When it came to hosting events last year, Las Vegas decided to go big. What better way to demonstrate a city has the infrastructure and service support for large gatherings than to capture the attention of fans for the biggest sporting events in the world?
The city smashed revenue records in 2023, with its highest-ever average daily rate and revenue per available room, in addition to record gaming revenue. Those numbers skyrocketed for the month of November in particular, thanks to the inaugural Las Vegas Grand Prix. That Formula 1 event reached an estimated 2.7 billion people around the globe, drew some 315,000 fans in Las Vegas and generated an eye-popping $1.2 billion in economic impact.
Less than three months later, Las Vegas hotels broke the continental U.S. record for Saturday and Sunday average daily rate (at $758 and $808, respectively, according to STR/CoStar) when the city hosted Super Bowl LVIII. The $739 room rate on Friday was the second highest for any Friday — and the two-day performance at the end of that week was so high that it boosted the weekly hotel metrics for the entire country, according to STR.
The city’s gamble on major sporting events appears to have paid off. Will that make Las Vegas any less of a convention destination?
Not at all, according to Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority president and CEO Steve Hill, who points out that such spectacles will only fan the flames of the city’s convention business. “These major events create a critical mass of capacity and infrastructure that are then available throughout the year for meetings and trade shows,” he said at the Las Vegas Preview tourism event in January. “The same folks who put on the Super Bowl help put on the trade shows and the meetings here. The bigger and broader that part of our economy is, the better it is for trade show organizers when they come. That talent is always there; that depth matters.”
What’s more, the facilities that are constructed for professional teams and sporting events add to the already diverse inventory of group venues in Las Vegas. “I was looking at a list for the third quarter of ’23 for [Raiders home and Super Bowl host] Allegiant Stadium, and while there were 15 really large events, there were another 100 smaller ones held in different parts of the stadium,” adds Hill. He expects the same for the new facility being built for baseball’s A’s, who are moving to the city. “We do that at T-Mobile Arena [home to the NHL’s Golden Knights] too. The Formula 1 Pit Building is going to be a venue for meeting planners for 48 weeks out of the year. And it’s a really fun thing to be able to participate in activities at these places.”
Capitalizing on sports
Planners can make the most of the city’s newer, sports-friendly infrastructure with event-friendly setups at all the venues Hill alluded to. Here’s a rundown of some of what’s available now, as well as those that are on the way.
Formula 1 International Racing
The second annual Las Vegas Grand Prix returns to the Strip Nov. 21-23 — but up until a few weeks before the race takes place, the 300,000-square-foot Pit Building serves as a unique venue for private events. The largest building of its type on the entire Formula 1 circuit, the facility consists of three levels plus a rooftop, all with flexible indoor/outdoor space. LEED certification is pending for the building, which can accommodate as many as 3,000 people on each of the second, third and rooftop levels. The garage level consists of 13 bays, each able of welcoming up to 250 people for receptions when they’re not being used to accommodate cars.
The building itself is part of the 39-acre Grand Prix Plaza, an expansive paved area suitable for temporary event structures and stages. Soon, for F1 aficionados, the plaza also will be home to interactive exhibits and a merch store. Sections of the race’s Strip Circuit are part of the plaza too, including turns 1, 2 and 3.
For incentive groups that are building a visit around the Grand Prix itself, MGM’s Bellagio Fountain Club is one of the VIP race venues that will return in November. The club will offer unrivaled views of the race and the Bellagio Fountains, front-row seats to the winner’s stage, indoor and rooftop hospitality decks, and unlimited food and beverage from famed chefs throughout the weekend.
Allegiant Stadium
The 65,000-seat, fully enclosed and climate-controlled stadium opened in the summer of 2020, in time to welcome the NFL’s Raiders to the city. The University of Nevada–Las Vegas also plays their football games here, and the facility hosted the city’s first Super Bowl in February. Countless big-name concerts and other sporting events have taken place here, as well, in the past few years.
More than 10 spaces within the stadium are available for private events, including five exclusive clubs or the Raiders’ locker room, each of which can be transformed for meetings, receptions or banquets of up to 300 attendees. Larger groups of up to 2,000 can use a handful of unique spaces, among them the Modelo Cantina Club, the Twitch Lounge, the Allegiant Flight Deck, Ford Plaza and Coors Light Landing. Full stadium buyouts or events on the field can be arranged for up to 65,000 guests.
T-Mobile Arena
Built in 2016 to welcome the then-new Las Vegas expansion hockey team — the NHL’s Golden Knights — the T-Mobile Arena is a state-of-the-art venue for up to 20,000 people. On the Strip just beyond the Park MGM and New York-New York resorts, as well as The Park outdoor dining district, the arena feels like part of a larger, walkable neighborhood. Two acres of outdoor activation space is available in Toshiba Plaza, which leads up to the arena entrance and can host as many as three stages.
Event spaces inside the arena include the 11,000-square-foot Hyde Lounge, which accommodates nearly 800 people, or the Goose Island Lounge, which holds 400. Four lounges, two party suites and four outdoor terraces are available for smaller receptions of 75 to 350 people.
A’s Ballpark
The baseball facility being built for the relocating Oakland A’s won’t exist until 2028, but it promises Major League game convenience right on the Strip, on the site of the recently closed Tropicana. The $1.5 billion, 33,000-seat ballpark will have a retractable roof and cover about nine acres of the former Tropicana’s 35-acre plot. Bally’s intends to build a new casino-resort alongside the sports venue, though additional details aren’t yet available. The Tropicana is still being torn down; ballpark construction is scheduled to begin in 2025. The A’s have agreed to play in Sacramento from 2025 through ’27 as Las Vegas prepares for their arrival.
Scoring with event planners
While major sporting events helped to drive the city’s massive success through early 2024, that windfall is affecting all areas of the Las Vegas infrastructure. As of January, an estimated $30 billion in economic development activity was taking place — including plenty of work that will benefit groups.
Among the latest announcements is news of a $1.5 billion redevelopment project at the Venetian Resort in honor of the property’s 25th anniversary, including a redesign of the property’s 4,000 suites in the Venetian towers. A new look inspired by the costumes of the Venetian Carnival will be featured in all rooms, and the first with the new design will be available beginning in September. New restaurants and gaming facilities soon will debut as well. As part of the project, $188 million will be invested in renovating the 2.25 million-square-foot Venetian Congress & Expo Center. The facility will feature an “invigorating” color palette, elevated lounge spaces for meetings, a speakeasy-style venue and cutting-edge technology. Executives also promise a groundbreaking Food Rescue Alliance Program that will reduce food waste and will benefit local community members in need. The project will be completed in phases through 2026.
As the Venetian celebrates its silver anniversary, the 3,044-room Mirage will mark the end of an era when it closes on July 17th, after 34 years in business. When Steve Wynn opened the legendary property in 1989, along with its erupting volcano attraction, it paved the way for the new style of luxurious, integrated casino resorts that eventually would come to define the Las Vegas Strip. Its closure — and the eventual disappearance of the volcano — wasn’t entirely unexpected, as Hard Rock International purchased the property in 2021. This summer its transformation into the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino and Guitar Hotel Las Vegas will begin. The property will be closed for construction, with plans to reopen in the spring of 2027 — featuring a nearly 700-foot-high guitar-shaped hotel with about 600 additional rooms.
Meanwhile, the newest luxury hotel to open in town, the 3,644-room Fontainebleau Las Vegas, continues to debut new F&B outlets on-site following the hotel’s grand opening in December. La Côte, a French Riviera-inspired poolside restaurant on the resort’s six-acre Oasis Pool Deck, is one of the newest at the stylish resort. The Fontainebleau covers nearly 25 acres on the North Strip, near the Las Vegas Convention Center’s West Hall, and its playful design and sweeping architecture pay homage to the style of the original Fontainebleau in Miami Beach. The Vegas resort has 550,000 square feet of meeting space, 150,000 square feet of bright and airy gaming space, an impressive 14,000-square-foot fitness center and a 55,000-square-foot spa with 44 treatment rooms.
