 million to the City of Henderson, which plans to use it for a youth sports complex.

Red Rock also paid $55 million for a 67-acre property at Losee Road and the 215 Beltway for a hotel-casino.

JMP Securities gaming analyst Jordan Bender said Red Rock is cleverly using the money it makes from land sales to “provide the company with a liquidity trail so it can work toward growing the size of the portfolio.” .

The flagship of the brand

The newest Wildfire has 200 slot machines, a Station Casinos sportsbook and two restaurants — a 200-seat IHOP with an outdoor patio and a Tacos El Pastor.

Wildfire was built on part of a 65-acre site that was once the site of the Showboat Hotel and Casino, which the company bought in 2005 and demolished a year later. Part of the property now includes an apartment complex.

“[The Wildfire] is relatively close to downtown, but we think it will be primarily for people in that neighborhood,” Fertitta said, adding that this particular area of ​​the Boulder Strip hasn’t seen such “fresh and new” property in years. ”

Barry Jonas, gaming analyst at Truist Securities, said the new casino will be “the flagship of the Wildfire brand,” which has locations in southern Nevada away from the company’s six major casino resorts.