Meeting planners looking for a venue where everything they need is in one place will find casino resorts might just fit the bill. “We have an all-inclusive entertainment experience right within the resort,” says Jenni Muscat, director of hotel sales and catering for downtown’s MGM Grand Detroit. “They don’t have to leave the property to get the full experience. Another hotel venue might not have that.”
The same is true for many other casino resorts. Expansive spaces that can be used for live performances double as areas for trade shows, conferences, conventions, and galas. That means stages and audiovisual expertise also are usually available. These resorts often have the flexibility to create smaller rooms for breakout sessions.
Many gaming hot spots also have their own restaurants and catering offerings, in addition to bars, spas, pools, and hot tubs. A few casino resorts provide on-site golf courses for after-meeting relaxation or team-building outings. And one even has a cake shop that supplies confections in-house while offering customized special-occasion cakes to the public.
Properties like Hollywood Casino at Greektown, MGM Grand Detroit, and MotorCity Casino Hotel—also in downtown Detroit—are within walking distance of additional attractions that make their locations even more desirable for groups. Others, including FireKeepers Casino Hotel in Battle Creek and Four Winds New Buff-alo, are in proximity to major freeways.
The Spaces
Catering Sales Senior Manager Megan Cole at FireKeepers Casino Hotel in Battle Creek says its 17,500-square-foot event center contains everything a large group might need. FireKeepers hosts conferences, trade shows, expos, and the like. Several boardrooms are available, two of which were added as part of a 2021 expansion that also brought a second eight-story hotel tower. In total, FireKeepers has 446 guest rooms.
The event center can be partitioned to accommodate a general session, meals, exhibitor displays, and breakout meetings, for example. Cole says 250 is the number that works best for the space for a conference or meeting, although FireKeepers has done similar events with as many as 325.
Island Resort & Casino in the Upper Peninsula community of Harris is in the process of expanding its convention space, which will be able to host larger conventions when the expansion finishes this June. “It definitely creates the opportunity for us to expand,” says Player Services Manager Robin Bourdeau. “We already handle a lot of larger meetings. This just allows for multiple events and larger corporate conventions.”
The $19 million expansion project includes 16,900 additional square feet of event space with capacity to accommodate 750 attendees seated and up to 1,200 for larger expos and conventions. The renovation also includes a new nine-hole golf course and a golf shop. Boudreau notes that with 454 total guest rooms, Island Resort & Casino is the largest hotel between Harris and Milwaukee, cities which are 220 miles apart.
Kewadin Casinos has been working on an expansive, multimillion-dollar upgrade of its Kewadin Casino Sault Ste. Marie hotel. On the heels of an exterior renovation, interior remodeling of the hotel’s tower are expected to wrap up this winter. This casino resort offers more than 30,000 square feet of meeting and convention space along with 311 hotel rooms.
Farther south in the Upper Peninsula, Kewadin Casino St. Ignace also offers convention facilities, including an expansive 17,600-square-foot event center that can accommodate up to 1,800 theater-style, 800 reception-style, or 650 for a banquet. Plus, the casino resort provides an outdoor event space and an 81-room hotel.
The Locations
Director of Hotel Sales and Catering Jenni Muscat describes MGM Grand Detroit as “an urban resort” because of its location in the heart of downtown Detroit. “I don’t know that people expect a luxury resort experience in Detroit even though the city is trending,” she says. “But when people come and see it, that’s what sets us apart.”
Likewise, Hollywood Casino at Greektown is downtown and part of an iconic city neighborhood once home to many Greek immigrants and rife with Greek restaurants, bars, and other popular attractions. “It’s also in the middle of a lot of things that are going on here, with Ford Field [home of the NFL’s Detroit Lions] and Little Caesars Arena [home to the NHL’s Detroit Red Wings] down the street,” says Miyoshia Williams, Hollywood Casino at Greektown director of hotel operations. “A lot of our guests like the fact they can walk out our front door and down the street and have different restaurants and bars accessible literally walking distance away.” With 399 guest rooms, Holly-wood Casino at Greektown presents 12 different spaces for groups to gather that range from a 1,700-square-foot ballroom to more intimate settings for smaller groups.
Also downtown, MotorCity Casino Hotel is a AAA Four-Diamond hotel containing 67,000 square feet of meeting space, including “three of the most exclusive rooms you will find in Detroit,” according to Director of Sales and Catering Michelle Duffy. “Amnesia and Iridescence are on the 16th floor of the hotel with grand views of downtown Detroit and the gorgeous Canadian riverbank,” she says. “And Sound Board Theatre is an extraordinary space.” These standout spaces are in addition to 100,000 square feet of gaming, the two-story FanDuel Sportsbook sports-betting area, a steakhouse, and spa. “Attendees do not have to search for extracurricular activities,” Duffy says. “It’s all here under one roof.”
Four Winds New Buffalo is set on scenic property in a rural setting just minutes from Lake Michigan. According to Director of Sales and Catering Ron Sorce, its Silver Creek Event Center is one of the largest venues in southwest Michigan, with 17,000 square feet of adaptable event space that can accommodate banquet seating for up to 1,000 people or as many as 1,600 attendees theater-style. There also is a hotel with 416 guest rooms and suites. The casino resort is easily accessible from Interstate 94, and a little over an hour’s drive from Chicago or Kalamazoo.
Along with its expansive event center, groups like FireKeepers Casino Hotel’s central location in Battle Creek and easy accessibility via freeway, Cole says. That is one reason why the Michigan Statewide Payroll Conference was first held at FireKeepers in 2016. The conference has been back four times since. “We have participants from all parts of Michigan, and we found this was a great central location,” says Christy Quick, facilities chair for the event. She notes attendees like returning to FireKeepers Casino Hotel because everything—the rooms, meeting spaces, food, entertainment, audiovisual, and special touches—consistently works for their education-focused event attended by about 150.
Locale is also one of the attractions at Soaring Eagle Casino & Resort in Mount Pleasant, says Sales Manager Matt Ames. “Being in the middle of [Michigan] is perfect for statewide events,” he says. “Location is definitely one of the big keys for us.”
But Soaring Eagle offers more than just a convenient site. With 516 guest rooms and 26,000 square feet of function space, a food court, multiple restaurant choices including Ruth’s Chris Steak House, the casino, a spa, sports bar, pool, and indoor and outdoor Jacuzzis, the amenities list is long. Soaring Eagle also has a 35,000-square-foot entertainment hall available for planners. The hall is frequently used for large general sessions and trade shows, and many who book it are repeat customers.
The Flexibility
Because it is not unusual for casino resort staff to host a huge musical act one day and a convention for hundreds of attendees the next, they are flexible about pretty much every aspect of an event. For example, Ames says Soaring Eagle will work with clients when it comes to its attrition policies. If planners cannot fill all the hotel guest rooms they booked with attendees, he says it is usually fairly easy to book the rooms with casino-goers.
Food-and-beverage staff at casino resorts work hard to create menus that accommodate the needs of individual meeting planners. “We annually refresh our banquet menus and have seasonal menu options as well,” says Cole at FireKeepers, where anyone with a sweet tooth might be happy to discover the resort has a dedicated cake shop. “We do a lot with custom desserts,” Cole adds.
The Cake Shop is open to the general public, even creating and offering deliveries for wedding cakes. A meeting planner might opt to order a personalized cake for an event. “A lot of times groups might do a custom cake with the company’s logo to celebrate the anniversary of the corporation, a birthday within the group, or they might incorporate a company logo in some edible chocolate or fondant on a cupcake,” Cole says.
Miyoshia Williams of Hollywood Casino at Greektown says the Detroit casino resort offers a huge selection of food with a menu that allows planners to order from preset choices or choose their own options for each meal. At MGM Grand Detroit, four specialty kitchens support event dining.
Ron Sorce of Four Winds New Buffalo explains that adaptable configurations of space in its Silver Creek Event Center mean staff can be flexible and meet planners’ desire to include fluid activities, as opposed to attendees being stuck in the same room all day.
“Silver Creek Event Center allows for setup of separate general sessions and breakout sessions along with the meals,” he says. “We’ve also seen the shift of meeting planners including more team-building activities, both on-property and off-property, using our shuttle service for transportation needs.”
In fact, it is flexibility on all fronts that helps create a new experience every time, says Cole at FireKeepers. “Our space is so flexible,” she says. “We do corporate, we do social, but we also host events for our patrons—concerts, meet and greets, giveaways. It’s always growing and changing and fun.”
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