The Doors Are Open, Again, At The Showboat
by KYW's David Madden
ATLANTIC CITY, NJ (CBS) -- The Showboat Hotel, minus the casino, reopened for business along the Atlantic City boardwalk less than 2 years after it was shut down. There's a new owner, and a new vision for the place.
This is a work in progress for Philadelphia based developer Bart Blatstein, who also owns and operates The Playground, an entertainment complex housed in what used to be retail shops on the boardwalk. The casino space is dark and cordoned off, but aside from that the place doesn't look all that different. Then again, just take a deep breath.
"Since we don't have a casino now, it's going to smell fresh here," Blatstein told KYW Newsradio. " You don't smell cigarette smoke. So it's a non-gaming hotel and largest in the state."
With 850 rooms now open and almost 500 more to come in the next year. Some 100 rooms were already booked for the first night. Reservations are available on line at showboathotelac.com with rates said to be comparable to those charged by other boardwalk facilities.
More than 200 people are employed here, a far cry from the days when gambling was the main attraction. Some 2 dozen workers are ex-Showboat staffers. Bonnie Ingersoll of Mays Landing worked for 28 years here in casino administration. Now, she's in housekeeping.
"It's very different, but I wanted to come back to Showboat so bad, it didn't matter that I'm not in table games," she said.
There's 2 restaurants and a coffee shop in here for now. Blatstein plans to rebrand the hotel, and make other changes in an effort to appeal to millennials, although he's keeping specifics to himself.