(Originally published October 10, 2005)
Atlantic City, N.J. — The most challenging part of Robert Kelly's job these days is getting meeting planners to make a site visit to the expanded Tropicana Resort and Casino and its dining and entertainment zone, The Quarter. After that, he says, the place sells itself.
"Corporate groups love this setting," noted Kelly, the Tropicana's national sales manager, during a tour of the new restaurants in The Quarter and the meeting facilities." My job is simply to get them here."
The Trop's $280 million expansion has added The Quarter and the Havana Tower, with 45,000 square feet of meeting space, 505 new guestrooms and 2,400 new parking spaces. The sleeping rooms were vital to increasing the property's appeal to groups, and convenient parking is a necessary amenity in Atlantic City's mostly drive-in market. The additions brought the Trop's totals to 121,000 square feet for meetings and entertainment and 2,100 guestrooms, making it the largest hotel in New Jersey.
The new facilities include ocean views from four new boardrooms and four hospitality rooms on the top floor of the Havana Tower, and 21 separate meeting rooms of 630 to 2,000 square feet on the fourth level.
The Quarter, designed to evoke the atmosphere and spirit of Havana in pre- Castro Cuba of the 1950s, has more than a dozen dining and nighttime entertainment venues and 35 shops. The retailers and restaurants surround a fountain in a central courtyard, with a three-story atrium rising above. With tropical plants arching over the courtyard, visitors feel as if they're practically outdoors, strolling the streets of a spiffed-up Havana.
The restaurants include branches of well-known names from New York and Philadelphia, where Atlantic City still gets most of its visitors. Among them are Carmines in New York, Cuba Libre Restaurant and Rum Bar in Philadelphia, and the upscale national chains P.F. Chang's China Bistro and The Palm. The combination dining-nightlife options include The Sound of Philadelphia, a soul-and-blues club; The Comedy Stop Cabaret and Cafe; Ri Ra, an Irish bar; 32 Degrees Luxe Lounge; Planet Rose, a karaoke bar; and an Imax theater.
The Tropicana's Kelly said groups have quickly seized on the chance to include the restaurants as part of their meeting attendees' dining options. "One group, with 4,000 room nights, the New Jersey League of Municipalities, will use three restaurants for a dinearound for 1,200 people this fall," he said.
The Tropicana's expansion and development of the 200,000-square-foot Quarter is the result of eight years of planning by Aztar Corp., the Trop's owner since it opened 26 years ago. Officials say they were among the first to recognize that Atlantic City needed to emulate the success of Las Vegas, becoming more of a group- and family-oriented destination by adding upscale meeting space and entertainment and dining options.
The 2003 opening of The Borgata, the first new Atlantic City casino-hotel in 13 years, was only the most visible of many properties' efforts to take the beach-andgambling destination to a new level, according to Atlantic City officials.
After it opened last fall, the Quarter quickly became its own destination at the south end of the Boardwalk area and in the opposite corner of the city from The Borgata. Groups that have used the Tropicana for years are among those who say that the property stepped up to the challenge of broadening Atlantic City's appeal, to the benefit of convention and meeting attendees.
The Utility and Transportation Contractors Association of New Jersey, which has 1,100 companies as members, in early September was expecting more than 1,400 people to register for its annual fall conference at the Trop the last weekend of September, about 12 percent more than any previous year, said Robert Briant Sr., the association's CEO.
"It's all because of what the Tropicana has done," Briant said. "The convention and banquet staff always do a terrific job. Now they have this tremendous facility in The Quarter. They have a real winner there."
Briant, whose group has used the Tropicana for more than 20 years, said several companies that are members of the association will use The Quarter's restaurants for private functions during the conference. While most other Atlantic City casino-hotels have upgraded their meeting, dining and entertainment facilities in the last few years, Briant said he expects to keep using the Trop, because "with all the meeting space we use, there's no other property in the city that can handle our group."
One other aspect of The Quarter and the Havana Tower that should appeal to many meeting planners: The facilities are separated from the Trop's casino, cutting down on one of the distractions that planners sometimes cite for avoiding gaming destinations.