Las Vegas: No Conventions and Visitor Numbers Decline with 70.5% in June

Latest report by the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority revealed a decline in visitor numbers in Las Vegas for June 2020.

Fewer Visitors and Zero Conventions Held in Las Vegas Last June

A report released by the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority (LVCVA) revealed a staggering decline in the number of visitors in the city for the month of June. According to the report, some 1,065,100 people visited Las Vegas in June. This marked a 70.5% decline when comparing results from June 2019, which showed more than 3.6 million visitors. The report also outlined the convention attendance, which hit the rock bottom with 0 conventions. On the other hand, last year in June, conventions in Las Vegas attracted some 514,000 visitors.

According to the report by the LVCVA in June there were some 95,396 hotel rooms available in Las Vegas. With that in mind, the occupancy was some 40.9%. In contrast, in June last year there were 149,627 available hotel rooms, which were occupied at 91.7%. Further breakdown of the occupancy in June outlines weekend occupancy of 51.8% and midweek occupancy of 36.5%. In terms of the Strip occupancy, we see another decline in the results. June numbers showed Strip hotel room occupancy of 40.4%, while downtown Las Vegas hotel room occupancy was 36.5%.

Another decline was observed when comparing results from this year to June last year in terms of revenue per available room (RevPAR). RevPAR in June 2019 was set to $110.43 while this year it dropped to $42.56. This marked a 61.5% decrease in RevPAR.

The Impact of COVID-19 on the Hospitality and Gaming Industry in Las Vegas

Back in mid-March, Nevada’s casinos were ordered to shutdown in an effort to reduce the spread of COVID-19. In the weeks after the shutdown, Nevada Governor Steve Sisolak announced a phased reopening plan for the casinos and other entertainment businesses.

After that, following strict guidelines for health and safety, the casinos, hotels and other entertainment venues were allowed to reopen on June 4. However, given the near three months of suspended operations many casino and hotel operators struggled to keep their entire workforce. Here it is important to mention that all venues which were allowed to reopen doors had to limit their capacity. Consequently, because of the reduced guest capacity as well as a decrease in travelling, furloughs and layoffs were announced in Las Vegas.

Most recently, Governor Sisolak replaced the phased reopening plan with a “long-term mitigation strategy”. With this move, the state officials set a plan which aims at strategically reducing the spread of COVID-19.

Changing focus to the LVCVA paper once again, we see that the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) severely impacted the gaming revenue. Gaming revenue for Clack County in June 2019 hit $906 million. However, this year’s June revenue dropped to $441 million which marks a decrease of 51.4%.

Additional breakdown of the revenue per area shows that Las Vegas Strip revenue was down 61.4% in June this year to $238 million. Downtown gaming revenue and Boulder Strip gaming revenue also dropped with 55.6% and 32.5% respectively.