Las Vegas Tourism Agency to Spend $1.7 Million on Formula 1 Tickets

The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority plans to spend $1.7 million on Formula 1 Grand Prix tickets for its clients.

The agency wants to use the tickets — for suites at $11,000 each — to showcase Vegas as a destination and provide gifts to clients, said Steve Hill, CEO and president of Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority. The race will take place from November 21 to 23.

Among the recipients will be airlines – the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority has been hoping that airlines will add more routes to the city.

“We’ll invite airlines to come to see what happens in a really big week in Las Vegas,” said Hill.

“One of the major purposes of the tickets for Formula 1 is to combine the opportunity to experience the race and see what Vegas can do around the race with what amounts to a site visitor or a familiarization tour for those clients,” he said.

Formula 1 Ticket Purchases Attract Publicity

The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, a government agency, is funded by room taxes, sponsorships, advertising and other sources. With revenue of over $415 million, the agency has the largest budget of any destination marketing organization in the U.S.  – even larger than the budget for Brand USA, America’s DMO.

Hill acknowledged coverage from local news outlets and noted concerns over whether tickets would go to employees of the agency. “It’s a single digit percentage of the tickets that will be used by us as employees to be there with our customers,” said Hill.

Buying Tickets Amid  Soft Demand for Formula 1

Hotel booking trends point to weak demand for the Formula 1 race. “The real issue with Formula One is it’s off to a soft start as compared to last year where we had a lot of advanced pre-bookings,” said MGM Resorts CEO and President William Hornbuckle in a second quarter earnings call.

Said HIll: “The demand for tickets last year will be hard to repeat because everybody wanted to be at the first race in Las Vegas. You had a whole lot of people who were not necessarily from Formula 1 fans, but they were curious about what this was going to look like.”