MGM Grand in Las Vegas H-M
MGM Grand
3799 Las Vegas Boulevard South,
Las Vegas, Nevada 89109-4340,
United States
Phone: (702) 891-1111
Website: mgmgrand.com
About the Casino
It's hard to believe but 2018 marked the 25th anniversary of the MGM Grand. A lot has changed in those nearly twenty five years, but that's what a Vegas hotel has to do to stay competitive. Sit still too long and other, newer, more contemporary resorts will pass you by.
I bring this up because the MGM Grand is undergoing a major overhaul that will end up with what is, by my count, the third incarnation of the property.
When the hotel opened in 1993, it was designed as a family destination with a "Wizard of Oz" theme from its emerald green exterior to the animatronic Dorothy in the front rotunda to the big theme park out back. It was the biggest hotel in the world at the time, with more than 5,000 rooms, and had a 171,500 square-foot casino, the biggest in Las Vegas. The girth of the place was celebrated: bigger was definitely better. Heck, they even put "grand" right there in the name.
But a funny thing happened on the yellow brick road. The Vegas as a family destination experiment failed and all of that stuff that was designed to appeal to them was removed (Bye Dorothy! By log flume ride!). And along with it, the folks that run this place started trying to disguise just how big it is. Smaller and intimate became the buzz words in the late '90s and the MGM Grand has been playing the downsizing game ever since, dividing up the casino into smaller more manageable areas and even separating parts of the hotel tower into different boutique style accommodations.
As newer hotels came along that were grander in terms of luxury and amenities, the MGM Grand became something of an upper-mid-market property. The rooms, the facilities, and everything else were fine but not the nicest, fanciest, newest, or most expensive. It wasn't often people's first choice, but you could almost always get a room at a competitive price and so that was good enough.
See full review of the MGM Grand courtesy of Rick Garman's Vegas4Visitors.com
