Q&A with Lyle Randolph of Century Casino Cape Girardeau

Lyle Randolph has served as general manager of Century Casino Cape Girardeau, 777 Main St. in Cape Girardeau, since 2013. The Gideon, Missouri, native has been in the casino business for 27 years.

On a macro level, Randolph is a member of senior management for Century Casino Inc. properties — and as a vice president for operations, has oversight responsibility for the older Century Casino in Caruthersville, Missouri.

Both Southeast Missouri casinos are due for multimillion-dollar upgrades between now and 2024.

Before Thursday's groundbreaking for a new $26 million hotel for Century Casino Cape Girardeau, the Southeast Missourian presented seven issues to Randolph about the business of gaming and how it has been impacted by economic factors and by the extended pandemic, now considered endemic in many parts of America.

An interior rendering of the upcoming $26 million Century Casino Cape Girardeau hotel, projected for completion in December 2023. A groundbreaking for the six-story, 69-room hotel was held Thursday at the Mississippi riverfront next to the casino at 777 Main St. in Cape Girardeau.Submitted

• Are you adjusting to a new normal in the casino industry? Another way to put it is, how badly did COVID rock your business?

It was a time for us to reset and see what is important to our customers and community. The hotel, which we hope will be in operation by December 2023, helps us expand into the broader, regional market with guests who want to come to Cape Girardeau. People may well be less likely to go on longer trips or to fly for vacation — whether that's due to COVID fears or gas prices. We want to be able to be that option for people to take a weekend trip or just get away and have a great experience.

• It seems there are notably fewer people employed overall at the state's 13 casinos and here in Cape Girardeau over the last five years. For example, the overall drop in casino employment in the state is more than 38%, according to the Missouri Gaming Commission (MGC). At Century Casino Cape Girardeau, the employment decline is 42.8%, from 424 to 243 employees, in the period 2017 through 2021. What can you say about this downward adjustment?

It's difficult in there are openings we'd like to fill with people who are willing and wanting to work, not unlike what we're seeing in a lot of industries and businesses in town. There's also pressure related to wages. We've seen a legislatively approved higher minimum wage, and, just to be competitive, we've had to continually make adjustments. The dynamic of COVID industry-wide changed the approach to food service. We've seen casino buffets, for example, which are not going to reopen. Our buffet closed and so did our steakhouse, and both were prior to COVID.

• What are the food service options now?

We have Red Star Grill and Beacon 53, with the latter in the old Keller's space overlooking the river. In the coming hotel lobby, we expect to see a new coffee and breakfast location and we are looking at other options we hope to announce soon.

• In looking at admissions, the Cape Girardeau casino has seen increases in people coming through the turnstiles in seven of the last 10 months, comparing 2022 to 2021. It should be said, however, monthly admissions are down year-to-year thus far in 2022 in three of the last four months — again according to MGC statistics. Any thoughts?

Yes. You'll notice quite a bit of volatility in the numbers. COVID brought restrictions, of course. One of our competitors in Metropolis, Illinois, was closed for the part of the first quarter last year, which impacted us briefly in a positive way. Former stimulus payments from the federal government also pushed money into the economy, which impacted the numbers. What we like to do therefore, is on a comparative basis, factor out 2021 and 2020 as aberrations and compare our statistics to pre-COVID 2019. When we do that, we see significant growth and very positive trends.

• The casino business is very highly regulated, yes?

In some ways, the regulations are similar to what is in place for the banking industry. But I would have to say I really don't know if there is any industry that compares to ours in terms of level of scrutiny.

• Give me an example of what you mean by scrutiny.

We have oversight, as you might gather, from the Missouri Gaming Commission, to whom we transmit on a daily basis our required tax payments based on revenue and admissions. There is also another level of scrutiny from the Missouri State Highway Patrol's gaming division for enforcement matters. What that means is, anytime we're open, a state trooper is on the premises.

• In the last three months or so, you've made adjustments in the height of the Cape casino hotel and the number of rooms. Please explain why.

The hotel will now be six stories high instead of eight. The cost of construction is way up, as everyone knows, due to higher material costs, driven by inflation, and by supply shortages. The original concept was for 75 hotel rooms. Now we'll have 69. We were able to get so close on the rooms, despite losing two stories, because now we will have rooms wrapping around the western corner. Corner rooms were not in the seminal design. Those corner rooms will not face the Mississippi River. We'd hoped with our single load original concept that all our patrons would have had a river view. The overall cost we hope will stay at the projected $26 million. We've made these changes in the last 60 to 90 days.

Do you want more business news? Check out B Magazine, and the B Magazine email newsletter. Go to www.semissourian.com/newsletters to find out more.