How the El Cortez has stayed relevant through 85 years in Las Vegas

Kenny Epstein has spent more than half his life connected to the El Cortez hotel-casino.

Coincidentally, both Epstein and the downtown Las Vegas property turn 85 this year; the former in July and the latter on Saturday. The connection is apt for an owner who describes the casino in unusually personal terms.

“It’s a family-owned business,” Epstein said during an interview at the recently opened Alex Prime steakhouse, named in honor of his late daughter, Alexandra Epstein-Gudai, who passed away in February. “It’s part of myself; it’s part of my psyche. The El Cortez is me. What can I say? It means everything to me.”

‘Shrewd’ operator of downtown carpet joint

El Cortez’s history is well established. John Kell “JK” Houssels Sr. opened the property at the corner of Fremont Street and 6th Street on Nov. 7, 1941. It briefly landed in the hands of a group of organized crime figures before returning to the Houssels family. Jackie Gaughan acquired it in 1963, and Epstein became a partner some years later. Epstein eventually bought the downtown hotel casino in 2008.

But its longevity is not simply a matter of surviving long enough to become a landmark, according to one local historian. It also reflects a relatively unusual continuity of ownership and management, and an owner who has resisted the temptation to remake the property in the image of whatever happens to be fashionable in Las Vegas.

“One of the reasons it has relevance (today) is that it’s still there and partly in its original form,” said Michael Green, a UNLV historian and executive director of Preserve Nevada.

Green said the El Cortez is part of a much smaller group of surviving properties from the early years of the city’s casino industry. Other hotels that opened around the same period, including the El Rancho Vegas and the Hotel Last Frontier, are gone.

But Green said the building alone does not explain the El Cortez’s staying power. He pointed to the people who have run it, and the continuity that has come with a relatively small number of ownership changes.

“What is overlooked is the shrewdness or wisdom, or both, of the people who have run it,” he said.

Gaughan’s influence remains central to how Epstein describes the business.

“Jackie was an innovator, and he was a great guy,” said Epstein. “He was my mentor, and we miss him a lot.”

Hospitality still lives downtown

Among many lessons learned, Epstein said the most important was to take care of customers, regardless of how much they spend.

“Because if you don’t have customers, you don’t have a business,” he said. “You might spend more time with somebody who’s a big player. But you have to take care of everybody.”

That philosophy is not merely a slogan at the El Cortez, according to Adam Wiesberg, the property’s vice president and general manager. Wiesberg started there as a dealer 12 years ago and worked his way up to the executive office. He said Epstein remains at the property six days a week and is involved in decisions throughout the operation.

Wiesberg said Epstein treats the El Cortez first as his home and then as a business. That approach, he said, is reflected in the way the owner reinvests in the property and the emphasis placed on the guest experience.

“It’s the people inside the building,” Wiesberg said, describing what makes the El Cortez distinctive.

Wiesberg said the property has a different approach to hospitality than larger corporate resorts, where customer-service standards are often built around formal training and procedures. At the El Cortez, he said, the emphasis is on employees feeling connected to the property and to one another.

“Hospitality and customer service, we don’t train it, but we live it,” he said.

He described a workplace in which employees, management and guests are treated as part of an extended family. Wiesberg said he spends much of his day on the casino floor, where guests regularly tell him the property feels different from other resorts and that they feel comfortable there.

Changing with the times

That does not mean the El Cortez has stood still. During Wiesberg’s time there, the property has invested in its hotel rooms, casino floor and dining offerings. He cited an approximately $25 million casino expansion completed last year and an $8 million renovation of the space that became Alex Prime.

Epstein describes the changes as an evolution rather than a reinvention.

“We just spruced the old girl up and still kept it as a period piece,” he said of the property’s renovation work.

Green said that balance is important. Historic properties cannot remain relevant simply by preserving every feature and refusing to adapt, he said. The El Cortez has retained its vintage character while incorporating modern touches, an approach Green said he respects. Its appeal includes both the nostalgia of an older Las Vegas and the amenities expected by today’s visitors.

El Cortez welcomes social media gamblers

The casino has also embraced a newer form of visibility: gambling influencers and social media video. Wiesberg said the relationship began organically about a decade ago, when a slot player asked if she could record her play. He agreed. After the videos appeared, he began hearing from people who said they had come to the property after watching them.

The idea eventually expanded to live blackjack streams, including one of the first sessions Wiesberg approved in late 2017 or early 2018. He recalled receiving a call from another casino executive who was alarmed that someone was broadcasting live from a blackjack table. Wiesberg was standing nearby, monitoring the session.

Epstein supported the experiment, Wiesberg said, and continues to approve new opportunities as long as they are appropriate for the property. The relationships have developed over time, he said, and are not simply paid promotional arrangements. For Wiesberg, that openness is another example of the casino adapting without losing its identity.

Take care of ‘everybody’

Epstein has seen Las Vegas change from a city with a much smaller entertainment and sports profile into a destination with major professional teams, new attractions and a very different downtown. But when he talks about what has mattered most at the El Cortez, he returns to the people who walk through its doors.

“You just can’t cater to the best customer; you have to cater to everybody,” he said. “We’re very lucky that we’re in a small place, so it’s much easier to see and take care of the customers.”

Green offered a small example of that sense of continuity. He recalled knowing a man whose father had been in the gaming business and who was touched when Epstein attended the father’s funeral, despite the fact that the two had not been closely connected in recent years.

“He remembered,” said Green, “and I think that speaks to the El Cortez. They remember.”

As the El Cortez reaches 85, the property is still evolving, including work on its players’ club and guest services area, a refreshed history hallway and plans for future suite upgrades, Wiesberg said. The anniversary is a milestone, but the work of keeping the property current is ongoing.

For Epstein, the achievement is not simply that a casino opened in 1941 is still operating. It is that the place remains recognizable to the people who have known it for decades while continuing to attract new visitors.

And at 85, he is still there, working to shape what comes next.

Contact David Danzis at [email protected] or 702-383-0378. Follow @AC2Vegas_Danzis on X.