Vegas Venues Mean Big Business

by Emily Lambert

Taking Advantage

Talk about foot traffic! Would you like to operate in an open-air mall that attracts more than 18 million visitors a year? Or in a casino resort full of leisure visitors with an average income that tops $84,000? There's a reason-millions of reasons, in fact-that Las Vegas is home to some of the most successful specialty retail concepts in the country.

Retail entrepreneurs in Las Vegas have a lot of advantages from the get-go. For starters, there are the 39 million tourists who spend more than $41 billion a year in the entertainment capital of the world, according to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority's 2007 count (the latest annual tally available at press time). That $41 billion represents a 5.6 percent increase over 2006, putting Vegas retailers well ahead of the national sales gain that year of three percent according to the National Retail Federation. With the Visitors Bureau expecting to welcome 43 million annual visitors in 2009, Vegas offers tremendous opportunities for specialty retailers who want to operate in centers that draw big foot traffic year-round.

But millions of tourists don't add up to big sales unless there are imaginative, passionate specialty retailers launching new businesses that appeal to shoppers' sensibilities. Fortunately, Vegas entrepreneurs aren't afraid to try something different, which is what makes the city so attractive to shoppers in the first place. And with 80 million square feet of retail space, there's no doubt that Vegas offers its visitors unparalleled shopping experiences in some of the most unique retail venues in the world.

Fresh approach to souvenirs

General Growth Properties' bustling Fashion Show Mall is one of the top 10 retail properties in the country both in terms of size and sales volume. With six flagship anchor stores, nearly two million square feet of retail space and a trade area with more than a million residents whose average household income is above $75,000, Fashion Show is a retail powerhouse. The center attracts more than 10 million visitors a year, many lured by a stream of special events at the center that include live fashion shows on a pop-up runway that consistently draws crowds to the common area.

It's no wonder that specialty retail entrepreneur Cindi Nelson decided to open her Vegas! souvenir cart in this three-level, enclosed regional center. Nelson opened Vegas! last summer and response from shoppers was so great that by fall she'd launched another cart in Chelsea Property Group's newly expanded Las Vegas Premium Outlets, an open-air center with more than 150 upscale outlet stores in a half-million-square-foot venue five minutes north of the Strip.

Both Vegas! locations sell Nelson's own proprietary-logo apparel for men and women, as well as caps, water bottles, key chains, teddy bears, visors, shot glasses and dog tees-all products in black-and-white only. "That's my theme. It makes a great statement," says Nelson. Apparel, the bulk of her product mix, includes camisoles, "wildly popular" lace tees, and high quality "very, very soft" long-sleeve V-necks. Men's lightweight long-sleeve thermal shirts also are a big hit.

Nelson says packaging is a key part of her success because many customers are buying gifts to take home to loved ones and want a special presentation. "Everything we do is wrapped in an organza bag with the logo showing through," she says. The two exceptions: menswear comes in mesh bags and doggie tees in organza bags with velveteen paw prints.

Nelson designed her Vegas! logo, a graphic that forms the word 'Vegas' into a letter V. Her goal was to create an eye-catching logo that had "a fresher look" than the graphics she saw on the run-of-the-mill Vegas souvenirs. She wanted "something that could make a statement for a broader market," she says. "The 20 to 40-year-olds weren't thrilled with the older Vegas [souvenir] looks."

Her love of the city shows beyond the merchandise she designs, becoming part of the customer's Vegas experience. "I engage [customers]. I ask them where they are staying and offer tips on where to go and what to do," she says. Building a successful business in Vegas means offering customers "more than just my product."

A picture's worth... a lot of sales

Nightly lines are typical at Cashman Photo Enterprises' Photo Magic kiosk at the Fremont Street Experience, a four-acre, pedestrian-only shopping and entertainment venue that hosts more than 18 million visitors a year. Dozens of specialty retailers here do business beneath the world's biggest big screen-a 1,500-foot canopy with 12.5 million LED lights that plays free, themed shows every night. With direct access to more than 10 casinos and 60 restaurants, it's obvious to retailers here why millions of visitors flock to Fremont Street year after year.

But what lures so many customers to the Photo Magic kiosk that nightly lines are the norm? The chance to create one-of-a-kind fantasy photos and videos with the City of Lights as the backdrop.

Photo Magic customers can have their photo taken with a Chippendale dancer at the kiosk or they can choose from more than 1,000 other digital fantasy photo shoots, including the best-selling "Elvis with Show Girl," in which a male's face is superimposed onto Elvis's body and a female's face onto the show girl's.

Or customers can choose a fantasy music video instead, opting to play the starring role in any number of popular music videos. Cashman owner Karen Cashman explains that "we superimpose the customer's head onto animated bodies" to produce a one-of-a-kind Vegas video souvenir (naturally a best-seller is Elvis's rendition of "Viva, Las Vegas!"). Thanks in part to four plasma screens above the kiosk playing clips of customers' videos, the lines at Photo Magic keep forming day after day. Six more Photo Magic stores dot the Vegas landscape, including those at The Grand Canal Shoppes at The Venetian, the Miracle Mile Shops at Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino, and the Stratosphere Hotel & Casino's Tower Shops.

The company also has another specialty retail concept, Cashman Crystals, with five kiosks in area resorts that use 3D scanning technology to capture a customer's image and recreate it inside crystal block or turn the image into a real-life action figure of the customer's own likeness. Other divisions of Cashman focus on event photography and videos for a variety of uses and clients-all related to Vegas. No matter what buying experience a customer chooses at the company's stores, Karen Cashman says, her company's mission is to be "a highlight of someone's Vegas vacation."

Custom jewelry fits casino crowd

Designed to recreate the romance and excitement of Venice, Italy, The Grand Canal Shoppes at The Venetian, a General Growth Properties platinum property, is stunning from the illuminated painted sky ceilings overhead to the cobblestone walkways and winding canals with serenading gondoliers below.

And don't forget the "Streetosphere" in between featuring trained singers, musicians and actors who interact with the property's 20 million annual visitors, giving them a truly unique entertainment and shopping experience. Specialty retailers here are part of a luxurious indoor shopping center unlike any other on the Strip in this one-level, 500,000-square-foot retail venue nestled in the heart of The Venetian Resort, Hotel & Casino, the largest AAA five-diamond resort in the Americas, owned by the Las Vegas Sands Corporation.

Located within walking distance of 75 percent of the Strip's 135,000+ hotel rooms, The Shoppes are across the street from the Wynn Las Vegas and Treasure Island Casinos as well as GGP's Fashion Show Mall. Ninety-four percent of the properties' 20 million visitors are tourists, with average annual incomes from $84,157 for leisure guests to $130,673 for business guests.

Harlequino, a striking kiosk that sells Venetian glass beads, fits into The Grand Canal Shoppes' casino resort environment perfectly. In fact, the kiosk is designed to showcase the beauty and romance of the Harlequino products while evoking "a feeling of Venice," says owner Stefano Ripamonti.

The Harlequino jewelry concept has an interesting twist, too: customers can purchase eye-catching bracelets, necklaces, earrings and other traditional jewelry pieces as they would at any store, or they can choose the beads they like and design their own pieces from scratch. The kiosk also sells a range of Vegas-themed charms, such as the dice-and-cards design that is "very popular," Ripamonti says. But usually customers pick the beads they love to build the exact look that they like, and while they continue shopping or stroll over to the casino floor for a quick bet or two, their jewelry is constructed by trained staff and tastefully packaged for pickup an hour or so later.

Ninety-five percent of Harlequino's customers are tourists attracted to the idea of taking home an affordable, one-of-a-kind piece of jewelry they created to match their own individual tastes-and maybe that little black dress they just picked up at the nearby Ann Taylor for a night on the Strip.

Prices at Harlequino run from about $45 for a small, simple design to $200 for larger, more-complicated pieces. Of course, for time-pressed customers, Harlequino offers a large selection of pre-made pieces ready for grab-and-go sales. Those sales are welcome, of course, says Ripamonti, but the act of "constructing their own jewelry adds to the customer's excitement," which turns a shopping trip into a shopping experience-just what Vegas tourists want.

One-of-a-kind treasures

Few things are more exciting for boys and girls (of any age) than dreams of finding sunken treasure-dreams that come true at the Historic Treasures cart in Turnberry Associates' Town Square Las Vegas, a 100-acre, open-air, shopping, dining and entertainment center with 1.5 million square feet of retail and class-A office space that opened in 2007.

At Historic Treasures, children and adults can purchase boxed coal from the Titanic and replica coins from Spanish shipwrecks, as well as meteorites, dinosaur bones and educational books and videos. Historic Treasures fits right into the Town Square tenant mix, an eclectic group of retailers and restaurants in a mixed-use complex of 22 buildings with some pedestrian-friendly streets and lushly landscaped walkways. The average shopper income here is in excess of $88,000.

Historical Treasures' president, David Vapnitsky, is both passionate and knowledgeable about his products, many of which have links to a 1622 Spanish shipwreck he helped explore in Florida waters in the late '80s. He offers replica coins from the wreck beginning at $1, to actual coins for $1,000 or more. A plasma video monitor at the cart shows customers a variety of dives for sunken treasure, including Vapnitsky at a young age working on wrecks off of Key West.

In keeping with its theme, the cart is designed to resemble a museum, with lots of products displayed in locked Plexiglas cubes. But not everything is do-not-touch.

Every day streams of customers enjoy playing Lift the Meteorite. "It's the size of half a cantaloupe but is very dense and very heavy, like the weight of a solid bar of gold," Vapnitsky explains. Referring mostly to his younger customers, he adds, "If you want to nourish the learning process, get this stuff in their hands." While he's making sales, he's also hoping to inspire a future scientist or two. Who knows, he says, his next young customer playing Lift the Meteorite "might even become a geologist!"

Big traffic, big opportunities

For Vegas visitors ready to hit the Strip in search of the hottest club or biggest party, Bella Boutique in the Tower Shops at the Stratosphere Hotel has just the outfit. Located on the second floor of the Stratosphere Hotel & Casino, owned by American Casino & Entertainment Properties, Bella Boutique gets a lot of foot traffic because the Tower Shops are a necessary detour on the way to one of Vegas's premier tourist attractions, the Stratosphere Tower-the tallest freestanding observation tower in the US that houses three amusement park thrill rides. In the 65,000-square-foot Tower Shops, shoppers find themselves journeying through themed areas that look like France, China or New York City.

Bella Boutique was recently purchased by retail entrepreneur Scott Savage, who immediately made many revenue-increasing changes, including "new merchandise and a new feel" and a new men's line due soon. He points out that at Bella Boutique all of the fixtures are cherry wood, merchandise is given room to breathe, sales associates are helpful, not pushy, and all receipts are handwritten.

"We make our store feel high-end, but the average price point is $50," he says. Prior to his buying the store, "almost everything was around a $100 price point and we made an effort to get that down."

When it comes to accessories, sunglasses are particularly popular, with designer names such as Dior, Gucci, Chanel, Prada, and Ray-Ban retailing between $145 and $500. "A lot of people come in and want to buy that one expensive item on their trip," Savage says. "People go to gift shops for the $2 trinkets for friends, but come to our store to buy things for themselves."

Business has been so good that he's now exploring opportunities inside the Tower Shops for another retail concept. "There is so much opportunity" in Vegas, he says, because "you have so many people walking by."