Here is how it began. Atlantic City has been in the news quite a lot lately and most of the news has been dire. The issues primarily concern the proposed closing of several casinos in Atlantic City. Some prognosticators have suggested that this signals the beginning of the end for Atlantic City. There are others who remain optimistic that Atlantic City has a bright future but needs to readjust to stay relevant. The issue had dominated my social media, particularly my Facebook page. After engaging in several discussions a thought occurred to me.
Many of us who are concerned about the future of Atlantic City and who have an idea of what we think the City needs or what might be attractive in the City have posted our thoughts and ideas. However we seem to be waiting for someone or some group of folks to come along and bring the ideas to fruition. It occurred to me that maybe a grassroots investment group might spearhead the effort to attempt to bring to the resort the attractions we believe the City is lacking. So I decided to throw out the idea to see what the reaction would be. My post read as follows: Here is a crazy idea. Several of us have expressed what needs to be done in Atlantic City with ideas such as amusement piers or water attraction or things of that nature. Why don’t we put ourselves on the front line and do a grassroots effort, along the lines of Kickstarter and all invest in one of those properties and see if we can make a go of that?? Let’s have that discussion and put a skin in the game.
Much to my surprise, the post received over 75 likes and some very encouraging responses. Most of the responses were supportive of the concept and several of the individuals seem ready to get involved and put their money behind the concept. What I envision is a group of investors who would form some entity, led by a management team. That group would meet to determine a concrete concept and plan and then seek additional funding to achieve the goal of bringing about the proposed development. Ideally the grass roots group will raise enough capital to be taken seriously by a venture capital group or some other financier and then move the project forward from there.
The notion depends on the one very real and somewhat unique quality about Atlantic City, a sense of nostalgia. Those of us who grew up in Atlantic City before gaming remember a different Atlantic City. We always had tourist and visitors in town. Entertainment was a central element of Atlantic City. An incredible amount of research and organizational planning would be required to move this concept from a Facebook status post to a real project but nothing happens until the first step is taken.