Daytime getting hot, sparkly at Palms’ ghostbar
I walked into the Palms on Saturday, and my big eyes were greeted by five scrumptious models walking toward me in neon-green mini-miniskirts and knee-high mirrored boots.
Why hello there.
These boot-walkers work upstairs at the new ghostbar dayclub-and-balcony.
But moments earlier, Palms co-owner George Maloof had scrutinized them at ghostbar, on the 55th floor, and decided to shepherd them down to the casino floor for impromptu marketing.
So the smiling models blew into pink coach whistles as they and Maloof sauntered aside blackjack dealers and poker players, then outside to the pool, where sunbathers smiled at the flash of flesh.
“Blow your whistle now,” is one of the kindly directions Maloof gave the women when they circled back to the ghostbar elevators, where hundreds of dayclubbers waited in line.
If nothing else, this excursion illustrated Vegas’ attention to detail. I mean, look at those boots! Look at those outfits!
And look at Maloof, the curly-headed businessman-child who masterminded this little parade detail, personally and brilliantly.
It was a decade ago when Maloof changed the tone of Vegas. That’s when rival hotel execs across the Strip turned down MTV’s request to stage the first Vegas “Real World” reality show inside their giant corporate casinos.
The word on the street, at the time, was executives at those big hotels didn’t want MTV’s young and (presumed poor) demographic sullying their mature, well-manicured facades.
It was Maloof who said: You know what, MTV? Not only will I give you a whole mess of suite space, I will also let you film pretty much anywhere.
At the time, the Palms was new and struggling for attention off the Strip. A publicist there pretty much begged me to come write something, anything, about ghostbar.
That’s because, before “The Real World,” ghostbar was a ghost town. I went, and it was dead. D. E. A. D. Dead.
Then, the Palms’ “Real World” began running on MTV.
Then, ghostbar got swamped with the hottest, prettiest tourists in town. It was 2003’s spiritual precursor to today’s Chandelier Bar at The Cosmopolitan.
Then, business-class tourists in their 30s, 40s and 50s started taking their platinum credit cards to ghostbar, since they wanted to see all the hot, young MTV-inspired girls inside.
A few months later, the Palms put me on the VIP list for ghostbar one night. When I got there, a security guard told me there was one line for regular people, one line for VIPs and a third line for VIP VIPs.
And even if I was in the VIP VIP line, my wait to ride the elevator up to the 55th floor would extend to at least 25 minutes.
So I left that line and didn’t go back to ghostbar for years.
Flash-forward to this past Saturday, and ghostbar was again the hottest place to be in Vegas — during the daytime on a Saturday, at least, when it transforms from a nightclub into GBDC (ghostbar dayclub).
Saturday’s launch was impressive.
Sparkle was afoot: the mirrored-boot women; a woman in a bikini walking on stilts; DJs playing good mainstream music (Skrillex and such); and a few notable sightings of actor Adrian Grenier, E!’s Shanna Moakler and Miss Nevada USA Sarah Chapman.
But creating sparkle is merely half the battle for a successful dayclub.
Dayclubs also require pretty young tourists and locals attending on their own accord, in order to attract bigger-moneyed interests to spend real cash.
The pretty young tourists and locals were there. They were on the balcony, jumping up and down on the see-through floor in the corner.
They were wearing all the right, absurd fashion trends: fake eyeglasses with garish-color frames; “Karate Kid”-esque headbands; one guy wore a mirrored disco ball (the size of a baby’s head) around his neck.
They mingled with daytime smiles. I saw a man and woman shake hands on the balcony, introducing themselves. I swear, not 10 seconds later, she playfully slapped his left butt cheek, they laughed, and they got on with the getting-to-know-you routine.
Since this was a fancy launch event, it’s difficult to gauge how many return visits GBDC will get from these kinds of revelers — the kinds that make a dayclub a fun, steady hit.
But executives at other hotels and nightclubs, where more dayclubs are sure to pop up, would be wise (again) to see what Maloof has got up his models’ sleeves.
Doug Elfman’s column appears Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays. Contact him at delfman@reviewjournal.com. He blogs at reviewjournal.com/elfman.
