Glasses. You wear the glasses.
I try to make you look at the glasses guy I don't like.
It it's horrible. I think it's such a bad idea.
What do you think? Be.
Honest. You can be honest.
No, if you're comfortable. I never understand.
It's good. I mean, it does not my thing.
But if you're comfortable, then you like it.
The eyes don't lie, man. The eyes don't lie.
You gotta. I wear different glasses every
episode. Oh, really?
Yeah. That's also his thing.
Should I get a brand deal with the?
Glasses. Yeah, that's cool.
That's fine. Got a special guest today.
I'm off though if you like. Not at all.
If you're right, do. You like that?
I, I feel like I'm a maybe it's like a poker match, just where
you're like staring me down and I can't see what's going on
behind the glasses. But I'm good if you're good.
Very special guest CEO of the Plaza Las Vegas, Jonathan
Jossel. Great to be with you.
Thank you. Thank you for taking time out
of. The We're live.
Oh, we're live. We just jumped straight into it.
Right. Nice.
I want to tell people this guy just jumped, right?
In You Started with the Glasses is that when you push the
glasses on the episode, That's how we know that's like the
we've begun. You ever seen Big Daddy, the
Adam Sandler movie? I think I have, yes.
Well, he, the little kid puts on the glasses and he turns
invisible. That's basically this guy.
OK, all right. Fair enough.
Hey, listen, whatever works for you, man.
You look good. You are sure you guys dressing
up? I'm sorry I didn't dress up
today. No, no, no, Totally fine.
We are honored to have any time out of your day.
Honestly. Thank you, busy man.
Some people call you the next Steve Wynn, one of our good
buddies. Yeah.
So where does it all start? Because you're a credible
individual, youngest to ever have a gaming license here in
Nevada, right? Yeah, First, I love the the
reference. I appreciate when somebody says
I'm the next Steve Wynn because he is someone that I look up to
and think is an incredible is not.
I think he is the most incredible visionary the city's
ever had. Some people say that was Jay
Sano for me is Steve Wynn. What he accomplished here is
just second to none. If I can be a fraction of him,
I'd be very honest. So I'm just a small time guy in
downtown. I'm not in any way likening
myself to Steven, but if I could be, that's that's the goal.
He's he's the he's the highest standard for the city of Las
Vegas and understanding about casinos and and, and human
nature, how it plays into casinos.
So thank you for that reference. How does it start?
And and yes, I was the youngest licensee in the state of I was
29 when I got approved by the game and Control Board.
I think there was other younger people that were key employees.
And so they were approved by the game and control ward, but to be
unaffiliated with the family. So meaning like my father didn't
own the place or it wasn't like a family member that I was
getting licensed through to be an independent owner operative
casino 29 and approved by the game and Control Board was the
youngest at the time, the youngest in the state.
I don't think anyone's younger at this point, but I could be
wrong. Was very cool.
And your question was how did I, how did I get you?
Basically, how did I? How did I end up there?
Born in South Africa, right? Born in South Africa, grew up in
London, always loved the gaming industry.
How loved gaming. Didn't mean to cut you up.
How old were you when you moved away from South Africa?
I was six, OK, young, my parents moved us, six years old, moved
from South Africa to London, don't even remember much of it.
I was just back in South Africa, an amazing country, but it was
the best thing that could have happened to me was leaving there
and growing up in London where I, I, I love, I love gambling,
whether it's playing snooker or pool as Americans called it,
snooker for money, where there was betting on dogs, whether it
was any form of gambling. We were interested in there as
young kids in England. And there's a big gambling
culture everywhere in the world where people think it's just
here in Las Vegas. But wherever you go in the
world, people gamble in some some capacity.
And so I was gambling in London on dogs, horses, different
things and really took an interest in the industry.
And then I did my thesis at university on what would be the
socio economic impacts of casino Las Vegas style casinos opening
up in the UK in the early 2000s. They were talking about
potentially that happening. And so that's where I sort of
studied and it was a business degree, but it was the business
of casinos opening up in London and the impacts of that.
And one day at lunch with some family friends, a gentleman
says, what are you doing? I told him and he said out of
the blue, oh I just bought 6 casinos in downtown Las Vegas
and I was like holy shit. Like can you can say shit?
Yeah, you're good of. Course, Yes, yes, yes.
Holy shit on this is crazy. Who who who says such a thing?
So I begged him for work experience day after day after
day. I wasn't even 21 yet I asked to
come out to Vegas. I lived here in the Plaza 2000
and four 2005 for about 6 weeks. How old were you?
20. That's crazy most people are
trying to figure out. Well, I, I, I had no idea what I
was doing there. I mean, I was a 20 year old
living in downtown Las Vegas and you, you, you may not even be
I'm 28. I'm 28.
OK. And and so.
You got baby fees? Yeah.
Yeah, yeah. So I'm like living in this
building and thinking downtown is a dump.
I mean, it was bad. You you again, you were too
young. I'm not sure if you were.
Here, yeah, I've been in. I was in Vegas since O2 so.
OK, so. I seen downtown when it was I.
Mean O four O 5 in downtown there was nothing you couldn't
you walked down Fremont Street there was that was it like you
couldn't go to E Fremont. There was no arts district.
I went last night to this new cocktail lounge in the arts
district, walked to a French restaurant like where am I?
This is a proper city now. But this wasn't here in 2004.
And so it was bad. And I lived here for about it
was meant to be 6 weeks. And after three weeks, I called
up the guy in England who had sent me here and gave me the
opportunity. And I said cool vision you got
here, but not for me. And he had, he had to his
credit, he had bought a building in Times Square in 2000 and
sorry in 1989. And Times Square was a similar
story. It was bad crime, drugs,
rundown. I need a vision for cleaning up
Times Square similar to what his vision was for downtown Las
Vegas, but office buildings very different to casinos and hotels.
And he had six casinos here and a bunch of land.
So I left in 2005, not expected to come back, but I ended up
working for him out after university.
And two years later, I'm working for him and he says, hey,
downtown Vegas is starting to change.
I was like, I was just there two years ago.
It was terrible. And he's like, no, I need
someone on the ground. It's all gone bad.
All my partners are bad. I need someone on the ground to
watch out for my interests. And I was the only person who
was not married, didn't have commitments to England or in any
other way. And I was like, I'll go out
there for three months and look at what's happened, if it's
really changed. Came back out, landed here 2007,
July 2007 and went down to the down E Fremont.
And all of a sudden it was still pretty shit.
But there was a downtown cocktail room, there was a
beauty bar and I met these two young guys at the cocktail bar
and one open owned the lounge, the bar and the other one was
building a high rise. I was like, wow, there's two
normal young guys trying to make a difference in downtown.
Like maybe there is something happening here.
And that was it. I just fell in love with
downtown and saw a path forward. It was also the huge recession
of O7O8O9 and all these casinos started losing money.
So the vision that they had for like developing downtown was put
on hold and it was just like shit, can we survive?
Can we make these places work? And that's when I learned the
business, and that's how it evolved.
Before we jump too far ahead, what What was that connection
with the men that ended up employing you?
Still today, still today, he owns the real estate at the
Plaza. I own the gaming license and the
operation. He's an amazing guy.
His name is Poyu Zablodovic, and he's the one who gave me the
opportunity to come out here and supported me.
And, and frankly, he's the one who carried these properties
through the recession, right? They needed a lot of money and
someone like myself when I was 23 who didn't have the vision at
that time for what these places could become, he stuck with it
and ultimately gave me the opportunity in 2014 to go ahead
and get licensed and take on the role as CEO here.
But it was all with his support and to this day, we're still
very close and he still still the landowner here.
He used to own Las Vegas club that's now soccer.
We sold the Western and the Gold spike to Tony Hsieh.
He owned the buildings out in East Fremont that are like
Commonwealth, La Comit la Mona Rosa.
That's my favorite area. Oh, yeah, yeah.
That was all me, man. When I, when I were not, the
whole area wasn't me, but those buildings were all were ours and
they were all like, there's a Philly cheese steak that were
rundown and nothing. And we put in the Thai, we put
in beauty bar, we put in Don Tomama.
Commonwealth at the time was La Comida, now it's Mona La, Mona
Rosa, all those bars, we all. Scream is there.
We all scream. I I'm always at, I'm always at.
We all scream. People love that place.
That's great. Yeah.
Good. Yeah.
So that was that was like my first project in town with those
buildings. How did he get connected to your
family? What would your father and or
mother do for? They were just friends.
They weren't like business associates.
They just knew each other as more acquaintances, friends in
London. I'm not sure exactly how they
met. I was young when we moved from
South Africa to London. They became friends maybe
through the neighborhoods, I don't know.
I, I that's a good question. I should probably ask my parents
how they knew him but they just met his friends and we were
just. I don't think they were super
close but we were friendly and I was just happened to be there.
Were you always just a? Prominent definition of luck and
good fortune and opportunity is understanding that every day you
meet somebody, you never know what that can lead to and and
and being open to all conversations.
Just so happens to own 6 properties in downtown Las Vegas
Yeah, that's incredible. You kind of alluded to it, but
you're one of the most pivotal individuals in the
revitalization of downtown Las Vegas.
Thank you. Why does?
I think there's a lot of people. I mean, and it all begins with
the man whose restaurant we're sitting in right now, Oscar
Goodman, if he hadn't been the champion of downtown in 1999.
There's an article on the wall over there where he's like Oscar
Goodman becomes mayor and sets his sights on downtown.
And it was a wasteland in many ways, and he was the champion.
He was the first one, as he said, when he got out of office,
it was a 12 year overnight success because everyone thinks
it just happened and it was easy.
But he put a, he put a lot of blood, sweat and tears into it.
It was him and then his mate and then his wife who became the
mayor. But I, but without them and the
Goodmans and their legacy, I'm not sure that a lot of the
people that ended up down here would have ended up down here.
So it it it all begins with them.
So how did that even come together with getting him the
restaurant we're in now? It's a great story.
He he was the mayor and we were renovating the Plaza.
We shut down in 2010. We were putting an all new
furniture that we bought from the Fountain Blue when it went
bankrupt in 2007. The old fountain.
We definitely need to get into that story.
It's one of my favorite stories of all time.
The old fountain. Was like this tile came out of
the fountain the original? Fountain.
It was vacant for a long, long time, you know.
Exactly. Yeah.
So we we had bought all that furniture in like 2010.
Could you blend those two stories together for us the the
actual acquisition of that because how old were you at that
time It's. Not.
I mean, I was 20, 8625, and we had decided we're going to
remodel the Plaza because it was doing really badly.
It was in the middle of the recession and we needed to do
something to bring this place back to life.
And the Las Vegas Club was across the street that was doing
really badly. And we would discuss like doing
a room remodel. It wasn't a big project.
It was a big project, but it wasn't what it ended up being.
And, and this designer lady called me and said, hey, I know
you're thinking of doing a room remodel.
I'm in the basement of the Fountain Blue, which has gone
bankrupt. And it's exactly the same
building that's there right now. That building was built the
shell, not the inside, but the shell.
And she's like, you won't believe what's in the garage.
And I was like, what is she like pilots of tile and wallpaper and
lights, everything that's going to go into this building.
And she's like, yeah, they're selling it for like $0.12 on the
dollar. So I went over there.
I drove there again. It wasn't like you could see
samples of the cockpits and the tile and the wallpaper, but it
wasn't like you understood the scale of it.
And I called the guy in England, I was like, hey, they're selling
all the stuff for cheap and it's really good looking stuff.
And to his credit, he was like, buy it.
And we just agreed on the spot to buy 1100 rooms worth of tile
carpet. But then what happened was like
we're like, wow, with these nice rooms, you're going to need new
elevators, new escalators, new casino carpet, new banquets,
new. Everything started evolving from
there. I was like, well we need a
restaurant, we need a steakhouse, we need to redo the
front desk. So we ended up buying way more
tile, way more wallpaper. Right now in the lobby when you
go down says that's the same tile from the fountain blue that
was meant to go in there. This right here sitting here is
the same tile that was in the fountain blue garage.
We didn't buy it all because a few other hotels ended up
getting like the scraps or the leftover excess stuff because
they had like 3000 rooms and we only needed 1000 ish.
So we ended up buying it on the spot, bought it in and that's
what was the catalyst for the big remodel.
And this used to be Firefly. Do you know, do you know
Firefly, the Spanish restaurant in town?
So this used to be Firefly and we realized we needed a
steakhouse for our higher end customers as part of the
remodel. So we were coming up, we were
sitting in a meeting thinking of names for a steakhouse and you
know, you think of it the one main and different names of
potential steakhouse. And we had to deal with this guy
to open a Speakeasy. And about a couple of weeks
before the opening, maybe a couple of months before the
opening, I got a little nervous that a Speakeasy was maybe not
ready for downtown, like downtown wasn't quite there yet.
And so I told him I was like, hey, what if we instead of
partnering with you to do the Speakeasy, what if we partner
with you to do the steakhouse? And he was like, OK, that's fair
enough. And we'll put a nice bar within
the steakhouse so you don't have to.
But I had a whole new Speakeasy. And he was like, OK.
And he was like, well, what's the idea?
And we was thinking about it. And he was like, well, Oscar
really wants to do a bar. What if we do a bar in the
restaurant after Oscar? And I was like, what if we just
do the whole restaurant as Oscar?
And he was like, I don't know. So we went to Oscar.
He was like, his last couple of days as mayor.
And all I did was I bought him a piece of piece of paper with a
picture of the Dome in the front there with his name and lights
overlooking Fremont Street. I was like, how would you like
to do this? And I don't even think he asked
me what it was. Could have been a brothel.
He didn't even ask me what is that?
He just said, I'm in, let's do it.
And and then we discussed the steakhouse.
We discussed the bar. We discussed the whole idea.
And he was in day one when he got out of office, we signed the
deal and he said to me when we signed the deals, like, I don't
know what this document says. He had a lawyer look at he's
like, but I'm not going to refer to this.
You do what you say you're going to do and I'll do what I say I'm
going to do. Otherwise we're going to have a
problem. And I was like, I was like a 25
year old kid. And the mob attorneys telling me
this. I was like, yeah.
And to this day, and it just came up the other day because we
needed some bank. We have never referred to our
document. We pay him, he does his things
he's obligated to. And we have the most beautiful
relationship now going to be almost 14 years old.
And we've never referred back to that document.
It's always been on a handshake the way it should be.
He's a great partner. Who was the woman that informed
you of the materials being sold? My name is Nancy.
She's an interior designer, contractor and I had another
contractor, interior designer, really great lady.
She's still in town, but she was the one who who was in the
fountain blue and got that access to that.
What did? How she got it?
What did that total deal ended up being worth that your
purchase from the what was it from the Fontainebleau or
because they had. Nose Carl Icon, Big business,
big businessman in in the country.
He's huge and he had bought the Fountain Blue, I think out of
bankruptcy and decided to sell all the old furniture.
I don't remember what it ended up costing us, but I remember
the number 12 cents on the dollar.
So whatever we paid, it was worth a lot more than that at
the time. We're talking multi $1,000,000.
Deal a big number. 26 years old. That's a big deal to.
Close. Yeah, that was a big deal.
And then and then to figure out how to shut this place down and
remodel it. Great life experience.
Yeah. What kind of cojones did that
take at that time? I don't know.
Because I, I, I never really thought about failure.
That's the thing. Like if you think about failure,
then it scares you. I never really thought about
failure. And the truth was I was
insulated by some really good operators, some good people that
were, they were good people. Whether they did a good job
running the place was a different question, but they
were good people. They had good intentions.
We had our owner in England who was backing us.
So it's like I felt pretty good about what we're doing.
And it's almost like I was stupid.
And so like, if you don't know the downside, then there is no
risk because I wasn't even aware that they could be major
downside. And it only dawned on me once we
did the big remodel and we reopened and we were still doing
even worse. That's when I realized, wow, OK,
this is this is a problem. It's all positive thoughts
Positive. Yeah.
Positive thoughts, positive outcome, right?
If you don't know the downside, then you don't have to worry
about it. So what was it like digging out
of the recession? Well, there was the recession
and then there was just the bad management of these places and,
and the misconception about it and learning what it was about
the Plaza that made it special. Back in the day in the 70s when
it was built, it was the place to go to.
It was the biggest hotel casino in the world.
It was, it was just a real icon and what had gone so wrong from
the 70s to the early 2000s in those like 30 years.
And the cool thing for me was walking around here as a 25 year
old, it was people that worked here and I talked to them to
this day that had worked here longer than I'd been alive.
It I wasn't here on opening night to 19711973, the second
tower, I wasn't here in the 70s, early 80s.
So for me to talk to these people that were here and saw
this place go from nothing, go go from being everything to just
nothing. First hand experience.
You know, was to learn from them was the key and and and I
understood what it was and it was a the original founder of
the Plaza was a guy called Jackie Gorn, who's an icon in
gaming and history of downtown Las Vegas.
He's really like the first, not the first, but one of the
biggest names in all of downtown.
His father, his son is Michael go on, who owns the South Point,
one of the best operators in town and and understanding from
him and the people that worked for him.
What he did that made this place special was a lot of what I took
on board to be like, I need to learn this and and understand
how to bring back the Plaza. So that was that was a big part
of it as well. What was your question?
Just the revitalization like kind of what went into that
because it I, I imagined getting out of the recession and even
surviving it was. Yeah, I mean, listen, surviving
it was tough. And then and then just thinking
about a lot of people said you should knock the Plaza down and
restart. It's like so bad.
It's rundown. And I took a different approach
of how can we improve it every day?
And it's still my mentality today is what can I do each day
bit by bit to improve the Plaza and the perception of the Plaza
that brings people down here. And so it was just kind of like
the metaphor, the nudge of how do you eat an elephant one bite
at a time. It's like you got to start from
somewhere. And so we did that remodel, but
didn't work. So what were the things I was
going to do each day, whether it was the the culture, the
training, the cleanliness, the music, little details along the
way, just keep improving the place.
And that's how we we dug out of it.
Have you ever heard that saying the elephant thing?
I've never heard that. I thought it was like a South
African thing too. You eat an elephant one bite at
a time. Never heard of it.
But I think that's what like one of the biggest things when you
watch like old school casino movies is the culture of the
early casinos, right? Everybody knew.
They knew customers names and everybody that walked in shook
hands. Right, that classic Vegas feel,
right, Like how do you balance that that, that that classic
Vegas feel and modernizing all the amenities and the services?
You know, it's kind of easy because the modernizing the
services and improving the property is obvious.
And everyone does that and everyone wants to improve.
Put new restaurants, keep upgrading, keep upgrading.
But just taking care of people and explaining to your team
members that like, relationships is what people are looking for.
Relationships are more important than, you know, fancy things.
People will go where they feel comfortable, and what it makes
them comfortable is. Yeah, it has to be clean and
safe, obviously, but what really differentiates you is how your
kids doing, how was your travel, how are things back home, what's
happening and understanding them and their relationships.
And that's what I've explained to our dealers, our security,
our casino hosts. Those personal relationships are
way more valuable than fancy tile and fancy carpet.
As long as it's clean, it's safe, it's nice.
That's the basic threshold you'll win on relationships.
That's the way it works for me. So repetitive because I live by
South Point, so when you go to South Point it's the same people
in their gambling every day. Yeah, Yeah.
By the way, if you work at the South Point, you never leave.
Yeah, because the guy's a good guy.
He takes care of you. And if you never leave, then
you're happy. Your job, you'll take care of
the customers because you take ownership of that place.
So you're exactly right. The people go back to where they
feel comfortable. And South Point is not the
nicest place in town. It's clean, it's safe, it's
good. They got greater restaurants,
good amenities, good programming.
But it's not, it's not the fanciest place in town.
It's just. But you run into the same people
all the time when you're in there.
Yeah, I like going. There at the tables at the
everywhere machines. What do you play do?
You gambling? I stopped gambling, actually.
But I'm with my cousin's like a chronic gambler, so I'm with him
all the time. I haven't gambled in eight
years. Oh.
Good for you. But he gambles a lot and I just
go with him and keep him company, yeah.
Live vicariously through him. Yeah, table games.
Table games, anything actually OK, Probably something like you.
He'll bet. We went to the, what is it the,
the All Blacks, the rugby. Oh, yeah, yeah.
And we're betting on rugby teams and we don't even know what the
teams are. We're betting by like, oh, who
comes out that time or who comes out that time?
Like he'll bet on anything. OK, fair.
Enough. Are you still a big time
gambler? I was never a big time gambler,
just more frequent. I enjoy it.
I don't gamble a lot, but I enjoy it.
I think it's, I see it definitely as entertainment.
People like, oh, it's so dumb. I understand the culture, the
psyche of the gambler, why they gamble.
It's different from many people, but I I definitely appreciate
the entertainment. I'm going to love it.
I love sports betting. I think like putting a bet on
some kind of sporting events and watching it.
It's really fun. So for me, I enjoy that.
But entertainment I, I, I don't necessarily go play a ton of
slots or sort of table games. There's not the patience for it,
but I enjoy it from out with friends.
Yeah, yeah. It is a lot of patience.
Yeah, yeah. If you want to be successful
like poker, I don't have any patience for poker.
It just takes too long. Yeah, that's true.
You were one of the first guys that kind of get with the social
media and having the the streamers and the guys doing
their videos come into the casino and play games and
whatnot. Yeah, what?
How did you know that that was going to be a thing?
I, I didn't know it, but I was watching some of these guys,
especially Brian Christopher was the first one in my opinion to
do it. And we, we realized like
20/17/2018 like there's something here.
And I remember doing a deal with Bryant to like pay him to come
down here. We were like, you're nuts.
And then we did bigger deal with him.
It was all in the newspaper. And like the guys from Golden
Nugget or South Point MG, I'm like, what are you doing?
Why you wasting your time with these influences?
Like it's just a bunch of kids. And I was like, I don't think
they get it. Like there's a 65 year old lady
watching this guy play slots. He's a kid.
He's young, not a kid, but he's young.
But the people watching him are not.
And there's people watch on YouTube and I was like, yeah,
you guys keep thinking that now. Now everybody's doing it.
Everyone's paying them down the street.
They're paying smaller influences.
It's it's amazing what it's taken onto a whole new life and
it's amazing how popular they become.
I mean, like Vegas, Matt, you walk down the street with him.
I did the other day. He's getting stopped by
everyone. The guys like he's, you know,
he's the, he's The Rolling Stones of today is the they're
just huge. So I I embraced it, realized
that just because they were young doesn't mean that their
fans are young. And now it's just a massive part
of the industry and everyone seems to be getting involved in
some degree. It was almost like taboo before
being able to record in a casino, right?
Like even take pictures or. Yeah, it's still is in some
places, but you got to find the balance.
I understand that people want privacy.
If your friend's gambling and he's betting a lot, he doesn't
necessarily want his friends or his family or somebody else's
wife to see him playing what he's gambling.
So I, I understand that you need to have special on table games,
but but what is weird to me is like they've got all these
rules, but yet people can walk through the casinos and film,
you know, you walk into the Bellagio, you can film the
Conservatory people have their phones out.
Phones to people are like extensions of their hands at
this point, right? It's not even, you don't even
have a hand. You just have your phone.
Everyone's got their phone right next to them.
So you hit a jackpot. The first thing you're doing is
taking out your phone to film it, right?
So it's like it's just finding the right balance between those
two things. Oh, was I going to ask you the
being a father in the casino industry time?
How do you split it up? Because I imagine being the CEO
you're sound like a massive numbers freak to me.
Numbers freak. Yeah.
Not at all. No, I really I like numbers, but
I'm not a no, no, I'm not that actually that good at math.
The, the answer your question is it's not easy because in the
early days and I and I, I'll give you another good quote.
I think I said this at my gaming Control Board hearing.
I was like 29. I can't believe I said this to
them, but they asked me like, what's your work ethic kind of
thing? I was like, the best, best
fertilizer in the field are the farmer's footsteps.
And what that means is basically the best way to run a business
is to be hands on and to be there.
And I used to stand here every single night and watch people
come into the Plaza and which way did they turn?
What was the first thing that they saw?
I would spend 18 hours a day easily in this building because
I, I loved it and it wasn't that hard for me to be here.
But you're both looking at me like I'm crazy with that weird
quote. It was it was good at the gaming
control. No.
No, I like it. I like it.
It was good at the gaming
Control Board anyway. So time is everything into a
business, right? Like there's that there's that
saying about 10,000 hours and something makes you an expert.
I've done my 10,000 hours plus in this building and, and so
very hard to deal with kids. I was lucky just to to start
down here at 23. I didn't have kids till I was I
think 31 or 32. So I had those years to earn my
time. And so, so now I found a much
better balance. I, I, I definitely realized
that, you know, my kids are already not one of them is 9.
I want to get home and do with my kids see them when they come
home from school sometimes. Otherwise, if I have a late
night, like last night, I don't see my kids the whole day and
then I may not see them till they go to school the next day.
And so like I can go 2 days without seeing my kids at some
point, which is not good. So having a good team is the
key. And, and in this town, it's not
easy, but once you build it, you keep it and you got a good
foundation. And I've been able to do that
now where I've got a great nucleus of a team around me.
And so like if I'm, I take my kids to South Africa like I did
last week, I trust my team. They know, they know me.
We've worked together. Some of them have grown up here,
as you know, my, my vice president of operations was a
poker dealer. I met him 12 years ago.
My head of casino marketing was a front desk agent.
And so I've, I've worked with them to, you know, and I was a
kid, they were kids. We all grew up together.
But they know what, how I think about things.
They can execute my vision, my ideas, and if they need me, they
call me. But generally they're a great
team which allows me to go be with my kids more.
How was that trip to South Africa?
How often do you guys get to go back?
Oh no, So I was far. I don't go back often.
I go back to England a lot more, but South Africa is I go, I my
kids have been twice in their whole lives, which is still a
lot for most people, but like it's, it's far.
It was a great trip though. We had a great time.
Safari Cape Town. Amazing place.
That's awesome. Yeah, it's good.
How what's the like the I guess the realistic, how realistic it
is. They're talking about things
like comments on social media in England right now and people
being arrested for their comments online against what I
hear on social media when I hear on podcast.
But I didn't know if you knew anyone around those type of
issues in England now like. The whole freedom of speech
thing. Right, you're arrested.
For what? Their comments on Facebook
posts. Oh, I.
Don't know anything about. Trying to restrict like freedom
of speech or something, something like that along those
lines. Sorry, I don't think about that.
Heading up for the because we're out of the winter time.
Are we going back to the the fireworks?
Yeah. OK.
Yeah, no. So tomorrow night, when does
this ad podcast go out? It's actually go out tomorrow.
Oh. Great, I love fireworks.
I love fireworks too, so I'll tell you a great story and ties
back to South Africa again, I'm just dropping wisdom on you
guys. This is great.
So, so about 2016 we opened up pull deck and I decided to do a
firework show. I'd never done a firework show.
I was so nervous. I was nervous of all the
different things that could go wrong.
I was just nervous about doing a fireworks show and it was
amazing. And so I was like, what if I did
fireworks for like that was July because it was July 4th.
So I was like, let's do fireworks for July 4th.
I was like, I had to wait till New Year's Eve to do another
fireworks show. So I started trying to find a
reason to do a firework show and it was expensive and like you
can't do it and it's just too hard.
You got to get permits, all these things.
So I waited for New Year's Eve and we did it again on New
Year's Eve. I was like, I'll never forget
the one casino owner down the street, all the way down on like
4th St. said to me, God, that's loud.
Everyone's asking where that noise is coming from.
They're like, oh, it's the Plaza doing fireworks.
And a light bulb went on from my head.
I was like, they're talking about me.
My competitors are all talking about me all the way down the
street. So then I was like, OK, it's
March Madness and not much as Saint Patrick's Day.
I'm going to do a fireworks show in March.
So I started doing a fireworks show for any big event I could
think of. Like I had a guy's birthday, a
casino guest birthday. I just do a fireworks show even
though it's expensive. I knew everyone was talking
about me. And then they built soca and
they're like, well, you can't do fireworks on this tower.
You got to do on that tower. And like, it became a bit more
complicated and we're just doing July 4th and, and New Year's
Eve. And then the pandemic happened
and I did fireworks even in the pandemic of July, and people
were mad at me that I was doing an event, like a super spreader
event. And I was like, it's just
fireworks, guys. You don't have to come stand in
the street. But it was packed.
Everyone was doubted to watch the fireworks in the pandemic.
Like people love fireworks, Everyone with their phone now.
So finally we were doing it during the day.
And then I said, you know, I was in Disneyland with my kids last
year and they did a great fireworks show every night.
How do they do this every night? Everyone comes out all over
Disney comes to watch the fireworks.
So that was it. I was like, you know what, I'm
going to do this, I'm going to do it every Friday night until
we get make enough money and I'm going to do it every night, but
I'm going to start with every Friday as a commitment to
welcome to the weekend. Everyone in Downtown Circle,
Golden Nugget, Fremont Street Experience all got behind it.
And so I was like every Friday night we're going to do
fireworks, make it a party, make it a part of the downtown
culture where everyone just knows it.
Friday, 9:15 PM, you can come downtown, free fireworks show.
And to bring it back to the South African thing with, you
know, the animals in South Africa, when they're walking in
the jungle, they make they roar or they make different noises to
let their other neighbors know that they're there.
That's their territory. And in the old days, the Plaza
was like this forgotten place in downtown.
No one was talking about the Plaza.
It was rundown. They built the zip line here.
You couldn't see. I like, I'm going to shoot
fireworks every night to make sure everyone in downtown knows
the Plaza is still here. And looking at us and cameras,
the Instagram, the social media, everyone's talking about us.
So come down tomorrow night, 9:15, we'll have fireworks.
Have you ever heard about the firework culture in Hawaii?
No. Like we go off and we love
fireworks. Really.
Yeah. It's insane.
Yeah. Flav Flav told me that he loves
everyone loves fireworks. I mean flavors.
I can do a bigger fireworks show.
I think he does an illegal show. We do.
We do on every New Year's at my house and it's like a show
pretty much. Really. 45 minutes?
Oh wow, it's really long. 45 minutes.
Yeah, we have. Everybody brings their
fireworks, like hundred of us. We bring it, we line it up.
That's kind of fun 'cause you're doing it yourself.
Yeah, to me, the, the someone was at a game, an Aviators game,
the baseball team, and they did a fireworks show.
It was like 45 minutes. And who wants to sit for 45
minutes and watch? What they do is they have the
same amount of product as I do, but they go and then it comes in
and it's like really slow. And I was like, I'd rather do 7
minutes but blow shit up, go big just everywhere.
And then it's done. As opposed to like kind of
wasting everyone's time like so. So our show on New Year's Eve,
July 4th is 8 minutes and it's, it's power.
Like a lot of false minds, you got to come to one.
But the Friday show we condense into 4 1/2 minutes because we
want to get people, you know, watch the show and then go and
listen to music or get drinks, whatever it is.
It's 4 1/2 minutes. But it's it's jam packed.
You love it? Yeah.
Like in in Hawaii we have every Friday.
They do it in Waikiki. Oh yeah, Every Friday.
Everybody goes out there, watches it, then you look for
any. Have a luau and then fireworks.
We look for any excuse to pop. Down tomorrow night.
Tell me what you think I'll. Come down.
I'd love to what? Why was that?
What's the whole story of the Fremont Experience cutting off
right before the Plaza and then the zip lines going up right
there? It's almost like they blocked
off the Plaza. Yeah, there was a lot of history
between the Plaza and the other casinos.
The Fremont Street's owned by the casinos.
It's it's governed by the casinos, I should say.
And basically the Plaza wasn't a member of the street then, it
was a member of the street, then they had a dispute affording how
this was before my time. And then right when I got here,
they started building the zip line as basically AFU to the
Plaza to to block it. But now there's a good
relationship with friends with everyone and it is what it is.
There's some people landing there.
It's kind of ugly, but it does well for the street, brings a
lot of people downtown, the zip line.
So at this point, it's it's water under the bridge.
Would it would it have been better in the old days?
Sure. Would it have been great if the
zip if the if the zip line landed at the Plaza?
And you get out the. Canopy had extended all the way
to the Plaza that would have been called but.
To the street or something like that up front.
Yeah, it would be nice. Yeah.
Are we out of time? But I think we are out of time.
Yeah, I'd be the we're out of time. 11:50 right now.
Yeah, whatever. We have a few more minutes.
Yeah, sure. Do you have anything?
There my favorite part of town of Vegas.
Honestly I love downtown. I've been living in Vegas back
and forth since 2002, but downtown it really is my
favorite. This is 1 mainstream man.
This is where it began. This was the first address in
Vegas right here. So yeah.
And I love that like the art district is is growing and you
feel safe when you're down there now.
Yeah, it's great. We used to come down here as a
family and then like 2000 and five, 2000 and six, 2008 and
like it was nothing. Yeah, Yeah, it was really
grinding back then. Yeah, now it's now it's great
part of town and I think it's only going to get better.
You know, I was at a groundbreaking for a high rise
opening behind us on Symphony Park.
I think when you see the new Art Museum coming, there's just so
much happening here that's got potential just to make this
really a great downtown like many other cities have so.
It's weird to like how people come to Vegas, but then they
don't want to. I feel like they're kind of
going away from the big business of the like the middle of the
strip you're trying to stay on the outskirts of.
It just this year alone, right? Like Vegas overall is down, if
I'm not mistaken, right? And downtown has been up the
last couple of months, right? It's it's hard to say.
I mean, the calendar is different.
Like we had the Super Bowl in February.
We didn't have the Super Bowl this year.
You have certain events that are good.
We just said WrestleMania, which is great.
That's really, yeah. I mean, some of you were saying
Canadian tourism is way down. It's hard to judge things like
in a short window of time. I think MGM just released their
numbers yesterday and they they have good occupancy and good
business. So we're ahead of last year,
we're up. So we're in good shape and you
got to continue I think as ebbs and flows to business patterns.
But it's generally Vegas head in the right direction.
Yes, it's probably getting a little expensive and they
should, especially on the strip, some of the things that maybe we
were talking about, but. The minimums in.
Yeah, the minimums and some of the service charges, but you
know, people are still coming so.
You are out if we're allowed to go into this you.
Guys need to come see our show. Have you seen the show?
The fireworks show or no? Mavericks the the the show.
I haven't seen it, no. Well, tomorrow if you come down
for the fireworks, we'll see the show 1st and then it's 21 plus
obviously. So you're just about able to go.
Justin just makes it. But go see the show and then see
the. Probably ID is.
Great. Yeah, exactly.
The show's great. Mavericks What time is it the
The Mavericks? 3:00 Yeah, I'm in like perfect.
7 till about 8:45 and then and then fireworks.
Shows I'm I'm definitely here for the I love my fireworks, I'm
telling you. Perfect.
Yeah. Do you guys kind of do you at
all cater to the Hawaiian audience out here just because
like so heavy downtown? Hawaiian audience, I wish, I
wish we could get. I tried for the longest time to
get zippies to come down. Here.
Really. Which I think would give me
credibility with the Hawaiians when I went to Hawaii.
They love Zippy's and they love Trader Joe's.
Yeah, I have people that hit me up every week.
Can you go to Trader Joe's and get me this and send it home?
It's the weirdest thing. I'm in Hawaiian like Trader
Joe's like. A guy just hit one of my friends
just texted me yesterday. He is.
Hey, can you get these tote bags from Trader Joe's?
I was like, just the tote bags. Yeah, just the tote bags and
send it back in all the colours and I'm just like weird, I guess
I. Don't get it?
I love the Hawaiian business. The California does a great job
of catering to the Hawaiians and they don't even do that much to
become a Hawaiian place. It just is what it is and
they've got a great a great. Brand couple of dishes in the
buffet that's about. It our bingo's really popular
with Hawaiian. We have the Las Vegas Jerky
store. That's our Hawaiian partners
there. Yeah, it's a great demographic
for Vegas and especially downtown.
Would you guys still be open to doing a Zippy's location?
I would love to or any other I I try to do the Rainbow Cafe
drive. Rainbows, rainbow driving.
I love that. Oh my, I went there.
I went to, I wanted to do that. I would do anything I could to
to, to become more credible in the Hawaiian community.
So yes, yeah. And they're moving here in.
Droves. Huge wave they're.
Moving Their first grand opening was massive.
Second restaurant. I'll do it.
We'll do some work on that. Zippy Zippy's wasn't ready for
downtown, apparently. They're opening their, then they
opened it already. They're open your.
Second, they're open your. 3rd their third, yeah.
Yeah, they just weren't ready for downtown, I feel.
That they might be way. Too busy down here for you?
We've got to read up, Justin. I think we might be ready.
Yeah, right. Before we get out of here, are
you willing to talk anything about kind of like the Jewish or
what do you call it anti-Semitism online and what
not? Because I I don't understand it
at all. We don't have many Jewish people
in Hawaii. I guess you could say that.
So it's just like a foreign subject.
I mean, I've never understood. I don't.
It seems to almost be like a like a dominating sentiment
online. It's crazy.
Not sure what I would say other than I, I, I'm Jewish and I find
it amazing. Like I was really sheltered I
guess as a kid. So I hadn't really experienced
anti-Semitism. And then coming to America, I
started hearing things. I was like, Oh my God, people
actually say that stuff. And then after October the 7th
when the attack on Israel happened, you started seeing a
lot more stuff. And yeah, I don't get it.
I, I don't like it. I don't, I don't like the people
that do it. And very proud to be Jewish.
Amazing people, amazing community.
And hopefully, hopefully it stops.
Why do you guys get blamed for everything though?
I don't. Know I know like from coming
from Hawaii, we're like mixed culture so we get along with
everybody but yeah all I know is like when they bring it up is
like oh they're really good at finances and I'm just like why
is. Why is, Yeah, I don't know why
people say it. And there's a lot of Jewish
people that aren't successful and there's a lot of Jewish
people that struggle. And so it's like, I feel bad for
them, especially because, like, they're like, yeah.
They went to this court. Or they or they all are this or
it's like, no, there's a lot of Jewish people that are not and
and it's really unfair to label everyone in the same way.
Don't know the answer. It's a really small, tiny, tiny
population of people. And clearly they've had success
in industries, but doesn't seem like a never understood the the
anti-Semitism. And you look at Kanye West,
fucking crazy guy. Yeah.
That's even gone worse and worse.
Right, exactly. So I can't explain it, but
obviously not not not a fan. Yeah, yeah.
Of anyone who is anti-Semitic. Yeah.
But thank you for asking that question.
Yeah, I I shedding a spotlight on that and make sure that if
you educate people. Yeah, policy was the one that
kind of like when I had asked him because I just didn't
understand that on, he said he's just done so much business with
Jewish people growing up that they just work hard, they're
focused, they're family oriented, they go to work, they
come home, read the Bible and then good.
People. Yeah, I don't get it.
Is he Jewish? Someone asked him.
No. He's not.
He's like speaks Yiddish.
I don't understand. He's like Italian and something
else. Yeah, Somebody was saying, is he
Jewish? I was like, I don't know.
He says he is, but I I'm not sure that he is.
I don't know. Is Jew, is that a like a a slur?
Is that a offensive at all? Jew.
Yes. No.
OK, so. Make sure to call someone a Jew.
I mean, it depends on the context I guess.
That's right. Good point.
Very good point. Great people.
Said you dirty whatever, that's not good.
But just to say, are you a Jew? That's not a RAID.
All right, just want to make sure because I've used it not
obviously not an anti-Semitic way, but like just call him my
buddy. Oh my buddy's a Jew, but like.
Yeah, I think that's OK. I've never got to even ask him
if it was a offensive at all. So good.
Perfect. Appreciate you bringing that up.
Most people don't talk about that on podcast, so thank.
You. Yeah, No, I just again, like we
don't have, I didn't grow up around racism.
I didn't experience it until I went off to College in North
Dakota, so. I was racing dirt bikes and I
ended up on the East Coast. And then there was talking about
racism and I was like, what? What is that?
I didn't even know what, I didn't even know what it was.
You know, I grew up in South Africa where there's apartheid,
so I understand, you know, racism, but I was never, like,
exposed. Exposed to it.
Yeah. Yeah.
That's awesome. We'll look forward to getting
together on Friday for Mavericks, the fireworks show
and appreciate you so much. Good.
Luck with the podcast Keep. Thank you.
Same to you everybody. Anything to plug other than the
Plaza? Obviously the podcast.
Come on down, coming down to coming down to Oscars.
Have drinks, hang out, check out the new table games.
Very proud of Downtown in the Plaza and what it's becoming.
The one and only is Jonathan Jossel.
Thank you so much for your time. See you guys next time.
Appreciate you, Jonathan. Thank you so much.
Thank you, Jonathan. It's awesome.