Exhibition World Issue 4 — 2020 | Page 22

Letter from America When will live events return to The Strip? Stephanie Selesnick looks behind the mask in Vegas for any tells on when and how the smart bet is for reopening he short answer to the headline question is ‘We don’t know’. Given a non-existent national policy on fighting Covid-19 in the United States, US state governors and local officials have been left to make the decisions on stay-athome orders, quarantines, face mask wearing policies, criteria for phased openings, and so on. In a well documented case in Georgia, that state’s governor and Atlanta’s mayor had sharp disagreements, going as far as taking their differences to court over mandating of mask wearing. The governor was opposed. The Las Vegas Strip is the capital of the United States exhibition business with over 150,000 hotel rooms and three venues in excess of 100,000sqm (over one million square feet). Las Vegas Valley includes a number of cities and unincorporated parts of Clark County. The Strip is not, in fact, located in the City of Las Vegas, but rather is part of unincorporated areas of Paradise and Winchester. I have called Downtown Las Vegas home the last seven years. It’s fair to say that this city is built on face-to-face engagement – whether it be corporate events, weddings, bachelor/bachelorette parties, concerts, shows, conventions or exhibitions. This is a city built on hospitality. In 2019 there were over 42.52m visitors to Las Vegas. January and February 2020 were pacing ahead of those numbers until the Covid-19 shutdown mid-March. According to figures from the Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority (LVCVA), in May 2020, the middle of the shutdown, there were 151,000 visitors, none of whom were in town Below: Stephanie Selesnick www.lvcva. com/research/ visitor-statistics for conventions and exhibitions. Compare that with May 2019 which had 3,691,000 visitors of which 520,800 people attended business events. That’s down in both visitor volume (95.9%) and in convention attendance (100%).* Ouch! On 18 March, 2020 The Strip went dark (although, in all honesty, with Covid-19 hitting much of the world, some hotels had previously announced temporary closures). Bars, restaurants, many shops, offices, gyms and salons were shuttered. For almost three months The World Famous Las Vegas Strip became The World Famous Bike Path. It became “a thing” for locals to do – including families – to ride down the middle of Las Vegas Blvd. taking photos in front of empty resorts like tourists. That was then. The State is now in Phase 2 reopening. About threequarters of the Las Vegas resorts and casinos are open and airlift is up. Leisure business is driving in from neighboring California and Arizona (both hot spots as we go to press), especially on the weekends. Gatherings of up to 50 people (up from 10) is permitted, while allowing for social distancing. Inside dining is still permitted at 50% occupancy, same with gyms and salons. With the rise in Covid-19 cases, the Governor rolled bars back to Phase 1 in early July so those establishments not serving food were again closed. A mask wearing mandate is also in place for everyone out public, while waiting in line to enter a public space, or when outdoors and it’s not possible to maintain six feet (1.5m) of social distancing. Casinos and resorts along The Strip are conducting temperature checks to all who enter and masks are required by employees and guests alike when on property. There are sanitation stations in place and visitors are encouraged to wash their hands. Even though we’ve gone from 30.1% unemployment in April to 15% in July, Nevada still has the highest unemployment rate in the country. Trust me when I say we all want to get back to the business of hosting worldclass exhibitions and business visitors. Smart safety plans are in place and tradeshows are still on the books for the last quarter of 2020. Sadly, when we open is not up to us. 22 Issue 4 2020 www.exhibitionworld.co.uk