Greektown Casino owners are betting on metro Detroiters' affection for the neighborhood
Originally published November 10, 2000

BY TINA LAM
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER

The Greektown Casino, an idea first hatched more than a decade ago, is finally a $200-million red brick and glittering neon reality.

The casino opens 15 months after MGM Grand and 11 months after MotorCity, giving its rivals ample time to build gamblers' loyalty and habits.

But this casino is the homegrown alternative, wholly owned by Michigan residents, and its owners and managers hope to capitalize on metro Detroiters' fondness for Greektown.

A 1996 poll of metro Detroiters found that Greektown is one of the best-known areas in the city and that people regard it as familiar and safe.

Four years later, the nearly empty and forlorn Trappers Alley has been reborn as a Mediterranean-themed gambling palace already surrounded by nearly two dozen restaurants and bars. Among them is Fishbone's Rhythm Kitchen Cafe, which in the recent past has been the state's top-grossing restaurant.

The casino is the only one of the city's three that is in an already lively area and the only one on the People Mover route. It's also the only one without attached parking, which could create trouble in an area already short on parking lots.

The casino has identified 3,400 parking spots during the day and a little more than 4,000 at night within a few blocks. But, unless they use the casino's free valet parking, gamblers who park in the lots associated with the casino will have to get parking tickets validated. Shuttles will operate between lots and the casino.

True to promises made to city voters before they approved plans for a casino in Greektown in 1994, the casino is not a self-contained fortress. With just one restaurant of its own and no buffet -- almost unheard-of for a casino -- it will encourage gamblers to eat at nearby restaurants already operating in Greektown.

"We don't want to take over the district," casino manager Mike Mecca says.

The other two city casinos, in areas with few other meal options, have four or five restaurants each, including lunch, dinner and weekend breakfast buffets. Those and their adjacent parking garages mean gamblers drive in, park and usually don't leave until it's time to go home.

At Greektown, three independent restaurants and a flower shop have entrances on Monroe Street and back doors that lead into the casino, inviting patrons inside but also giving gamblers easy access to the street. Inside, the casino has several stages for entertainment in its bar areas.

Greektown Casino has something else not often found in gambling halls: windows.

The nonsmoking room has a large skylight, and big windows grace a bar and lounge area that adjoins two gaming areas.

The refurbished Trappers Alley side of the casino has a tall atrium, a slate-floored cappuccino bar beneath a glass ceiling and a balcony with outdoor tables. Red brick, green-trimmed windows and iron railings give the place a historic feel -- and rightfully so.

Greektown got its start in the early 1900s, when it became the heart of a bustling community of immigrants from southern Greece.

In 1966, the city and the Central Business District Association came up with a plan to clean up and market Greektown and held the first of many annual festivals there in July. In 1978, several businessmen and the city began planning a festival marketplace, which finally opened as Trappers Alley in 1985. Ex-Greektown Casino partners Ted Gatzaros and Jim Papas bought it in 1989.

The casino owners have put another $200 million into refurbishing Trappers Alley, and the adjoining restaurants have also had major face-lifts.

National gambling experts expect Greektown Casino to do well, since the other three casinos in Detroit and Windsor have proved there's a strong market here. Gamblers seem just as eager to line up for tonight's grand opening as they have for the others.

Casino Windsor is taking in about $1.3 million daily, MGM Grand about $1 million daily and MotorCity about $900,000 daily in gambling revenue, according to their most recent reports, for a total of about $1.1 billion each year. Greektown's opening could bring slight drops at the other properties, but most stock analysts expect the Detroit-Windsor market to bring in $1.2 to $1.5 billion each year.

Most of the gamblers who come to Greektown are likely to be from southeast Michigan.

"This is a locals market," says Sal Semola, vice president of table-game operations for the Greektown Casino.

Greektown managers earlier this year held focus groups with some local gamblers to determine what they wanted. The answer: higher betting limits, says Semola. Greektown plans to focus heavily on high rollers, devoting about a quarter of its second floor to the exclusive Pantheon Club, where bets can rise as high as $10,000 per hand and two of the slot machines cost $500 per pull.

The Pantheon Club boasts higher staffing, fewer seats at table games, more attention and some of the casino's strongest supervisors, Semola says. It has its own bar, big-screen TV, entrance, elevator and valet parking. Card decks are shuffled by hand rather than by machine, as they are elsewhere in the casino.

Greektown Casino has the biggest stage among the three Detroit casinos in its Apollo lounge, where the elegant Opa bar features a huge flame that changes colors, and several smaller bars.

The casino's Mediterranean theme comes through in giant Greek Isles murals, stone statues and paintings of urns, all mixed with rich marbles, dark-hued carpets and glossy wood finishes.

For its owners, the Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians and a group of Detroit investors, the new casino is a dream finally come true. Says investor Marvin Beatty, "We've waited for this for such a long time."