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When Was The Last Time You Said 'Amazing' and Meant It?
I admit it. I'm obsessed with ARIA's marketing campaign. From the first smoldering sniffs of 'city within a city' to the scandalous scent of "remember to breathe" to the steaming stench of "words will fail you" I've attempted to make sense of how property is being explained/sold to us. My best efforts have yet to yield little more than anguish. And hair loss inducing head scratching.
Two weeks ago, the bafflement shape shifted itself yet again, from fanciful video montage injected between Bourdainisms to gigantic rectangular quips hanging over various strip malls (small s) and McDonald's in my greater 'hood. Aria - and nearly every other Vegas joint - has me physically surrounded, an occupational hazard being in the prime casino target audience : a Southern Californian.
What is it that ARIA wants every resident of Los Angeles to know about its property? This:

And just like that, it's time for a trip to Vegas.
There's a new casino, come check it out! Makes perfect, yet dull, sense.
And this:

When was the last time you said 'amazing' and meant it
Good question. Radiohead at the Hollywood Bowl 5 years ago?

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Well for me at least, I think the last time I had dinner with Chuck & Hunter, that evening was pretty Amazing. :)
perhaps you overlooked the "and meant it?" stipulation in the tag line.
I live pretty close to Atlantic City, and I remember when the Mirage was being built, they had billboards on the Atlantic City Expressway advertising it. I'll never forget it either. No pictures or anything, it just said "Over the rainbow, and just past Utah. The Mirage, Las Vegas" I know I know, cheesy. But it made me want to get out of Atlantic City and see Las Vegas.
I've been seeing those billboards around Chicago lately, too.
CityCenter lacks a defining feature and these ads only accentuate the problem. Elvis is its biggest selling point and it has serious issues. They need to have at least one thing (club, rooms, pool, spa, restaurant, casino, fountain, theme, event, etc...) they can claim as the best (in Vegas).
Molson Canadian up here has an even better line for their Rickards Red line, "take the best day of your life and put it in your mouth". Always make me laugh...
I strongly agree with the commenters who suggest that City Center needs a focal point. The premise behind CC, originally, was that it would mark a transformation into something like a real, urban city -- with condos & offices in addition to hotels, a casino and retail. The offices and condos didn't really happen -- at least condos with actual people living there. In addition, the depression/recession sort of knocked the excitement out of Crystals, the retail component. My reaction and others I've talked to was that Crystals is sort of depressing -- being surrounded by empty stores and stuff that is so expensive that I could never afford even if my retirement fund ever recovered. Thus, we are left with three really nice hotels, a casino and a lot of ultra high-end retail and restaurants. I think they need to do something more creative with Crystals to draw people in and make CC something special in practice, not just in theory.
I was at that Radiohead gig.
As for 'amazing', the halibut and chips at Mastro's was amazing.
Aria is like the Buick LaCross of Vegas properties. Sure, it's nice and new, but it's not obviously not in Wynncore's league or even Bellagio's, and it's a mistake to promote it as such. They shouldn't promise what they can't deliver.
Granted, the marketing team is in a huge bind. The ersatz city theme is hardly a drawing point ("Even More Realistic Than New York New York!"), and the rich urban sophisticates that City Center was designed for now seem no longer interested in making Vegas their playground. They've moved on.
Anyone seen the TV commercials for CC? With the piano music I thought it was a commercial for Nordstroms. I had to see it couple of times before I realize it was a commercial for CC.
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