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Hard Rock Bristol goes all-in for grand opening

The bright lights of Bristol shine considerably brighter following the opening of Virginia’s second full-fledged casino.

The Nov. 14 grand opening of the $515 million-plus Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Bristol, Virginia’s first hotel/casino combo, was grand indeed. Symphonies of sounds, from music to slot machines, indicated the site’s time for business had arrived.

“This brand is now 54 years old, [with] 60,000 employees in 74 countries,” says Hard Rock International Chairman Jim Allen. “I hope we have collectively created something that everyone is proud of.”

Located near downtown Bristol, the casino resort’s dominant features include a 45-foot-tall guitar at the entrance to the 303-room (including 56 suites) concave-shaped hotel. The 620,000-square-foot facility opened with the Hard Rock tradition of The Who-like smashing of guitars inside Hard Rock Live Bristol, an indoor flexible capacity venue that can seat up to 2,000 people.

There’s a spa in the hotel, nearly 1,500 slot machines in the casino, 38,000 original miles on Faith Hill’s vintage Rudolph red Corvette on the casino floor, 50 table games, and countless grins on the faces of those who made the place happen.

“It was a moonshot,” says Jim McGlothlin, chairman of Bristol-based United Co. The Bristol Hard Rock was developed through a joint venture between Hard Rock, McGlothlin and Par Ventures President Clyde Stacy. “With Hard Rock, we went to work in Bristol. We’re changing a lot of lives here.”

The new resort casino replaces the temporary Bristol Casino: Future Home of Hard Rock, which opened in July 2022 as Virginia’s first operating casino. Since then, a permanent facility in Portsmouth and a temporary casino in Danville have opened. Located inside the former Bristol Mall, the 30,000-square-foot temporary casino featured 900 slot machines, 29 table games and a sportsbook. In its first year of operation, the temporary Bristol casino’s net gaming revenues totaled $157 million.

Today, Hard Rock Bristol maintains about 1,400 permanent jobs.

The development team previously pushed back the opening of the permanent casino at 500 Gate City Highway, which had been expected in July, in favor of opening the full casino resort, the nation’s eighth Hard Rock Hotel & Casino.

Adults grinned like children at a theme park on opening day. Their enthusiasm was music to the ears of McGlothlin and his Hard Rock brethren.

“It’s Bristol, baby!” McGlothlin says. “The casino is our winning lottery number.” 

Out & About August 2024

On June 13, Virginia Business honored the winners of the 2024 Virginia CFO Awards during the magazine’s annual black-tie banquet at Richmond’s Jefferson Hotel. Photos by Rick DeBerry.

1. L to R: Virginia CFO Awards nominee Paul Huckfeldt of Hooker Furnishings and wife, Annette; 2024 CFO Awards winner Joel Flax of Cohen Investment Group and wife, Gail.

2. L to R: Courtney Browder, Virginia CFO Awards nominee Juanita Parks, Charlie Knight and Krista Gillespie of

3. L to R: Behrad Amirsoltani and wife, Anna, a Virginia CFO Awards nominee with Cassaday & Company; Craig Brown and wife, nominee BJ Brown, both from the Law Office of Craig A Brown.

4. On July 9, Colonial Williamsburg Resorts broke ground on The Shoe, a new, Rees Jones-designed, nine-hole, par 3 gold course. Colonial Williamsburg’s first new golf course in 33 years, it’s expected to open in summer 2025 at the Golden Horseshoe Golf Club. L to R: Jim Thomas of Williamsburg; Colonial Williamsburg Foundation President and CEO Cliff Fleet; Williamsburg Mayor Doug Pons; and Keith Jackson, Colonial Williamsburg’s vice president of hospitality. Photo courtesy Colonial Williamsburg Resorts.

5. L to R: Chris Harman and teammate Josh McCartney, workers for Kentucky energy company Iron Senergy, simulate performing first aid on a volunteer during a mine rescue contest in late June at the Southwest Virginia Higher Education Center in Abingdon. The event was co-hosted by National Mine Rescue Association Post 7, the Metallurgical Coal Producers Association, the Mine Safety and Health Administration, and the Virginia Department of Energy. Photo courtesy Virginia Energy.

Caesars Virginia — a work in progress

Lots can change over three years and eight months.

Back in September 2020, Danville, its industrial development authority and Nevada-based Caesars Entertainment signed a development agreement naming Caesars the city’s preferred gaming operator and outlining the parties’ obligations.

Back then, Caesars budgeted $400 million to build its Caesars Virginia resort casino on the Schoolfield mill site, once a part of Danville’s bygone textiles industry. Initially, Caesars planned to hire 1,300 full-time employees.  

In May, Danville City Council members voted 8 to 1 to amend the agreement.

The biggest takeaway: the price tag for Caesars Virginia has almost doubled. It’s now a $750 million investment. 

The increase has a lot to do with the passage of time, according to Chris Albrecht, senior vice president and general manager of Caesars Virginia. 

“Some of the scope change included adding a covered parking garage, some incrementation to our hotel rooms, and then really the rest of it is just changes in construction costs and supply costs since this project started four years ago,” he explains. 

In the 2020 agreement, Caesars agreed to build 300 hotel rooms in Danville. For a while, that number shot up to 500 rooms, but developers later scaled plans back to 320 rooms.

Under the new agreement, Caesars Virginia only has to hire 900 full-time employees, who will be paid at least $31,200 a year or no less than 125% of the federal minimum wage, whichever is greater.

Caesars currently has 460 workers operating its temporary Danville casino, which opened in May 2023. In coming months, Albrecht says, he expects to hire “another 700 or so.”

Additionally, Caesars now plans to build a single multipurpose space instead of a conference center and a separate entertainment venue. For performances, the space can hold 2,500 fans. 

“So, all the things that we talked about and promised from the beginning are happening,” Albrecht says. “They’re just happening in the same room.”

Back in 2020, casino executives had planned to open Caesars Virginia in three years. The completion date listed in the contract is Dec. 31, 2024, but that date might involve some wiggle room. 

“They want it to be open by Thanksgiving,” says Ken Larking, Danville’s city manager. 

Albrecht would not confirm that. 

“When we have an exact date to put out. to the world, we will be excited to share,” he says. 

Hard Rock Bristol delays permanent casino opening

The Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Bristol’s development team has pushed back the opening of the permanent casino, previously expected in July, and will instead open its approximately $515 million permanent casino resort in late fall.

The team — a joint venture between Hard Rock, Par Ventures President Clyde Stacy and The United Co. Chairman Jim McGlothlin — said in a news release Wednesday that it expects the project’s completion in late fall.

“I think sometimes people forget [Hard Rock is] not just a casino company,” Allie Evangelista, president of the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Bristol, said Friday. “And that’s why we’re not so focused on rushing into opening a casino floor, because we really want people to see us for who we are as an entertainment and hospitality business.”

The temporary Bristol Casino: Future Home of Hard Rock opened July 8, 2022, making it Virginia’s first operating casino. The temporary 30,000-square-foot casino in the former Bristol Mall has about 900 slots, 29 table games and a sportsbook. It also has a restaurant, Mr. Lucky’s, as well as a sports bar and lounge, and a grab-and-go food outlet.

In its first year of operation, the temporary casino made $157 million in net gaming revenues. The casino hosted visitors from across the nation during its first six months of operation, Evangelista told Virginia Business earlier this year.

The permanent resort casino is expected to have a 303-room hotel, more than 1,500 slots, 75 table games, new dining venues and a 2,000-seat indoor entertainment venue.

“As a business, for us, this is a lot more exciting because we were opening a casino floor rather than opening the full Hard Rock experience,” said Evangelista, “and being able to open everything at once … allows us to really have a great first impression.”

It also means that the resort will not be a construction site, she added, so guests won’t experience disruptive construction noise — particularly important for hotel guests’ stays — and interruptions in operations like power outages.

“There’ll be probably like a few weeks between the time that we are fully operating in the permanent [casino] that we’ll be doing some work to install some of the games that we have currently operating on the new floor and things like that, but there won’t be any downtime or any impact to the guests,” Evangelista said.

Now that the full casino resort will open all at once, rather than in phases, “we believe the construction is redoing their timeline, because you don’t have to [put up] temporary wall things, [and] you don’t have to go around operations, so we believe we can pick up some time,” said Evangelista. “We really don’t have a timeline; we’re just going with fall until they’re able to give us a more precise date on how much time they can pick up from not having to open in July.”

TN Ward and BurWil Construction form the construction team for the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Bristol.

Hard Rock is continuing with some openings that were scheduled for July, though. It will open a few of its permanent food options next month, according to Evangelista. A former pizza restaurant is under renovation and will open as Constant Grind, a Hard Rock coffee and pastry shop brand. An area upstairs, leading up to the new casino floor, has been dubbed Marketplace, and it will open with Fish & Chicken Co., Brick’d Italian Kitchen and Street Tacos.

Mr. Lucky’s will stay open until the permanent casino opens, and the existing sports bar will close then. In addition to Constant Grind and the Marketplace options, the permanent casino’s dining venues will include Hard Rock Cafe, Council Oak Steakhouse and YouYu Noodle Bar.

The extended timeline follows a 2024-2026 budget amendment directing the Virginia Lottery to renew, before June 30, temporary casino operators’ authorizations to conduct gaming for an additional six months beyond the previously codified two-year limit, provided certain conditions are met.

The conditions in the amendment are that:

  • A portion of the temporary gaming facility will be incorporated as part of the permanent facility;
  • the preferred casino operator has met the $300 million minimum capital investment;
  • and the Virginia Lottery “determined that the preferred casino gaming operator has made a good faith effort to comply with the approved construction schedule.”

More than 600 construction workers are on site daily, according to a news release. Because Hard Rock was preparing the permanent casino for a July opening, the casino floor has slot machines, cameras, lighting and carpet installed and cages ready, Evangelista said.

The hotel is built, and the walls and window installations are complete. Almost all of its bathrooms are completed, she said. Workers are pouring the flooring for the front desk area.

The resort’s 2,000-seat entertainment venue, Hard Rock Live, is built out and enclosed, and work continues on the inside, according to Evangelista.

The Bristol Hard Rock currently has 619 employees, Evangelista said. An additional 200 people have accepted job offers and will come onboard as each acquires the necessary Virginia Lottery license.

From now until the end of the year, the team will continue hiring, with a goal of reaching about 1,400 employees for the full resort, Evangelista said.

Northern Va. Big Deal: Safari in Spotsy

A high school marching band, a giant seafood boil and an enthusiastic crowd of about 200 people helped celebrate the Oct. 20, 2023, groundbreaking for the $900 million, 1.38 million-square-foot Kalahari Resort in Spotsylvania County.

The fifth African-themed resort from the privately owned, Wisconsin-based Kalahari Resorts & Conventions, the sprawling tourism and events destination is planned to include a 175,000-square-foot indoor water park, a 907-room hotel and 150,000-square-foot conference center. It’s slated to open in November 2026, with plans to create more than 1,000 jobs.

“This was not your typical ground-breaking where we went out and put a few shovels in the ground,” says Kevin Marshall, business development manager for Spotsylvania’s economic development department, as well as a county supervisor representing the Berkeley District. He has worked closely with Kalahari Resorts to bring the project to Virginia since June 2020, when company executives first laid eyes on the site, an old farm situated between U.S. Route 1 and Interstate 95 in Thornburg.

After examining two other options that did not make the cut, Marshall piled the Kalahari team into a truck and took them to the Thornburg site. “I said, ‘I’ve got another site for you,’” he says. “We jumped in the pickup and rode around the 140 acres.”

Kalahari Resorts has had its eye on Virginia — and the Fredericksburg region — for some time. Back in 2007, the company announced plans to build a resort near the Fredericksburg Convention Center, but the 2008 Great Recession led them to cancel construction.

This time, the project’s $900 million price tag represents a substantial increase from estimates when the company first began looking at the region. “Things have leveled off, and we are on budget,” says Travis Nelson, the company’s president. “The numbers started quite a bit lower from back when interest rates were 5 points lower and inflation was not what it is.”

The company’s model is based on a guest population that drives to its parks, with most guests traveling from within a three-hour radius, making interstate access crucial.

“We looked at some other opportunities in Georgia and Maryland and Massachusetts and a few others,” Nelson says. “Virginia was on the short list and definitely was someplace we wanted to be for a long time. [Then] we found a fantastic site in Virginia and that kind of honed it in. When you drop that [three-hour driving] hoop down on a map [of Thornburg], you encompass some pretty great areas — Washington, D.C., Richmond and a number of other places.”

Marshall says he anticipates county tax revenue to exceed $6 million the first year the park is open, and to increase with time. It’s estimated that the property will employ about 800 associates year-round, with that number climbing closer to 1,200 during busier seasons. Employment opportunities created by the resorts, which also will have 12 on-site food and beverage venues, will range from entry-level to executive, with a variety of management-level positions. There will also be part-time opportunities. 

“We have five [county] high schools and lots of 16-, 17- and 18-year-olds looking for part-time jobs — that helps [them] get that car and keep that car on the road,” Marshall notes.

At the time of the groundbreaking, the only associate who had been hired was the resort’s general manager, who is relocating from the company’s property in Sandusky, Ohio. The next scheduled hire is a director of sales, who’s expected to be brought on by spring.

“It will be a slow trickle here and there, and then it ramps up when you get inside of 12 months,” says Nelson, noting there will also be “lots and lots” of construction and related jobs generated by the project along the way.

The addition of the resort also holds the promise of bringing convention business to Spotsylvania. Before a shovel was even put in the ground, the Virginia Kalahari resort had already booked a four-day anime convention, Colossalcon, for May 2027.

“[Colossalcon] holds events at all — now five — of our resorts and often sells the resort out of overnight rooms,” says Sara Hood, a spokesperson for Kalahari. “Our Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Ohio events see from 3,000 to 4,000 attendees, while our Texas event is still growing. We would anticipate around 1,000 people at the Virginia event.” 

Caesars Virginia ‘tops off’ Danville casino

Caesars Virginia is a step closer to opening its permanent casino in Danville after a topping-off ceremony Thursday.

Though the temporary casino opened in May 2023, work on the permanent Caesars Virginia casino and 12-story hotel has been ongoing. The floor of the casino has been poured, metal framing is in place and the hotel structure has been fully built, with windows being placed onto the building’s facade up to the sixth floor, according to a news release from Caesars.

The hotel will have 320 rooms — a reduction from the originally announced 500 rooms — plus a swimming pool and spa.

A partnership between Caesars Entertainment and the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI), Caesars Virginia started construction on the casino in August 2022. The development, at the former Dan River Inc. Schoolfield mill site, is expected to be finished by the end of the year.

Chris Albrecht, senior vice president and general manager of Caesars Virginia, was excited that he doesn’t have to say “next year” or “late next year” anymore. “This has truly changed the skyline of Danville when you come from miles away and now see this great addition to the three sisters,” Albrecht said in a statement, referring to the local nickname for a trio of prominent smokestacks left over from closed textiles factories.

The topping-off ceremony, which marks the completion of the building’s framework of a building, included hoisting a tree and American flag to the highest point of the hotel, placed next to a silhouette of Gaius Julius Caesar himself.

“In my eyes, a topping-off solidifies the fact that Danville made the right choice in picking Caesars as a partner in this project,” Barron Fuller, regional president of the Southeast Region for Caesars Entertainment, said in a statement.

The 40,000-square-foot temporary casino brought in $145 million in revenue from its opening in May 2023 through the end of the year. It has more than 400 employees and officials estimated that at least 800 people will work in the permanent casino, which will feature 1,300 slots, 85 live table tames, 24 electronic table games, a poker room and sports book, along with bars, restaurants, a 2,500-seat live entertainment theater and more than 50,000 square feet of meeting and convention space.

Virginia’s first casino, the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Bristol, opened in July 2022 in a temporary space at the former Bristol Mall after receiving licensing approval less than 90 days earlier. In December 2022, developers began construction nearby on the $500 million permanent Hard Rock casino, which is slated to open in July. The 90,000-square-foot permanent resort casino will include a 2,200-seat indoor entertainment venue, but early plans for an outdoor venue there were scrapped.

The $340 million Rivers Casino Portsmouth, which received its license in November 2022, opened its permanent space in January 2023.

The Pamunkey Indian Tribe’s license for the proposed $500 million HeadWaters Resort & Casino on the Elizabeth River in Norfolk is still pending state approval and construction has not yet started. The Norfolk Architectural Review Board is the first body to review plans for the casino, which is pending approval from Norfolk City Council. The review board was set to review the casino’s new plans during its Jan. 8 meeting, but developers continued the review until Jan. 22.

Following Richmond voters’ rejection of a proposed $562 million casino for the second time, Petersburg lawmakers are seeking to hold a casino referendum in the city, which would require the General Assembly to allow a casino in a city with a population below 200,000. State Senate Bill 268, with state Sens. Lashrecse Aird and Louise Lucas as patrons, would amend requirements for a host city to ones favorable for Petersburg, The Progress-Index reported.

$900M water park resort breaks ground in Spotsylvania

A massive water park resort has broken ground in Spotsylvania County.

The 1.38 million-square-foot Spotsylvania County Kalahari Resort, located between U.S. Route 1 and Interstate 95 in Thornburg, north of Kings Dominion, is expected to offer a 907-room hotel, a 175,000-square-foot indoor waterpark featuring slides, a wave pool and surf park. Also planned are 10 acres of outdoor pools and a 90,000-square-foot adventure park with rides, a rope course, climbing walls, a dozen on-site food and beverage offerings and more than 150,000 square feet of meeting and convention space. Kalahari Resorts & Conventions expects to invest $900 million in the park, which is currently slated to open in 2026.

The Spotsylvania County Board of Supervisors in 2022 approved rezoning of about 135 acres for the park as well as performance incentives and a gap loan to help cover construction, and once completed, it is expected to be the county’s largest taxpayer, according to Spotsylvania County Supervisor Kevin Marshall, who also serves as business development manager for its economic development department. According to The Free Lance-Star, county-approved tax incentives for Kalahari over 20 years are estimated at more than $185 million, with the county expected to take in $83 million in tax revenue during that time period. Spotsylvania’s cost for the gap loan would be $74.8 million over two decades, according to Northern Virginia magazine.

In May, the county approved the creation of the Matta River Community Development Authority, a tax district to raise funding for infrastructure.

In a statement, Marshall said the investment is expected to not only generate construction jobs but also add 1,400 full- and part-time jobs ranging from “entry to executive level,” while driving economic growth for the region. 

This will be the fifth African-themed resort for the Wisconsin-based Kalahari, which opened its first complex in Wisconsin Dells, a popular tourist destination, in 2000, and the first to open in Virginia. The privately owned company also operates locations in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Texas.

“Our family could not be prouder to call Spotsylvania County, Virginia, home to our fifth Kalahari resort,” Todd Nelson, owner and founder of Kalahari Resorts & Conventions, said in a statement.  “County and commonwealth officials and the Virginia people have been incredibly welcoming and supportive in helping us to make Kalahari Resort’s fifth location a reality in this beautiful state.”

In 2007, Kalahari announced plans to build a resort near the Fredericksburg Expo Center, but did not follow through due to the 2008 Great Recession.

Casino backers gamble on November revote

On Aug. 31, a new name was unveiled for the proposed $562 million resort casino that Richmond voters will be reconsidering in a November referendum: the Richmond Grand Resort & Casino.

But not much else appears new about the project.

The Richmond Grand Resort & Casino seems virtually identical to the proposed ONE Casino + Resort that voters shot down in a 2021 referendum. Maryland-based Urban One once again is pitching the casino, joined by Kentucky-based Churchill Downs, which last year purchased the assets of Urban One’s previous casino partner, Peninsula Pacific Entertainment.

Just like the earlier pitch, the Richmond Grand proposal includes a 250-room hotel, a 3,000-seat concert venue and a soundstage where Urban One pledges to invest $50 million over 10 years in TV, movie and audio productions. Also like before, the casino promises to make a $26.5 million upfront payment to the city government and forecasts that it will create an estimated 1,300 permanent jobs and generate $30 million in annual tax revenue. If passed, it would be built on the same 100-acre South Side site proposed in 2021.

Urban One and Churchill Downs say the new pitch reflects an extensive survey of Richmond voters who supported and opposed the casino referendum two years ago.

Urban One CEO Alfred Liggins acknowledged at the plan’s rollout that although his media conglomerate knows plenty about advertising, it is new to amassing political support. According to state campaign finance records, Urban One gave $3.9 million and Churchill Downs donated $3.1 million to a pro-casino PAC in August — more than three times what was spent in 2021.

Churchill Downs, which owns the Kentucky Derby and is an investor in casinos in 13 states, is an equal partner in the project with Urban One. If the referendum passes, it will become a significant part of the company’s holdings in Virginia, which also include Colonial Downs in New Kent County and six Rosie’s Gaming Emporiums across the state.

Churchill Downs CEO William Carstanjen didn’t specify what his company plans to do if the Richmond casino referendum fails a second time.

“This is a project that needs to get done in Richmond … and we put together the team that can do it,” Carstanjen says. “Now we just have to take our message to the citizens of Richmond and convince them, and we think we can do that.”

Richmond casino reintroduced with new name

The corporate backers of a $562 million Richmond casino on Thursday unveiled a new name for the resort casino city voters will consider approving this fall: Richmond Grand Resort & Casino. But not much else appears to be new about the proposed project.

Many of the features of the proposed ONE Casino + Resort that failed in a close 2021 referendum, are similar this time around, including a 250-room hotel, a 3,000-seat concert venue, a $26.5 million upfront payment to the city government, an estimated 1,300 permanent jobs with an average salary of $55,000 and a predicted $30 million in annual tax revenue and $16 million over 10 years in charitable contributions. Also part of the proposal again is a soundstage where co-developer Urban One pledges to invest $50 million over 10 years in TV, movie and audio productions. The casino, if passed, would be built on 100 acres in the city’s South Side, just off Interstate 95, on property owned by Altria Group.

The chief executives of business partners Urban One and Churchill Downs said Thursday that the plan’s details reflect an extensive survey of Richmond voters who supported and opposed the casino referendum two years ago. They said the project will create a 55-acre park in what has been industrial property, and that locally owned businesses, including restaurants, will have a chance to be part of the resort.

Urban One CEO Alfred Liggins acknowledged Thursday evening at a Richmond news conference that although his media conglomerate knows plenty about advertising, it was new to the arena of building political support.

“It’s no secret that we didn’t make a winning case in 2021,” he said, adding that the casino campaign that lost by 1,200 votes was driven by splashy billboards — rather than conversations with city voters.

“I know that [the] last go-round, we bought every billboard … in the entire city, and you know, it was probably annoying,” Liggins said. “Problem is, we should have been talking to more people, as opposed to advertising to more people.”

In the past year, as Richmond casino backers fought for a second referendum while other state officials attempted to win a chance for Petersburg to vote on a casino, “we have had hundreds of conversations with Richmonders,” Liggins said.

Thursday’s announcement took place at a Shockoe Bottom storefront that will be home to the pro-casino campaign, managed by Richmond resident Tierra Ward, a local elections director for the Virginia Democrats. She said after the news conference that she is still hiring staff. Also on hand were local union members who have spoken in favor of the jobs the project is expected to create, as well as three Richmond City Council members who also support the plan.

William Carstanjen, the CEO of Kentucky-based Churchill Downs, said that when his company purchased Peninsula Pacific Entertainment in November 2022 for $2.75 billion, he was “very aware” of the proposed Richmond casino project, which PPE had partnered with Urban One on in 2021. “We did a lot of due diligence on it. We were really excited about the opportunity. We joined the project after we completed the acquisition, based on the relationship we have developed with [Liggins].”

Churchill Downs, which owns the Kentucky Derby and is an investor in casinos in 13 states, is an equal partner in the proposed casino with Urban One, Carstanjen said, and if the referendum passes in November, it will become a significant part of his company’s holdings in Virginia, which also include Colonial Downs in New Kent County and six Rosie’s Gaming Emporiums across the state.

The new name — which Carstanjen said was one of “dozens and dozens” of suggestions the team heard during conversations and phone and online surveys of city residents — seems to be part of an effort to make Richmonders feel a greater sense of ownership in the project. Liggins declined to say what the budget for the current campaign is, or if it would exceed its $2 million in spending for the 2021 election, but noted, “the reality is, we’re going to invest what we need to get the proper message to as many people as possible.”

Carstanjen didn’t specify what his company would do if the referendum failed a second time, saying, “This is a project that needs to get done in Richmond … and we put together the team that can do it. Now we just have to take our message to the citizens of Richmond and convince them, and we think we can do that.”

Hospitality | Tourism 2023: CLYDE STACY

A former coal mining executive who headed Rapoca Energy, Stacy is a prominent developer and investor in his hometown of Bristol. He purchased the vacant Bristol Mall for $2.6 million in 2018 and partnered with longtime friend Jim McGlothlin, chairman of The United Co., to build Virginia’s first casino. The two friends were instrumental in changing state gambling laws to allow casinos in economically challenged Virginia cities.

The Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Bristol, a $400 million development, is slated to open next summer. Expected to generate as many as 1,500 jobs, the resort casino will also include a 3,200-seat performance venue and a 20,000-person outdoor entertainment space. A temporary casino opened in 2021.

Stacy was an investor in Dharma Pharmaceuticals, a licensed medical cannabis processor that was acquired in 2021 by Chicago-based Green Thumb Industries for $80 million. In October 2020, the company was the first in Virginia to dispense medical marijuana after the General Assembly loosened cannabis laws. Dharma Pharmaceuticals’ founders filed a lawsuit against Par Ventures, claiming Dharma is owed more than $7 million in relocation expenses for moving out of the Bristol Mall in 2021.