"Las Vegas will bounce back" says airline chief

Las Vegas will bounce back from its recent slump in tourism numbers, a local airline head has predicted. 

Allegiant Airlines CEO Greg Anderson recognises Las Vegas, where Allegiant is headquartered, has recently seen a decline in visitor numbers with Canadian travellers avoid visiting the US and budget travellers seeing the city as too expensive. 

Anderson, however, told travel news hub Skift that budget carrier Allegiant is still seeing healthy demand for Las Vegas.

 “In terms of Vegas, I know there's been some headlines," Anderson said.

"I’d say for us in Allegiant, there’s been a lot of capacity that’s been pulled out of Vegas from other carriers, particularly some of the low-fare carriers. So I think that comes back overall in Vegas. 

"Vegas, we’re the hometown airline here, and we have a real strong position in the community in and around Vegas. We’re seeing some success here in Vegas, and we’ll continue to keep a close eye on it, as well as Florida and other areas throughout the network.

"It’s a resilient city, and they’ll continue to find ways to adapt to the environment. And long term, I think Vegas will continue to do very well. It’s in category one when it comes to your leisure destinations.”

The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority (LVCVA) recently released its numbers for July visitors, noting a 12% drop from last year, Fox News reported.

There were 3,089,300 visitors this July compared to over 3.5 million last year, while hotel occupancy on the Las Vegas strip dropped 7% from 86.5% last year.

To save money, the Golden Gate Hotel & Casino has announced it will be abandoning live dealers, shifting to electronic table games. A sign of things to come?