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Steve Marcus
George Maloof, shown at the KUNV 91.5-FM studios.
Published Thursday, July 15, 2010 | 2:36 a.m.
Updated Thursday, July 15, 2010 | 2:37 a.m.
George Maloof, in point-making mode.
This is what a radio show looks like, case you're interested.
Audio Clip
- George Maloof
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Sidney Crosby and George Maloof at the 2010 NHL Awards media day at the Palms on June 21, 2010.
George Maloof and the 2010 Miss USA Pageant contestants at Simon Restaurant at Palms Place on May 9, 2010.
Palms mogul George Maloof and Lady Gaga at the Palms on Dec. 18, 2009.
First, we’ll get the personal stuff addressed and dismissed: George Maloof has no plans to marry and is, at the moment, single.
Ardently so.
“I don’t have a girlfriend. I don’t want one,” Maloof says.
Why is this so?
“My schedule,” he says. “It wouldn’t be fair to her. I’d flake too much. Dinner was at 7? What is it, 8 now? Nine? Sorry!”
A man who says he has no hobbies as defined as such, Maloof allows that, “The Palms is my place.”
There’s no doubt of that. The hotel opened in November 2001, and during a taping of the radio show “Our Metropolis,” which I host each Tuesday at 6 p.m. on KUNV 91.5-FM, Maloof talked of his long path from working as a kid in his family’s Coors distributorship in Albuquerque, N.M., to resort ownership in Vegas. He also related his last talk with his father, George J. Maloof Sr., who died in November 1980; and spoke of Las Vegas’ chances of landing an NBA team without a new arena (the short answer from the co-owner of the Sacramento Kings: Not a chance).
There’s more, a lot more, from the 1988 graduate of UNLV’s William F. Harrah College of Hotel Administration. Here’s a sampling:
John Katsilometes: You were a reserve defensive back on the UNLV football team when you were in school. Is it true you were a locker mate of Death Row Records founder Suge Knight?
George Maloof: Yeah, Suge was right next to me. He was a good guy, he worked hard – he always worked hard. He was always first in the drills, first in sprints. He was always in the weight room and working out when everyone else was not. He was a very hard worker. He was great.
JK: Ickey Woods was a teammate, right?
GM: I played with Ickey, too. We had a lot of great players. Our teams were not as great as our players.
JK: When did you actually start working in the family business?
GM: At a very young age in New Mexico, about 10 years old. You couldn’t keep me out of the warehouse. I’d get up at 6 o’clock and bug my mom to get me in there as soon as possible. I learned the challenge of accomplishing something and enjoying and understanding business. … I’ve always been a workaholic.
JK:Are you like your father?
GM: I’m somewhat like my father. He could get along with anybody. He was very approachable. He was a great guy, smart, talented, a great businessman. He probably focused on bigger things before he passed away. He was always looking at doing something, purchasing something, always.
JK: He died in 1980, when you were 16. What was your last conversation with him?
GM: It was at my house, I saw him just before I was going out. I’d just started driving – I got into a wreck that night, actually, believe it or not. It happened just before I heard he’d died. I did a silly, teenager thing. I was racing my car against someone else and ran into a curb, and had to try and find my mother, who was at the hospital at the time. My last conversation with my father was, he gave me a $20 bill and said, “If you go out, have fun and be careful.” And that was it, really. I got some of that right. I miss him all the time.
JK: At the time of his death, you owned the Houston Rockets. This was a young family suddenly running an NBA franchise. Who actually ran the team at that point?
GM: Gavin, my older brother, took responsibility of the team, and the year my father died was actually the year we went to the NBA Finals and played the Boston Celtics. It was quite an experience.
JK: This was when Moses Malone was the star. Robert Reid was on that team.
GM:Robert Reid, yeah. Very good.
JK: But you soon sold the Rockets. Why did you do that?
GM: The following year needed to focus on our beer and liquor business. The NBA was not doing well at that time. When we made the Finals we actually had T-shirts printed up that said, “The Not Ready For Prime Time Players,” because the Finals were not on prime time. They were on tape-delay. So we got back into focus, which was our core business.
JK: Do you think your dad would have sold the team?
GM: I don’t think so, no. But we were very young and trying to figure things out. This was before (Michael) Jordan came into the league, and before (NBA Commissioner) David Stern took over. We couldn’t see the future.
JK: What led you back into pro sports?
GM: At the time we sold the Rockets, we started thinking, “Ugh, why did we do that?” But we pretty much needed to. So our first opportunity to get back into it was with the NFL, in the World League (of American Football). We owned the Birmingham Fire, which was a disaster. We tried that and obviously the league didn’t work. After that, we wanted to get into one of the top four sports, so we spent about five years looking for a team, and we were really close to buying the Tampa Bay Lightning in the NHL. I mean, really close. … But there was a little dissention in the family because we weren’t all 100 percent behind the deal. We didn’t feel comfortable with it. We didn’t understand hockey, as a sport, very well at the time. We understand it today a lot better and it’s a great sport. But we didn’t pursue it.
Just about a year later this opportunity with the Kings came along, where we could buy controlling interest of the team, and we took it. We tried buying eight different NBA teams, and they are hard to buy because there are only 30 of them and the owners never want to sell. It’s an emotional thing.
JK: And fans in Sacramento are concerned you might be moving the team to Las Vegas.
GM: From the damn day we bought that team until today, the story never ends. It never ends. I’ve been asked the question from the day we bought it 16 years ago: “Are you moving the team?” The fans in Sacramento have been great. We need a new arena, that is clear. It’s not fair to them that we don’t (have a new arena). Fans are great, but we want an arena and you can’t build it yourself. Nobody does. You need some public help. … It’s happening here, too.
JK: Will there be an NBA team in Las Vegas?
GM: There won’t be a team in Las Vegas unless there’s an arena. It’s not going happen. I think that we need an arena. I think it would be good for the city.
JK: Would public money be required for any arena in Las Vegas?
GM: Some, some. I have so much knowledge about how these things happen, and you can’t build it without public money. At the end of the day, it’s an amenity for public use. If it’s state-of-the art, people are going to enjoy it, and there should be some public money spent. It would bring in a lot of events. Obviously, now is not a good time to be asking for money to build an arena. But ultimately … we would need it.
JK: Are you curtailed in your ability to speak freely about an arena in Las Vegas because of your position as owner of the Kings?
GM: I’m not holding back on my opinions. I wouldn’t do that. But when I start talking about an arena, the first thing people think about is the Sacramento Kings moving to Las Vegas. That’s the reason I’ve always shied away from that discussion.
It’s kind of a two-pronged story for me. If I talk about an arena being built in Las Vegas, it doesn’t really give the fans in Sacramento a lot security, you know, when we’re telling them (Sacramento) is our city and this is where we want to be -- which is true -- and then George Maloof is telling everybody how much Las Vegas needs a new arena.
JK: Couldn’t you say, “We need a new arena in Las Vegas even if we have to use public funding, but I am keeping the Kings in Sacramento,” which would leave open the possibility that some other NBA team would move to Las Vegas – where you do business?
GM: “(Laughs) I haven’t thought it through that much, but taking that into account, I’ve just stayed away from it. This is the most I’ve ever spoken about it. … People have opinions about the public money part of it, and my opinion is, sure – at the right time. It’s been such a brutal time. I don’t know if it’s a good time to ask everybody to foot part of the bill for an arena. It doesn’t make sense right now. It would be very difficult.
JK: Your first toehold on resort ownership in Las Vegas was when you opened the Fiesta in 1994, in North Las Vegas. How did that come about?
GM: Being in school here, and knowing that I wanted to open a casino some day, I spent a lot of time in Sam’s Town, Palace Station, the Gold Coast. I had a sense of the local market and knew that people who live here do gamble, and I carried that message back to my family. I spent a good year looking for the right piece of land, and the people of North Las Vegas were very welcoming. Rancho separates Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, and on the east side of Rancho was a gaming district. All you needed to build was 100 rooms.
But I looked all over the city, every location, for a full year. The idea was to create other Fiestas around town, but then there was another opportunity near Strip I’d heard about. We sold the Fiesta to Stations, and we worked on our plan for four years, going through some very challenging zoning to get the land that became the site for the Palms.
JK: Why did you name it the Palms?
GM: The first name that I came up with (laughs) – uh, it was called the Breeze. That was the working title for about a month, until I told my sister (Adrienne). And she said, “George, you can’t name it the Breeze.” There is a female product that, at that time – I don’t know if it still exists -- was also called Breeze (which is the name of a line of indoor tanning products for women). Thank God for sisters. So we changed it, we nixed that. …
Then I happened to be at lunch at the Gold Coast one afternoon with the architect, John Jerde, and we were just said, “What’s a simple name that isn’t related to an area around the world, that just has its own name?” And we liked Palms.
Follow John Katsilometes on Twitter at twitter.com/JohnnyKats.
Hey George - you're letting your bean counters ruin your casino!! Why don't you go back to your old school philosophy like you did when you ran the Fiesta.
His ego will be his demise. The palms will fail unless they use the family fortune to fund it. I feel threatened each time i go into the palms. A pretty rough group of people hanging all around the place. Good luck George.
I can tell you from experience that George Maloof is very approachable in the casino. Name another owner who walks the floor and will listen to any guest. I think that's a big part of his success.
How about Gaughn at the Southpoint? He is always approachable. If u have any ideas to save a dime his door is always open. That's why he's expanding!
George will never change the down cycle his casino is on because it requires loosening up the slots, and doing better with the comps. These guys just don't get it. They are too corporate management minded where everything has to be profitable. You would think that the last fifty years of Las Vegas Success under that formula would be enough information for them to use, however, they will NEVER come around..EVER..
Who cares about Maloof? We are giving him too much credit. There are many other Casinos where u have a chance at winning (TEXAS STATION , CANNERY , ) to name a few.
Guess what guys? You are NOT the Palms' target demographic. Get over it.
environprotector,
By your statement I am assuming you have seen the P&L on the Palms and know what your talking about?
Unfortunately, The Palms does it's best to attract skanks and hoes -- which in turn attracts young men looking for a skank or hoe. Unfortunately, these young men don't have money to gamble. And, the young men's blued hair mothers and grand mothers, who do have money to gamble, stay away from this place -- for the most part. Thus, his financial difficulty.
"[Y]ou can't build it without public money. At the end of the day, it's an amenity for public use."
Nonsense. It is a piece of commercial property developed to generate profits for private owners.
Taxpayers never come out ahead on these deals. They end up paying more than they get in return. There are other ways to create jobs than to give public money to private citizens. The taxpayers would do just as well to put the money in a pot and have a lottery to divide shares every year.
If it is a true public arena then all the residential property owners should be issued a proportionate share. Of course, that takes the profit motive away from the developers and they won't be interested anymore. The developers aren't interested in building an arena for the public good. They are interested in it for their own good.
If an arena is such a great financial deal then certainly the private developers can raise all the money they need from investors in the private sector. Having the taxpayer foot part of the bill only sweetens the deal for the investors by increasing their return on investment.
If it's not such a great deal and private sector investors won't put up the money, why should taxpayer money be used to line rich folk's pockets?
His father's influence was a couple of hundred million dollars.
Money, money, money...it's not happines!! A good wife and kids are!! ...As well as sincere grateful employees!!
To eb........It helps!!
Is it me or does George own only have one suit and one blue shirt? With all that money one would think he could afford a haircut and at least a part-time stylist.
Vegaslee-
environprotector may not know what's going on with the Palms P&L, but I do. They're in trouble.
Big trouble.
They lost a ton of money last year, and are sorely trying to raise the bottom line...the Palms will be sold if Harrah's doesn't buy them out.
Maybe Penn gaming would be a good candidate.
The only casino owner I ever met was Jack Binion at the Horseshoe, maybe 15 years ago. Talked for a minute or 2, seemed like a nice guy to me.
If an arena can't be built without public funds, it shouldn't be built. We have one here in our town, built in the 1990's. A big money drain on the city. I don't think it's ever turned a profit. They do have some great acts come to town because of it's size which is similar to Orleans Arena. Alan Jackson, Eagles, Brad Paisley, Bill Cosby, Korn, etc. Of course, the other 350 nights a year it's small crowds for the college basketball team and medium size crowds for the Condors hockey team or nothing going on.
Isn't the arena in Sacramento fairly new? I bet it isn't paid off. When the Kingdome in Seattle was imploded, the city still owed 50 million on it. What an investment!
Impressed that Maloof was a collegiate defensive back, but he still ain't getting our public money to pad his own bank account. City hall is laying off employees, they're hiking the fees kids have to pay to use public parks for Little League -- forget about how low teachers salaries are in the public schools... the last thing this community needs is to have our dwindling tax base diverted for the next 30 years to pay interest on bonds sold to build Maloof's/Oscar Goodman's $800 mil. white elephant. If you want it George, raise your own money. Keep your "palms" off the people's money. Both in these times, and all the time.
George Maloof is a very nice person, and yes he is approachable on his property, and often there working or making observations of how things are going. George's family is from New Mexico, and that is a state with a lot of good people. It shows.
I worked at the Anaheim Sheraton in the early/mid 80's and the Maloof's owned the hotel. The dining room was called Gavin's and the bar/lounge was Adrienne's. From what I remember it was always run well. As far as the Palms goes, I rarely go there in the evening or weekends because I am not the demographic that they are targeting and they got cheap with the "free" casino gaming so my wife and I generally go to the Orleans, South Point or Red Rock now. Also the seats at the Pearl are not too friendly for heavier bottomed (ok, fat) people!
Lets face it the Palms is for the swinging crowd.There entertainment is for the 18-35. Those people don't care about slots and gambling. As long as there is food and a chance to get La--. they had a successful stay.
Cognastics, you are RIGHT. 25 or 30 years ago public money WAS needed, for roads, sidewalks, water, sewer etc. Now these guys want us to pay for their casinos ?!?!?!?!
I adore George Maloof and I LOVE the Palms. I don't enjoy any of these negative comments. They appear to be driven by envy and jealousy. Why be jealous of someone else's good fortune. Sadly, he did lose his father and much of what he gained was through sheer hard work and genius of vision. I was just compelled to comment because I find some of these comments just so incredibly distasteful. Quit being haters!