Agreement to bring new entertainment events to Las Vegas

The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority on Tuesday approved a three-year, $6.75 million contract with a company that will produce special events in the city.

The contract with SFX Live will bring to Las Vegas at least nine special events on weekends with a history of low hotel occupancy.

The company will develop concerts, theatrical presentations, specialized motor sports events and festivals in the city. In addition, the company will market Las Vegas and feed visitors to the city from events it sponsors nationwide.

The first event in the package: the George Strait Country Music Festival on May 8 at Sam Boyd Stadium.

SFX Live is a division of New York-based SFX Entertainment and bills itself as the largest diversified promoter, producer and venue operator for live entertainment events in the United States. Last year, the company produced 13,000 events and sold 35 million tickets.

LVCVA board member Don Snyder said the agency's partnership with SFX "is the entertainment equivalent of having a major league franchise." Indeed, SFX sells more tickets than the National Football League or the National Basketball Association in a year.

Bruce Eskowitz, executive vice president of SFX Life, said diversity is a key element to SFX's success. The company produces several styles of live concert, from rock to country, and theatrical presentations that range from "Jekyll and Hyde" to "Rent." It also offers gymnasts, ice shows, "Lord of the Dance" and monster truck rallies.

The Nashville River Stages, the Music Midtown of Atlanta and the Summer Sounds of Charlotte, N.C., are all music festivals under the SFX banner.

SFX officials said they would stage their events in "neutral sites" like the Thomas & Mack Center and Sam Boyd Stadium and hope that individual hotels have tie-in promotions, like similar acts, to perform in the same weekend as the SFX event.

In addition to staging the shows, SFX will market Las Vegas in other cities in which it has presentations. In the first year, SFX said its emphasis would be on Atlanta, Boston, Houston, Kansas City, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Phoenix and San Francisco.

In 2000, the company will add Chicago, Philadelphia, Seattle, St. Louis and San Antonio, Texas, to the mix and in 2001, Denver, Nashville, Pittsburgh, Washington, D.C. and Columbus, Ohio, will be added.

In addition to promoting Las Vegas as the entertainment capital in its shows and festivals, SFX will mention the city in its advertising campaigns.

Eskowitz said Las Vegas hotels would get thousands of tickets for events as incentives for good customers. Resort guests would get preferential ticket offers before sales to the public. Backstage passes, meet-and-greet events and other special promotions are part of the package.

The LVCVA and SFX already have identified potential weekends for events. Weekends with occupancy levels below 90 percent are being targeted. They include the first weekend of February, the second weekends of April, May, June and December, the third weekends of January, August and November and the fourth weekend of November.

The May 8 appearance of country stars headlined by George Strait kicks off the partnership. The 11-hour concert event will feature Tim McGraw, the Dixie Chicks, Kenny Chesney, Jo Dee Messina, Mark Wills and Asleep at the Wheel. Since the Strait festival won't be making a stop in Southern California, SFX intends to market it heavily in Los Angeles.

"The alliance with SFX is a major component in our overall strategic plan for marketing and promoting Las Vegas," said Manuel Cortez, president of the LVCVA. "It creates numerous opportunities for all of our resort partners to get involved with high-profile, world-class mega-events."

The SFX deal was six months in the making by the LVCVA's advertising consultants, R&R Advertising.

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