A bigger, better Graton Resort & Casino relies upon new technological initiatives. By David McKee
California’s Graton Resort & Casino was two decades in the making. The tribal casino, near Rohnert Park in California’s wine country, opened on November 15, 2013. But the road to that debut was a long and winding one. The Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria originally aimed to build on Sears Point. However, environmental and traffic concerns caused them to fall back on the Rohnert Park area, where civic leaders backed the tribe’s play.
After one more site move, Graton had found its future home. Ministering angel Station Casinos plunked down $76 million for the requisite land. Getting it taken into trust took from May 2008 to October 2010. Negotiations with then-Gov. Jerry Brown required another year and a half. Construction finally began in June 2012, at a cost of $825 million, then a record for a tribal casino.
The rancheria worked hand in glove with Station until 2021, whereupon Graton took over sole operation of the property. It has subsequently been under the helmsmanship of General Manager Brian Green, a Station veteran whose latest accomplishment was to switch the resort over to cashless operation — no small feat. He discussed that and other Graton-facing topics this month with Casino Life. Our conversation has been edited for clarity.
Congratulations on 10 years of operation, as of last November. What do you consider the signal accomplishments of that decade?
The continued growth of the casino, and being able to continue to give back to the community and the tribe. The casino looks like it did Day One. It continues to operate at high volumes. Giving the wine country people a place to enjoy themselves is what we love to do.
It took another 10 years just to get Graton Resort & Casino situated and built. Was the lengthy process worthwhile, in retrospect?
I’m sure if we talked to the tribe they would say absolutely, 1,000 percent worthwhile. We all wish it would have been approved immediately but you’ve got to go through everything that’s necessary to take the proper steps to get to where we are today.
How was your relationship with Station Casinos? Was the transition to tribal management seamless?
I actually came from Station Casinos. I worked with Station for over 20 years. The tribe asked me to stay on, so I would say the relationship was good and seamless.
What would you say are the greatest corporate-culture similarities between what you’re doing now and at Station, and what were the greatest adjustments you had to make?
That’s a tough question to answer. Similarities are Station built the infrastructure. They put in the policies and procedures. They helped develop the team here, so we’ve maintained that. The difference would be it’s easier to get things done because you’re going directly to the owner now instead of through a management company.
What are your primary feeder markets?
The Sonoma County area as well as the entire Bay Area. We have a large number of people coming from the East Bay, North Bay, San Francisco and South Bay.
What are your player demographics like? Do you draw from across the board?
We are kind of all all over the place. We’ve got a large Asian demographic. There’s a large Caucasian demographic but we all over the board.
Do you still have 3,000 slot machines and 144 table games?
We have over 130 table games. we’re currently sitting at around 3,300 slot machines.
Which games and machines are the most popular?
It just depends on what the player’s favorite is. We have some of the great IGT games like Wheel of Fortune and Megabucks. We have Prosperity Link from IGT as well. Then you have the tried-and-true Dragon Links from Aristocrat. You name it, everybody has their favorites, so it’s just a matter of the players.
Which new products are trending particularly well on your new floor?
There’s always a new product out there. The newest IGT product that we have on the floor, in their newest cabinet, is performing well. Players vote by their dollar, right? If they continue to put money in, we’ll keep it on the floor. If they stop putting money in, then we have to look to change it out to get something that they want to play. I would say that we have quite a few games that are out there today that continue to evolve.
Let’s segue into cashless gambling. Was it difficult to incept Fast Funds?
Fast Funds and our IGT Pay resort wallet were all brought in together as one, and introducing our Graton app as well. Difficult? I would say yes. It’s something new. If you’re doing to introduce something new and you’re going to be out there in front, you’ve got to work through all the legalities of it, all the intricacies and making sure your network is set up, as well as the machines being able to accept the connectivity. In that way it was difficult. In other ways it was easy. Jacob Tanning of IGT was with us every step of the way, helping guide us, helping us understand what coming and asked questions to get it to where we wanted to be, together as partners.
So you’re describing a three-pronged cashless initiative. Could you go into a little more detail about the products involved?
The traditional resort wallet is where everything lives. So if I just launched “resort wallet,” you’d be able to go to the cage, load money onto the wallet, go to the games and just upload it to the game play. If you won, download it to your wallet. We not only instituted that, we instituted IGT Pay, where you can fund your wallet via your credit card, your bank account, so you can fund it so you don’t have to get up and go to an ATM. You can push money back to your account as well. We also instituted cashless credit and carded credit — not traditional credit where you would have to go fill out a credit application and wait eight hours to 24 hours to get approved. It’s instantaneous and you’re in action within five minutes.
How has player adoption been?
We continue to see player adoption grow. As with any new product, it’s going to take time, as we evolve and continue to push the product. What we’re seeing … would we want to see more? Absolutely. So we’ll continue to fine-tune and listen to our players to make it easier, and more functional for them to use.
Why did you take this step?
The world’s going cashless, right? I go to the grocery store and I forget my wallet, well, guess one thing that you never forget? Your phone, right? You never leave home without it. If you have your smart phone you can just use Apple Pay, Google Pay, Android Pay, whatever it is. Tap and you’re done. You’ve paid your bill and can go on. So how do you bring that to the casino industry? We’ve decided to partner with IGT, who’s been in the cashless business for a while and integrate with our system, which is IGT as well. We’re in the Bay Area, right? We’re tech-heavy in the Bay Area, so we thought adoption would be greater in the Bay Area than in other areas.
And has it?
I’m excited with what our adoption is. Like I said, it continues to grow. People really don’t share their numbers out there on what cashless is doing but I will tell you, I think we’re happy with the direction that we’re in.
How do the costs compare to cash management?
Moving cash is a pretty expensive deal. You have to pay an armored-truck company to deliver cash. You pay team members to count the cash, to put it out in ATMs. You’ve got all that labor there. You also have bill validators and count teams to drop the money, count it. So there’s a lot of money in moving cash. As well, when they’re cashing out they go to the cage or an ATM and it’s just a cycle there. When you go cashless you don’t have that. You don’t have the wear and tear on the games. You don’t have the wear and tear on the people doing it. So you can move those people into other areas where they can better service guests. It’s a greater convenience for both the player and the casino.
What other benefits does it have?
Security. Think about Grandma going to the casino. I just hit a jackpot for $3,000 and I’m walking out of the casino, right? There’s an opportunity for someone to do something negative. If it’s cashless there’s no way they’re getting it. They move it to their bank accounts instead. So security is a huge advantage.
What advice would you give to casinos that are currently considering this step?
Plan it out. It’s not going to happen overnight. Talk to your system provider. Talk to other operators that have gone cashless. Then just continue to focus on moving forward. Again, it takes time. It’s not a quick process. I think when Jacob and I first started talking about it, it was probably at least a year if not a year and a half out, and we thought the quickest we could get it implemented was four months. It took a lot longer than four months! There’s a lot of things to go through. You have to think through the regulations that you have to cross off, the training of the team members, the technology that has to go into place with lead times. There’s a lot that goes into it.
What other changes to Graton Resort are on tap?
We’re currently under construction. We’re nearing completion of our new, 1,800-space parking garage. That is to enable us to expand the casino, so the casino will expand to over 625,000-ish square feet of space and we will have another 3,000 games out there on the floor. We have a new Starbucks going in, a new sports bar, a rooftop restaurant, a new high-limit room. And after that we’re going to expand our hotel and add another 225 rooms. Once that’s done we will add a showroom.
How robust is your entertainment program?
We’ve got a pretty solid entertainment program. Actually, this weekend we have Lea Salonga coming in for concert. We’ve had Nikki Glaser recently. We’ve had Kevin Hart here. We had Don Felder two weeks ago. We continue to have great acts. Willie Nelson’s been here a couple of times. Jo Koy’s been here every year for the last three years. We continue to bring more and more entertainment to the area.
What is your resort infrastructure like?
We currently sit on 325,000 square feet. We have have a hotel with 200 rooms and we employ over 2,300 people. We have a high-limit slot space, high-limit table games, a 20-table poker room, four large restaurants, as well as a seven-pocket food court.
Do you charge resort fees and what is your philosophy on them?
We do charge resort fees. But with our resort fees you not only get Internet and everything else, you also get access to use our spa.
Where do you stand on smoking in the casino?
We are currently smoking. We do have a large, non-
smoking space where you can enter and exit without ever having to go into a smoking section. I’m all about player preference. I am not a smoker, nor will I ever become a smoker. Our expansion, we’re planning to go non-smoking. But the current casino will remain smoking and we have a large number of players that enjoy smoking.
What about sports betting? Which approach do you favor toward California legalization, if any?
I’m all about the tribes offering and managing sports betting on-premise. Our tribe wants to get with the other tribes, and continue to focus to keep their tribal sovereignty and maintain gaming.
What are your goals for Graton’s future?
I want to continue to grow and help the property continue the business volumes that we see today, and enhance them. But I also want to give back to the team and the community, and help the team become the elite property of California and of the whole U.S. We want to be Number One. We want this to be the place where people want to come to work, to have fun and we want to offer great service at a great value to our guests.
Casino Life Magazine would like to thank Brian Green and the Graton Resort & Casino for all their help and assistance with this exclusive feature for Casino Life Magazine.
*** This exclusive feature interview was originally published in June 2024 edition of Casino Life Magazine Issue 166 ***
