Now the tusk is fixed, glued back on _ a symbol that the company realizes the small things are just as important as the big ones when it comes to succeeding in the new Atlantic City.
"You have a lot of competition to Atlantic City now, which it's never had before," said company chairman Donald Trump. "Now it's really a question of marketing and running (the Trump casinos) beautifully."
The company faces stiff headwinds _ more than $1.5 billion in debt, better-financed competitors with a big head start on offering the kind of Las Vegas-style resort appeal that Atlantic City has only recently embraced, and at least two deep-pocketed companies who will open new casinos within four years. It sought buyers for the Taj Mahal, Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino, and Trump Marina Hotel Casino. A proposed deal came close, but fell through in July.
Donald Trump said there are still several potential buyers, either for the company as a whole or for a piecemeal sale. But he refuses to identify them or characterize how serious the talks have become. In the meantime, the company is focused on turning around its bottom line.
"Our turnaround strategy has always been to identify our better customers and market to them," said Mark Juliano, a 30-year veteran casino executive who once ran Caesars Palace in Las Vegas and who took over as Trump's CEO this summer. "It's to try to get the company away from depending on the day-trip gambler as opposed to someone who wants to come for a 2 or 3-day entertainment experience."
To do that, Trump needs more hotel rooms to put them in. The company is building a second tower at the Taj Mahal for $255 million that should be open in the third quarter of 2008. The 786 rooms it includes will give Trump 3,670 rooms _ about the same as a new casino planned here by Revel Entertainment Group. The new rooms at the Taj are a major part of the company's strategy to whittle away the $1.5 billion in debt that has limited its options in the past and scared off some potential buyers. The debt remains despite a 2005 bankruptcy reorganization.
Virtually every room in all three casinos has been renovated in recent years, and new restaurants opened at the Taj and Marina. A makeover stripped much of the garishness from the Taj, including its infamous purple carpet, which Juliano promised the state Casino Control Commission "has been banished forever."
http://www.1010wins.com/Trump-Casinos:-The-Art-of-the-Comeback-/1019132
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