Well Happy New Year to everyone.  So what are your resolutions?  I’m sure that everyone has similar ones trying to give up their dark delights for the next year and maybe some will work out but all and all they mostly don’t.  So why is this…I see the reason being it’s more fun to be bad then good and heck I guess that’s why I live in Las Vegas.  Here are a couple resolutions that I think the Las Vegas Nightlife should stick by.

#1 we need to get rid of all the bull shit promotions companies that keep popping up everywhere.

In the spirit of Jeff Foxworthy; you are not a promotions company if:

You don’t have a business license

You don’t have a company bank account

You don’t have an office

You are the only person in the company

Your listed company webpage is a Myspace page

You pay your people in cash

You are a street hustler who works for tips

These companies piss me off for numerous reasons mostly though because these so called companies give real hard working companies a bad name.  Also they post their ads on craigslist and make it harder to get good employees.  If you are an actual promoter and you go to one of their interviews it’s most likely going to put a bad taste in your mouth about the nightlife companies in Vegas.  And hell maybe you go to another interview to see if it’s any better but it’s another crappy “company”, well that’s enough to make you go back to waiting tables.  If you want a promotions job in the city you have a couple good choices for reputable companies that have been around.  Pure Management, Light group, Angel Music Group, Red Carpet VIP, and of course us, sure there are a couple others that are good and I’m sorry for leaving you out but these are the bigger ones with actual clients, employees and contracts with venues.  Ok moving on…

#2 Door hosts need to lighten up, in reality your job is very, very easy

Door hosts in Vegas have this enlightened sense of importance and why is this? I guess because if they don’t like you, or you don’t glad hand them, they can tell you to fuck off and bar you from their club.  OK we understand that, but let’s expound upon this further…  As an example, I’ll use a fictitious club, let’s call it Douché. If your staff is rude to everyone, making them wait in line for an hour just to tell them they can’t get in for whatever arbitrary reason you have, this creates a ripple effect.  Equaling less clients and making you spend more money on marketing and promotions in the future.  My solution is to have an extremely nice group of door hosts.  This will increase client repeat visits, create a good vibe and buzz about the club and make more profit for the venue overall.  Of course it doesn’t matter if you have a nice or mean group of hosts if you have no marketing or people coming into the club anyways. (Sorry Riské)

#3 Stop the kick back battles

Ok I know this one is gonna piss off some people but come on, paying a cab driver a $100 per person to drive 1 someone to the strip club is crazy.  Think about the limo and taxi drivers are not creating anymore business for the strip club.  The driver is just that a driver they are not an expert promoter by any means.  Person gets into cab and tells the driver take me to Sapphire, which they do and the driver get $100 a person?!?!?!  If you’re going to pay someone that money it should be the person or company that put the idea in that persons head to go that club in the first place.  (Counter agreement for all my limo and cab drivers…Say the person wanted to go to Crazy Horse 3 and we convinced them to go to the Velvet Lion instead)  Ok well that fine but the only reason you would convince them to go anywhere else is to get more money, it doesn’t matter if the club is a hole in the wall you don’t have the clients best interest in mind you have yours.  Half the drivers don’t know anything about the clubs but what the kick back is that night. That’s just bad customer service.  All in all the same amount of people are going to go to the strip clubs whether the kick back is $10 or $100.  The solution is to just stop this ridiculousness and go back to actual marketing and promotions, or at least have all the clubs come to an agreement on a cap level to pay out like $50 per head maximum.

#4 Stop hiring your friends into highly important jobs

Another one that might piss some people off, but I guess all these will get under the skin of some people.    Think about it we have all heard the saying it’s not what you know but who you know and that is true everywhere but I have never seen this so much as I do out here in Vegas.  The director of marketing and promotions or General Manager or VIP services manager should be someone who is well qualified for the job.  These people should have years and years of experience and probably a degree.  But that is not the case in Vegas, how does someone who was a shoe salesman go to being VIP host or how does a line cook end up being in charge or your marketing or how does a security guard end up being your GM? The answer is simple they knew someone.  It’s fine, it really is and I get it to an extent but it just sucks when you then have to listen to this person who has no idea what they are talking about, or when you see them running a club into the ground and they won’t even listen to a word you’re saying.  The funny thing is though that this person will end up making you feel like you have no idea and start questioning yourself. lol gotta love Vegas!!

#5 If you failed miserably at 1 or more places doing a job stop hiring them or even promoting them

This one kind of goes with #4 but I thought it needed its own section.  Out here people change venues and locations in the nightlife seamlessly.  They will get fired or quit because they are not getting the results they need to get, go somewhere else because they know the hiring manager and start with a clean slate, fail and then do it again.  It’s funny to see and doesn’t bother me until they start getting promoted to bigger and better jobs.  Why would this happen, well because on their resume they have worked for 6 different nightclubs in Vegas, they know everyone in the industry and this get’s them ahead.  Yes they have experience but its experience on how to fail and I’m not a big supporter of this. Being promoted for a job well done is one thing, being rewarded for a failing at the prior job is quite another.

#6 and the final resolution: Clean the Las Vegas Strip of all the street hustlers

These are the people that lazy promoters give their VIP passes to so they can go home and smoke a bowl or play poker for a couple hours instead of doing work.  These people are con men they will sell you anything and half the time they do.  This last New Year’s Eve street hustlers were out on the strip selling VIP passes and wrist bands to people for up to $50 a piece and telling their customers that they will get them free admission, open bar, and whatever other lie they have to tell to make the $50 off the rube. It’s a huge scam and it puts a bad name on all the actual promoters that work the Las Vegas strip and actually get paid on their returns.  How to spot a street hustler it’s pretty easy.  Most of them are drug addicts, they will almost never be dressed up looking professional, and they will always be outside on the strip.  This is because they don’t work for any of the clubs so they would and have been kicked out of all the casinos.  Another sure way to know them is if they will not give you the passes for free which all the VIP passes in Las Vegas are.  They will always ask for a tip or a good tip.  Most of the street hustlers do work longer and harder than any of the real promoters which is why I was going to add another resolution to have the actual promoters actually work this year but you get the point. These guys make it so much harder for real companies and promoters to accomplish a job.  The clubs and venues that support and let these leaches feed off the scraps should seriously think about this one little idea: You are paying someone to promote your venue, they turn around and give their material to a street hustler, he in turn sells it to some group, and misrepresents your venue with blatant lies, and now the doorman who is generally rude to people has another headache when some group of 5 guys walk up with wristbands they bought for the “open Bar” only to find out that the wristbands were for women only, and that they will have to pay an additional cover. This is putting a really bad taste in the mouth of the guys who just got ripped off for $250 in wristbands when their told that the cover is $20 for the night. Anyone see how the all of this becomes a vicious circle that costs the club money in door revenue, man-hours, promotional pay, marketing, and spin control?

So Happy New Year Las Vegas Nightlife here’s to a great 2010, the fact of the matter is that none of these things will change, but imagine if they all did, it’s not that hard if you try.