The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California • Page 358

liliilsl as Vegas Family-run Fiesta Hotel strives to become hangout for locals, frequent visitors Jir i i J- I aNt I Pm- Ml In! Jfi By STACEY WELLING George Maloof the grand opening of the Fiesta Hotel in December was the culmination of a childhood dream. "I've been a total Las Vegas groupie since I was 10 years old," says the 30-year-old casino president who used to vacation there with his parents. "I've watched all the hotels expand throughout the years, I inow who expanded and when and what they expanded with." During those early visits, he even collected postcards from hotel gift shops and counted the rnSiier of rooms at each property. Ambitious visitors could count 100 rooms in Maloof's new Southwestern-themed hotelcasino. It's small compared to such mega hotels as the MGM Grand, but the size works well with Maloof's objective of developing a hangout for locals and frequent visitors.

One way he hopes to attract customers is through good, reasonably priced food. The new property's star restaurants are Garduno's Restaurant Cantina and the Old San Francisco Steakhouse. Maloof imported Garduno's, which operates six restaurants in New Mexico, from his home state because it has a proven concept and menu. "The idea popped into my mind about 3:15 in the morning when I couldn't sleep," he says. "I Maloof went to the University of Nevada at Las Vegas, graduating in 1987 with a degree in hotel management.

He manages the Fiesta with his brother Gavin, while other family members (including his mother, two other brothers and a sister) live in neighboring states. Maloof's family purchased the north Las Vegas site of the Fiesta in 1989. Their hotel is about five miles northwest of downtown Las Vegas at the corner of Lake Mead and Rancho Drive. It joins the Santa Fe four miles north on Rancho Drive and U.S. 95 as the only hotelcasino catering to northwest Las Vegas.

But other properties are expected in the near future, including the Texas Hotel, which is being built across the street from the Fiesta. Maloof makes frequent appearances around the hotel. He typically works 14-hour days or longer, and many of the 700 employees greet him by his first name. "When you're here all the time, they know you," he says. Maloof says tourists are finding out about the Fiesta primarily through word of mouth, with the property's rooms selling out every weekend.

Eventually he plans to market more directly to frequent visitors. "There are a lot of tourists who come into Las Vegas four, five or six times a year, and they Please see FIESTA, Page 76 Fiesta Hotel opened in the northwest I. 1 Photo by STACEY WELLING portion of Las Vegas in December. N.M., owns four hotels in New Mexico and Phoenix, and operates the Central Palace Casino in Central City, Colo. The family's New Mexico holdings also include Quality Import a liquor distributorship, and controlling interest in First National Bank.

They once owned the Houston Rockets basketball team and the Sheraton Anaheim Hotel near Disneyland. The family has wanted to open a hotel in Las Vegas for years. And Maloof has always planned to be a part of it. The 100-room Southwestern-style didn't know anything about preparing Mexican food, and Garduno's is very well known in New Mexico." Decorated in a warehouse-style motif, the restaurant features display cooking. Menu items include fajitas ($8.95 to two-item combination platters ($6.95) and Mexican steak and seafood The restaurant makes its own tortillas and serves 14 kinds of margaritas.

Fresh green chiles are trucked in daily from New Mexico. The Old San Francisco Steakhouse is known throughout Texas for serving quality beef and Play the Best viav for placing a large block of Swiss cheese and fresh bread on every table prior to dinner. Menu items include chicken fried steak prime rib ($11.95 to $18.95) and shrimp scampi The Fiesta also has three other eateries: Cactus Rose Cafe, a buffet; Emack and Bolios, a Boston-based deli and ice cream parlor, and Panda Express, a Chinese restaurant from a chain based in Pasadena. Maloofs family-owned company, Maloof Cos. of Albuquerque, "7 0l Over 2,200 video Escape hotel square The Enjoy adventures Ask about Call i HI" in aw wjF jrs- The best slots.

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