Lady Gaga’s liking of her experience at Casino Wien was greatly helped by the level of privacy offered to her during her casino visit—originally planned as a one hour visit, she ended up staying for five hours. The casino restricted media access, with photographers and national TV kept in the downstairs entrance area.
“The level of privacy and discretion that we deliver attract high-end guests to our casino, especially those from Eastern Europe and the Middle East. Over the last two years we have seen an increase in guests from the BRIC* countries.”
As I said my goodbyes to Mr. Türmer and the staff at Casino Wien—located as it is in the heart of this beautiful, historic city—I could only wonder at the growth potential facing such a property with the opportunities to attract a wider audience. What exciting challenges await Casino Wien!
Grand Casino Baden The following day, I visited Grand Casino Baden,
located in one of Austria’s most touristic spa towns. The casino is housed in the Kurhaus, an 18th
Century building that was originally a spa—or bath house. In 1870 it was already a ‘casino’ attracting royalty from around Europe who would come to the Kurhaus for the healthy waters and who would gamble while visiting to entertain themselves.
As with Casino Wien, the ground floor has an informal Jackpot Casino that offers gaming from 1pm. On the first floor is the main casino area, a separate poker room, and a range of F&B spaces; all open from 3pm. The second floor focuses on entertainment and F&B and is dominated by the historic Festsaal. The casino currently offers 270 slots, 29 live tables, multi-roulettes, and 700 square meters of dining space. The MEGA MILLION JACKPOT that operates across all 12 Casinos Austria’s was recently won at Grand Casino Baden by a guest who walked away with an impressive €1.1 million. In fact, Casinos Austria made 11 guests millionaires during 2010.
I received a tour of Grand Casino Baden from Mr. Paul Vogel, Guest Relation and Operations Manager. Mr. Vogel has worked at several Casinos Austria properties since 1990 in a variety of customer-focused roles, starting out as croupier at Seefeld.
“Grand Casino Baden attracted about 300,000 guests in 2010, with 60,000 visitors purely for
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Damien Connelly and Paul Vogel, Guest Relation Manager at Grand Casino Baden
dining and entertainment. We offer dining and casino packages, as do other Casinos Austria properties; in 2010 we sold approximately 50,000 of these packages. In total, Grand Casino Baden accounts for one third of all dining and casino packages sold each year by all of Casinos Austria.
“We have a broad range of entertainment options, including our external areas. We recently held a function with Walt Disney linked in to a major film release, and this made use of our external areas. We can use these as ‘transmitter’ areas so guests who do not wish to enter our gaming areas can be directed to our F&B areas. Those guests who come to dine or be entertained and then decide to enter our gaming areas can be registered at a
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