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IN BUSINESS DINING STATION MAKES SHIFT IN STRATEGY ON RESTAURANT OPERATIONS By Delen Goldberg staff writer After several years of experimenting with leased venues and private contractors, Station Casinos is back to running most of the restaurants at its properties. The resort chain recently took over ownership and operation of several casino restaurants previously run by outside partners. Executives also renamed and redecorated a number of eateries to create consistent companywide brands. Consider: • Station-owned Grand Cafe soon will replace the privately owned Original Pancake House at Green Valley Ranch. The flapjack chain closed locations at Green Valley Ranch and Aliante Station in October. Green Valley Ranch previously housed a Grand Cafe, but that restaurant closed abut three years ago when Station outsourced the business to the Original Pancake House. • Metro Pizza moved out of Sunset Station's food court and was replaced with Slices, a Station-owned pizza parlor and fast-food counter. ECONOMY HOMEBUILDER WITHDRAWING FROM LAS VEGAS MARKET By Steve Green senior staff writer Arizona-based Meritage Homes Corp. is winding down operations in Las Vegas and will exit the struggling market in early 2013. "It's a sad state of affairs there," executive Brent Anderson said during a recent interview. He said home sales by Meritage had fallen to 79 last year from 653 in 2005. "When the market crashed, it crashed hard," he said. Anderson, vice president of investor relations at the Scottsdale, Ariz., homebuilder, said the decision to leave the Las Vegas area was driven in part by the currently weak market and projections by industry analysts that Las Vegas would take several more years to recover. The company's eight to 10 full-time Las Vegas-area jobs may be redeployed along with other resources to more promising markets such as Tampa, Fla., which Meritage announced plans to enter on Friday. Anderson said that the plan to wind down operations involved continuing to build homes on 75 lots in Meritage's two | 12 DECEMBER 2011 | local active communities. Some 375 lots elsewhere will be sold, likely to other homebuilders. Because of the plan to exit the market, Meritage expects to take an $8 million charge against earnings to write down the value of its Las Vegas land holdings. Meritage is one of the smaller players in the Las Vegas market, which it entered in 2002 with the purchase of Perma-Bilt Homes. VEGAS INC research shows that in Las Vegas, the company was the market's 14th largest homebuilder in 2009, with sales of 113 homes valued at $22.9 million. Meritage has also been mired in litigation over the forced bankruptcy of the Inspirada planned community in Henderson. While its homebuilding partners settled a dispute with lenders over Inspirada, Meritage called the settlement discriminatory and last month appealed approval of the Inspirada bankruptcy reorganization plan. Overall, the Las Vegas homebuilding market has continued to struggle this year. Las Vegas' No.1 Business Resource Has Never Been More Important. P R E M I E R E I S S U E 4 APRIL 2011 2011 minding your business min d in g y our b usines s™ THE TOURIST THE RETURN OF They're back. Now what? J. PATRICK COOLICAN INVESTIGATES EXCLUSIVE THE INTERVIEW 5 20110404_VI01_F.indd 1 UNLV PRESIDENT: READY TO RUMBLE BIG STORY DISASTER SCENARIOS, REALLY SCARY TRUTHS IN BUSINESS Construction Jobs On The Rise Look Who's Flying To Mexico Now Is Retail Actually Heating Up Again? * DesertXPress: Derailment, Vegas Style p.39 + Where's the heart of Las Vegas? "There's a new consciousness that has seeped into our brains." • Station has rebranded its Italian restaurants at Sunset Station, Palace Station, Aliante Station, Texas Station and Boulder Station. All are now Pasta Cucinas. Station owned the restaurants' predecessors but wanted to change their names to provide a consistent and recognizable brand across properties. • Similarly, company officials took over the former Camacho's Mexican restaurant at Aliante Station, which was privately owned, and transformed in- house Guadalajara Mexican restaurants at Sunset and Boulder Stations into Cabo Mexican Restaurants. Cabo locations already were in place at Red Rock Resort, Palace Station and Santa Fe Station . Mark LaVoie, Station's vice president of food and beverage, says customers prefer company-owned restaurants and like knowing what to expect when they sit down for a meal. Eateries controlled by the company, as opposed to those operated under contract, allow for consistency across properties, he said. "As the company grew, we realized we had similar restaurants under different names that were successful to different degrees," LaVoie said. "It made sense to take the strongest brands — with their recipes, color profiles and designs — and expand them." But the changes in restaurant operations signal a shift in thinking for the Fertitta family, the Station properties' owners. The Fertittas began divesting of Station restaurants in the late 2000s when Las Vegas sank into a recession and the company's profits fell. Starting in 2008, in an effort to save money, Station replaced almost a dozen in-house cafes at six properties with Denny's and Coco's. The shift saved Station money, but the decision didn't sit well with workers or the Culinary Union. Station spokeswoman Lori Nelson said at the time the company struck a deal with the chain operators to retain a majority of Station workers at equal pay and hours, but union members claimed the change resulted in longtime employees being fired. They also complained that health premiums for remaining workers skyrocketed. Station Casinos for years has waged a vicious battle with the union. The Culinary has tried unsuccessfully for more than a decade to unionize Station's 13,000 workers, and the fight has intensified in recent years. Union members allege the casino group, which owns or manages 18 valley casinos, mistreats Latino workers and has violated dozens of federal labor laws. Station Casinos accuses the union of engaging in an ongoing campaign of harassment. Only since restructuring financially has Station found enough footing to again take on the risk of running most of its properties' restaurants. The company filed bankruptcy in July 2009, and CEO Frank Fertitta III and his brother Lorenzo Fertitta invested nearly $200 million to reorganize.As the economy began to improve this year, Station announced it planned to hire 1,000 people, take back leased restaurant space and improve service. Three hundred of those jobs went to workers in Grand Cafes that returned to space previously leased to Coco's. 3/31/11 3:48:22 PM Get your one-year subscription to and we'll include our best leads via email. All for only $50 a year. For additional information call 800.254.2610 or email subscriptions@gmgvegas.com VEGASINC.COM/SUBSCRIBE 15