How To Get Diamond At Barona

Those of you who accept followed my columns over the decades know that I love Barona, which I strongly believe is the best-run and histrion-friendliest casino in the world. For those of y'all who may be unfamiliar with Barona, I'1000 referring to Barona Resort & Casino, the clear leader in the San Diego market. It's the jewel of the Barona Ring of Mission Indians, which operates it with its longtime consulting partner, VCAT.

My virtually recent article on Barona was more than two years agone in a embrace feature for Casino Periodical (email me to my accost below with the bulletin "Ship Me Barona" and I'd be glad to send you lot the commodity). In that story, I described many of the things that make Barona and then successful and unique. They bear on a powerful formula that almost no casinos would dare emulate. But in this column, I want to take a deep dive, not into the magic of Barona, merely the guiding principles of Barona's magical strategy.

A few disclaimers start. Barona has been a client and admired casino operator of mine at several points over the last 25 years. Well-nigh recently, over a ii-and half-year flow, I spent three to four days a calendar month at Barona. My consulting assignment? "Come down and take fun with our players and staff" (I'g not kidding). That wasn't hard to do at the Happiest Casino on Earth. And it made clear how the uncomplicated but powerful Barona formula created a magic that I've seen at no other casino.

Shutterstock/Barona Resort & Casino

So I won't spend this column writing about Barona'south free ATMs, or greeters at every point of entry, or food served all mean solar day on the casino floor from whatsoever restaurant, or casino managers handing out free-play vouchers to players while they play. No, those are simply tactics (and Barona has scores of them). Today, I want to highlight the simple and incomparable underpinnings of Barona'due south magical strategy. And I'm certain the folks at Barona don't mind me sharing these thoughts; they're confident that few, if any, casinos would dare copy the "Barona Way."

The Guiding Principles of Barona's Strategy

• If You Put People First, Profits Will Follow: I believe that this principle underscores all of the others for Barona. Whether those people are staff, players, tribal members, vendors, or anybody, Barona believes that honesty, depth, generosity, and length of its relationships with people are way more than important than the transactions you have with them.

• Speak Your Ain Linguistic communication and Never Sweat the Competition: At Barona, "customers" are chosen "players." "Employees" are chosen, just, "Staff." The Employee Dining Room is called "Family Dining." "Graveyard" is the "early on-bird" shift. Numerous other unique language phrases invoke luck, players, generosity, family, welcome, fun, and other elements of the Barona core.

• Keep Your Vision and Mission Elementary: I've seen endless mission statements for casino companies. I've never seen 1 as unproblematic and powerful as Barona's "Clean. POLITE. HONEST." (Actually, I understand that since COVID, it is now "ALWAYS CLEAN. POLITE. HONEST.") Do y'all think Barona staff could recite their mission argument for you? How near your staff? Could they recite yours?

• Shape Your Business concern around Your Most Assisting Players: Everyone in the casino industry knows that gamblers are the most assisting segment, with the highest margins. Nevertheless most casino operators effort to maximize yield in every aspect of the casino-resort, as if all visitors were relatively equal. Not at Barona. They have a golf grade, but don't look for golfers who'll pay a hefty greens fee; rather, they expect for gamblers who like to golf game and let them golf at a steeply discounted or total comp charge per unit. The same with the hotel, restaurants, and spa. Those civilities are mainly for real players who like them. Barona knows where (and with whom) it makes its money and doesn't try to squeeze players at every cash register simply so they can have "adequate business margins."

• Minimize Bureaucracy: At Barona, you see about no managers who accept offices and rarely see meetings. You'll never come across volumes of data shuffled amongst staff that doesn't need it or doesn't care plenty to read information technology. What yous will see at Barona are senior executives who spend the vast majority of their time in the "office" of the casino flooring, continuously interacting with players and staff. Five-minute "pop-up meetings" take place in a corner of the slot floor or in a closed tabular array-game pit with managers who demand to talk over something important. Need-to-know information is shared simply with staff that needs to know information technology. Reports about business results are elementary and articulate and important metrics clearly explicate what is really happening in the business and doesn't make eyes glaze over.

• Lead the Pack, Take Risks, and Innovate Only When It Makes Sense: Barona pioneered the very first Ticket In Ticket Out system decades ago. They had one of the first fully performance CRM systems. They were the first to finish charging ATM fees on the property, which is a huge financial decision. They pioneered truthful Gameside Dining, where players can eat right at their slot or table game. They took out ticket-redemption kiosks when other casinos were all installing them. And most recently, during COVID, Barona became another trendsetter by going to a 100% non-smoking casino and hotel. Does Barona initiate these policies just to say they were showtime? Inappreciably. They do so because they make sense to improve the experience of their people.

• Provide Careers, Not Only Jobs: Some casinos say they hire and promote from within. Barona actually does it. And not but that, if a staff fellow member has the skills and want, there is no department someone tin can't be transferred or promoted into. This policy, plus the people-focused fun working surroundings, plus the continuous recognition and generous rewarding of staff, plus the intense civilisation of caring, goes a long mode in explaining why Barona has the everyman employee-turnover charge per unit in the casino manufacture.

• Take a Player Development Culture That Actually Knows Your Best Players and Offers Them Uncommon Value: Barona knows their best players, not just from some actor-tracking report or customer research," only considering dozens of their staff get to know them personally. Barona also doesn't look to bestow Diamond or Platinum status (its top-two role player tiers) on valuable new players. They don't brand them wait three visits or six months to tell them "we love you"; they likely give them preferred status in a day. Some promotions are for Diamond and Platinum players simply and advantage lots of them. And the promotions always have loads of winners and are never inexpensive, because Barona knows real players hate cheapness and tin can instantly come across information technology a mile away.

• Information technology'southward the Little Things: Barona has the cleanest casino floor in the earth, not because information technology has an army of EVS staff (it has plenty), simply because every staff fellow member, from frontline to executive management, knows "ALWAYS Clean. POLITE. HONEST." They know it'due south amend for players to accept straightened slot stools and a trash-free floor. At Barona, information technology's the little things, which is why they hand out free bottles of water everywhere, why they always greet y'all with "Welcome Home" no thing what entrance you come in, why they give you a pocket-size wrapped chocolate or two in your room or when presenting you your cheque in the restaurant, why they have more than 100 free scooters on belongings for players who are mobility challenged. And a hundred other petty things, which if you add them all up, make ane spectacular Barona "large affair." Which is that they care. And that's not something y'all can fake.

I could continue and on about Barona and the magic of its strategy. But rather than hear me gush eloquently about Barona, I encourage yous to take a few hundred bucks, get to San Diego, drive up Wildcat Coulee Drive, and spend a few days at Barona experiencing for yourself what I've tried, probably inadequately, to draw. I think yous'll come across a formula that's so uncomplicated, though surely not easy to execute. And I hope you'll see what I've seen in my decades visiting Barona, that someone has figured out, "Hey let's simply get out every twenty-four hour period, no matter what our job is, and make friends." Now that's a magical strategy.

Dennis Conrad is a long time executive consultant who works exclusively with select gaming clients who truly intendance about beingness client and employee focused. He can be reached at Dennis@conradworks.com.

Earlier posts by Dennis:

1. My Tiptop 10 large-picture casino-industry trends
2. I am your client
3. The Rad Bar — If I owned a video poker bar
4. Stop eroding role player value
5. What? You're still alive?

Source: https://cdcgaming.com/commentary/the-magical-strategy-of-barona/

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