Sarah Feldberg
When the announcement went out that Tropicana Las Vegas would open Sky Beach Club — a daytime, 21-and-over pool party complete with bottle service, beer pong, DJs and celebrity hosts — I couldn’t help thinking, Again?
The Tropicana has been here before. Fresh off a $100 million-plus makeover in 2011, the property imported Nikki Beach, the sun-drenched day club brand with locations in Miami and Marrakech, to give the place an upscale edge. A star-studded grand opening white party heralded the new venue, which lasted only one season on the Strip.
Next up was RPM, an in-house nightclub that took over the space … and then was promptly packed away to make room for another import. Bagatelle, the swanky bistro with outposts in Los Angeles, New York and St. Tropez, promised to bring sophisticated food and a hip, supper club vibe to the corner of Tropicana and the Boulevard. Hopes were high and yet, within six months, Bagatelle too was parting ways with the Trop, turning the sprawling indoor/outdoor space over to the resort to use for private events under the name Havana Room and Beach Club.
If you’ve been counting, that one venue saw four brands in two years. So the Sky Beach Club announcement, well, it felt a bit like deja vu.
However, it also raised an interesting question in Las Vegas right now: Have we reached peak party pool?
When Rehab debuted at the Hard Rock in 2003, no one could have predicted that its daytime, poolside boozefest model would take over Las Vegas Boulevard. Back then, afternoons were for recovering, nursing hangovers and memories of last night’s losing streak, and preparing for another night out on the town.
But the Hard Rock party offered an alternative: a last-gasp Sunday hurrah before returning to the reality of Wherevertown, USA. The line to get into the resort’s outdoor pool grounds stretched down the casino corridor with barely dressed 20-somethings impatient to get in and get sunburned and drunk.
Today, however, Las Vegas is packed with Rehab’s offspring, pool-based party venues that range in size and scope from intimate topless lounges to DJ-fueled mega clubs. Wet Republic to Tao Beach, Liquid to Encore Beach Club, Daylight to Drai’s, they are nearly everywhere you look. Even gentlemen’s club Sapphire opened its own pool club. Marquee Dayclub at the Cosmopolitan now erects a heated, 22,000-square-foot dome over its pool so guests can don their bikinis and dance the day away all year long.
And Rehab, the dayclub granddaddy, is still going at it, celebrating spring break this month with a DJ set from Elijah Wood and appearances from cast members of “Vanderpump Rules.”
So-called daylife has been a wild success on the Strip, there’s no debating that. But can the market sustain another party pool? How much demand can there be for another outdoor fiesta fueled by alcohol and EDM? Maybe Sky Beach Club can differentiate itself enough to stand apart from the competitors and draw its own bottle service-buying, beer pong-playing crowd. But isn’t there something to be said for bucking a trend that has already hit its peak … and giving people a nice place to just catch a few rays and read a book?