New Year’s Day Q and A With Jeremy Aguero On Allegiant Stadium
By Alan Snel of LVSportsBiz.com
After LVSportsBiz.com was born in June 2017, the first person we interviewed about the Las Vegas Raiders stadium was Jeremy Aguero, who knows more details about the 2016 stadium bill that gave birth to the subsidized palatial domed venue than just about anyone.
At the time, Aguero was principal analyst of Applied Analysis and served as the private consultant to the Las Vegas Stadium Authority, the public agency that worked with the Raiders on construction of the 62,000-seat stadium. About three months ago, Aguero stepped down from his Applied Analysis job and took an executive management job with the Raiders.
When I interviewed Aguero in mid-June 2017 at his Applied Analysis office, I recall several bowls of M&M candies in the middle of the conference room table — an ideal treat to disarm any reporter.
Now a Raiders employee, Aguero, once again, answered our questions about the stadium that opened in 2020 but began hosting packed houses of fans in mid-2021 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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LVSportsBiz.com: As a Las Vegas native and local, you’re in position to put into context the meaning of this stadium in Las Vegas history and how it ranks in Las Vegas history as far as an entertainment venue.
Jeremy Aguero: The addition of Allegiant Stadium to Las Vegas’ inventory of tourism assets is transformational. It not only adds a new dimension to what Las Vegas can offer in terms of special events, but it instantly made Las Vegas an NFL city. That is something that seemed entirely unattainable just a decade ago.
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LVSB: I believe the Raiders’ stadium management company, the AEG spinoff, forecasted 47 annual events for the stadium — is the stadium going to realize that number?
JA: The current expectation is that Allegiant Stadium will surpass that number of events in 2022.
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LVSB: I know everyone is excited about the Super Bowl in the stadium in 2024, but as you have mentioned before there are already 300,000 visitors for Super Bowl weekends each year. What do you think will be the net spending increase with Las Vegas hosting a Super Bowl above a regular Super Bowl weekend in Las Vegas?
JA: That is a bit difficult to determine at this point; however, I believe Super Bowl 58 will be the largest special event (economically) in Southern Nevada’s history.
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LVSB: Since you helped craft the stadium bill language, what was the trickiest part of building the stadium when you look back at the process?
JA: There is no one thing that you can point to. There are a 1,000 reasons why Allegiant Stadium could have failed as a project. It didn’t because countless stakeholders including the Raiders, the resort industry, two governors, the LVCVA, and the members of the Southern Nevada Tourism Infrastructure Committee worked tirelessly to make it happen. Perhaps, that in itself is the answer to your question.
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LVSB: Would you say the stadium is the single-most important tourism building in Las Vegas?
JA: No; that would be McCarran International Airport.
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