Yuku free message boards

09/03/07

FOR RELEASE: IMMEDIATE
CONTACT: TAMARA PETTIT
DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC RELATIONS
304-387-8335(OFFICE) 304-479-8097(CELL)

CHESTER, WV Three Hancock County charities will be the recipients of proceeds from two charity nights featuring Texas Hold 'em poker at Mountaineer Race Track & Gaming Resort. The Weirton Area United Way, New Cumberland United Church Social Service and the Upper Hancock United Fund will sponsor two nights of Texas H'ld'em poker on October 15 and 16. For a donation of $25, those attending will enjoy a complimentary cocktail hour before being seated at a $10 to $20 limit Texas Hold'em game for two hours of competitive fun. Each participant will receive $500 in play money which will be exchanged for non-value gaming cheques. Prizes will be awarded every ten minutes.

The event will debut Mountaineer's newest gaming entertainment as well as its new Poker Room located in the Grandstand Area Trackside. The event will also serve as a practice run for the newly trained dealers in preparation for the soon-to-be announced official opening of the Poker Room.

The Weirton Area United Way will host the October 15 event which begins with complimentary cocktails and hors d'oeuvres at 7 p.m. with Texas Hold'em from

8 p.m. 10 p.m. The New Cumberland United Church Social Service and the Upper Hancock United Fund will host the event on October 16 with cocktails and hors d'oeuvres at 8 p.m. and Texas Hold'em from 9 p.m. 11 p.m.

RSVP's are suggested to ensure seat availability. RSVPs may be phoned to Mountaineer's Director of Public Relations, Tamara Pettit, at 304-387-8335 or 304-387-8575.

Mountaineer debuts full casino this week
By PAUL GIANNAMORE, Business editor

TABLE GAMES TO DEBUT Mountaineer Casino, Racetrack and Resort employees, from left, Paula Billie, Thomas Peters, Marilyn Julius and John Stewart perfect their skills at roulette in preparation for the projected debut of live table games at 10 a.m. Thursday.

CHESTER After years of work and six months of intense activity, Mountaineer Casino, Racetrack and Resort will debut its full casino to the public Thursday morning.

Ted Arneault, president and chairman of MTR Gaming, parent of Mountaineer, said even with the debut of the casino, the Hancock County facility isnt going to take a break to rest on its laurels.

First, theres a new marketing plan on the way.

Arneault said the goal is to target a new brand of visitor, in the 21 to 50 age group.

Its not that were ignoring the others, but its geared toward them. Its showing Mountaineer as a new action place, he said. Its not just your aunts slot joint anymore.

He said one tag line is, Weve got a table waiting for you. And that means not just poker tables but also casino game tables, fine and casual dining tables and a massage table in the spa.

Its just to change that whole image. Our final tag line is Were the reel deal, the reel of the slot machines and the deal of the cards, Arneault said. Were trying to get as much of a message across as we possibly can.

Arneault took a break to talk Wednesday afternoon after an all-employee luncheon.

You can just feel the excitement starting to build, he said.

Charity nights will be held on the new table games, including roulette, blackjack, craps and others, on Monday and Tuesday nights. Arneault said those will be good tests, but not indicative of the business to come.

Theyre there to be real tests of the systems. But when the kickoff comes on Thursday, its going to be a whole new game. Its going to be a different place, he said.

The charity nights will benefit the Weirton United Way and other charities, dependent on the amount raised, according to Mountaineer spokeswoman Tamara Pettit.

Arneault said there were more than 900 seats filled at the employee luncheon and there are many new employees.

Thats why I wanted to introduce the management staff. A lot of them have never seen these people, Arneault said.

Between now and Thursday, Mountaineer will be a busy place getting ready for the final push toward full casino operations.

Were testing each camera. Weve put in more than $5 million worth of new surveillance equipment. All of our dealers are finishing up their licensing process with the state. We have to open up our charity games. The West Virginia Lottery has been unbelievably great to work with. Theyve pulled out all the stops and hired all the people they need to help us be able to get this done, he said. Theyve done an incredible job. They recognize the importance to the whole Northern Panhandle for this to be done.

Construction work is still being wrapped up.

It will probably be done Wednesday night at midnight. Weve changed our conference area and our entryway and it will be nicer than it ever was, he said. Theres still a ton of construction. The tables are all in. Were testing over the weekend that our player tracking systems are coordinated with our computer system, that everything balances.

As mundane as it sounds Monday and Tuesday, well be using fake dollars as part of the charity nights. We have to fill the tables with fake chips. At the end of the day, once the testing is done, assuming everything comes out OK, we have to take the fake chips out, make sure theyre properly accounted for and then fill with real chips and go through the entire accounting process, Arneault said. Its like a football game. Youre in the huddle, getting ready to break for the play and you hope that 100 people involved in the first shift remember the play.

And, concurrent with all of this, were changing our operation to 24-7, he said.

That means an entire new shift of employees will be going to work throughout the resort, including in the Gatsby Dining Room and Big Als Deli and Pizzaria, and the Market Street.

The doors basically will never close, he said. Its going to be an entirely different atmosphere.

The slots used to follow the same schedule as state-permitted bars. The bars will continue to follow the state regulated hours of operation, Pettit said.

Mountaineer will continue to close on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day to allow employees to spend the day with their families. Staff will be on duty to service hotel guests, he noted.

After that, we could basically take the doors off, but we cant because of our winter, he said with a smile.

And for New Years, Mountaineer is planning Casino Royale, The Reel Deal, a New Years party focused on the casino function, complete with entertainment.

When Arneaults group purchased the old Waterford Park horse track and property and began building toward todays casino and resort in the early 1990s, he recalled, there were less than 360 employees. Including backside horse staff, there were about 1,000 people at the track. Now, with the full advent of table games and the 725 jobs that were added this year, Mountaineers direct employment is at 2,200, with another 3,600 on the backside, including trainers, jockeys and horse staff, for total employment of 5,800. Thats more than the last centurys two economic giants, the areas two steel mills ArcelorMittal Weirton and Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel Corp. combined. Originally, Mountaineer first promised 400 new jobs when the table games legislation was passed. When the vote was approved in July, 700 employees were estimated and the actual number is 725.

Arneault said, We really look at it one employee at a time. The key for us is having a group that can service our customer and I dont look at it as a number. Weve got a great group of people out there to service our customers and bring them back. I just make sure we get our message out there and that people are coming in, and once they come in they have a great time.

In October, Mountaineer debuted 37 poker tables and their use has been successful enough that the casino will be adding three more tables in the near future after making security adjustments. A fourth table will be added in the future.

The numbers have been very solid and we havent advertised it as much as we could. On weekends, were jammed. I thought that until we get a pit over there, we really wouldnt advertise poker. But now, we want to make it part of the overall scheme. We kept our powder dry to hit the whole thing, he said. We probably could have done incrementally better than what we have, but our numbers are on budget with what we expected.

The poker tables have brought in between $650,000 and $675,000 since opening, he said. Slot play has increased year over year with the debut of the poker tables.

Arneault said hes not worrying about the impact of Pittsburgh area casinos, with Pennsylvania having six of 14 planned slots parlors opened in the two years since they were permitted.

Were just focused on building our own resort. We have a lot of potential for additional amenities, he said. Mountaineer owns more than 2,000 acres that it hopes to develop with partners.

Plans continue toward retail across state Route 2 and new office space for MTR. A proposal from a Columbus group has been made for conversion of an historic apple barn on Mountaineer property along the Ohio River into an Irish-style pub, which Arneault said has been a dream of his for about 10 years.

Weve talked with groups as varied as putting in an amusement park and finishing the golf course, he said. A contract soon will be entered to complete mining of aggregate materials from an old quarry on Mountaineer property south of the current resort. Arneault said once the mining is done, development of the golf course and housing, or a larger upscale housing development with a golf course to be built elsewhere, can begin. He said there are three lakes on the quarry property, along with 1.25-miles of river frontage, making it a potential prime place for upscale housing.

Mountaineer also has had select cutting of timber on its lands in anticipation of future development to come.

With table games as close as they are, weve been focused on that. Its not to say we havent met (on other issues) but we havent been able to concentrate or give all the attention it deserves right now. Well start developing over the next couple of years, he said. The main problem we still have to address is our infrastructure needs, the ingress and egress to Mountaineer, and that will take the involvement of the whole community and the state government.

Arneault has talked in the past of building an Ohio River bridge that would connect Mountaineer to the state Route 7 expressway on the Ohio side, opening up and easing direct access to Mountaineer from the region. Currently, visitors have to travel miles along two-lane state Route 2 in the final part of the drive to Mountaineer.

MTR is hoping to get its sale of its Las Vegas properties, including Binions and the Ramada Inn Speedway casino, finalized in February. He said the owner of the Four Queens casino, which is across the street from Binions, is on the Nevada Gaming Control Board January agenda.

He said the sale of those properties will allow greater focus on Mountaineer, which he likened to the equivalent of opening a new casino in Las Vegas. He said there is no other facility in the world combining every component of gaming, including horse racing, in one place.

He said he anticipates the casino will allow greater efficiency in operation of Mountaineer. It was built to be table games ready, he said.

Between that time when you build it and they come, youre not as efficient as you want to be. Now, youre going to see the reason for us to have all the things we have. Even if you just look at our jewelry store. Weve really restocked it, recognizing that were going to have a different kind of clientele. La Bonne Vie, weve doubled in size, by bringing it out into the lobby area with stanchions and covered tables, similar to one of my favorite restaurants in Las Vegas, he said.

Arneault anticipates hotel occupancy, for example to go from 60 percent to 75 to 80 percent. And that, along with more visitors and the 24-7 operation, means more supplies from companies that do business with Mountaineer across the spectrum from food vendors to other suppliers.

And beyond Mountaineer, there is a ripple in the business community. Arneault said, for example, one local gas station owner says Mountaineer has enabled the facility to stay open, handling extra traffic heading to the resort.

Pettit said more employees mean more sales of goods in the area, too, from cars to houses to other goods, as well as an increase in school attendance. She noted Allison Elementary in Chester has seen an increase in enrollment for the first time in years, for example.

With all the potential from Mountaineer, Arneault says its still up to the area to determine its future.

The challenge is, how do you want it to affect you? How will you take the next step? The people will be here. How far does the community want to go, he said. Is everyone willing to invest in their business to let it grow and take advantage of the opportunities that will be here?

(Giannamore can be contacted at pgiannamore@heraldstaronline.com.)

P Tusa: Here you go:
Tokes at Mountaineer Casino per hour:
12-22: $15.06, 12-23: $11.14, 12-26: $16.55, 12-27: $14.70, 12-28: $17.43.