Originally published at: Las Vegas Sphere lost nearly $100m in first three months | Boing Boing
…
3 Likes
I’m shocked, truly shocked, to hear that a member of the Dolan family is an incompetent and tantrum-throwing nepo-baby.
That clan makes Steinbrenner look like a level-headed, humble business genius in comparison.
11 Likes
It’s a pity that someone incurred the waste of finding out that it’s a bad idea the hard way; but this story would be a lot more depressing if it had turned out to be a good idea.
6 Likes
The video screen technology on the exterior is nifty, but that’s available to anyone on the Strip without buying a $300 ticket.
10 Likes
A whole $2.6M in advertising revenue, eh? If they’re paying an average rate of $0.18/kWh then the electric bill alone is somewhere in the neighborhood of $4.5M per quarter, so that’s not even enough to keep the lights on, let alone maintain the thing.
15 Likes
7 Likes
It’s a sufficiently novel project that no one knows for sure how much it costs to run.
Which would, hypothetically of course, make it an excellent way to plausibly embezzle $100m.
Whilst everyone opines “Well, a Sphere THAT big is gonna cost you $100 million a quarter, obviously. I could of told you that, just look at it…”
6 Likes
Visited Vegas in mid October and i didn’t get to swing by to see the sphere, but my thoughts on it are two fold. The location itself is slightly away from the main area of the strip so for those without cars or that might not have a ton of time taking a detour over to it takes up too much time. The other is that i’ve heard that tickets for performances inside the venue are crazy expensive, and while i’m sure it worth it that really limits people’s willingness to spend money there.
Beyond that i’m sure that operational costs to run the super bright LED sphere is pretty high.
3 Likes
Yeah, as a business model it doesn’t make a lot of sense… the most interesting feature of the building can’t even be seen by the people who paid to attend an event inside it.
4 Likes
It does have LEDs on the inside as well 
supposedly the effect is great, that’s why U2 was the first act to play in the venue as a good way to show off how cool it is.
There’s probably better videos to show off the interior but here’s one i found
10 Likes
Interesting, I hadn’t seen the inside.
Still, what a tremendous energy footprint…
7 Likes
I can’t see many touring bands going there. They set out on world tours with a whole purpose-designed rig and stage set. Does not look like this place accommodates that. Looks more like it is good for shows that are purpose-designed for this specific venue and this venue only.
(And I know the sound quality of that recording is crap, but even allowing for that, Bono’s singing in that clip sounds, well, crap.)
5 Likes
This seems like something where their expenses and revenue for the first year at least would have been pretty well defined. I don’t see how this was either unexpected or the CFO’s fault.
4 Likes
The display inside is pretty unbelievable too; Channel 4 News did an interview with U2 before they opened in Vegas and they showed some of the sequences that have been programmed for the interior:
4 Likes
I’ve read that “CFO” can involve more generalized advisory work than just being the beancounter-prime; but that was my first thought for why the CFO took the CEO throwing a tantrum at him especially badly.
It’s…not a great look…when Mr. Decision Man is screaming at you because he doesn’t like his decision’s bean-count.
Yelling seems unprofessional regardless; but at least it would be on-topic if the CFO were getting screamed at because the auditors were refusing to sign off on the books or something like that.
5 Likes
Yea, it’s for sure going to be better for acts to have a residency, as U2 is doing. There are some bands that could at minimum do a short one there (rumor is that Phish is on tap for 2024 and other than Billy Joel, no one has played MSG in NYC more than them) but after the novelty of having this long U2 residency wears off, they’ll have to start packing that place nightly somehow to make money.
Maybe their turn it into a Planetarium on “dark” nights.
6 Likes
I think the sphere is both amazing and a completely ludicrous eye sore. Which, frankly, is very American. I would also be happy to go there and see U2 if I thought I could get tickets and it wouldn’t bankrupt us.
3 Likes
i actually saw U2 there last week, and while it was crazy expensive (a major anniversary celebration splurge for us), i can say that it was worth every penny. that place is incredible, and has real potential for any other imaginative, creative band or artist who uses it. i’m not surprised to hear it’s lost money so far, but i think in time, if they can keep it going, it will be fine. Not everything in there has to be as expensive as a residency show for one of the biggest bands around.
8 Likes
I found this wikipedia excerpt an impressive testament to waste:
the world’s fourth-largest crane, a Demag CC-8800 crawler crane, was set up on the site’s northeast side for the purpose of lifting heavy construction materials. The crane is capable of standing up to 580 feet (180 m). In a disassembled state, the crane was transported across the Atlantic Ocean from Zeebrugge, Belgium to Port Hueneme, California. The crane then required 120 tractor-trailers to transport it to Las Vegas. A separate crane was required to assemble the main crane, a process which took 18 days.[27][28]
There’s always 2nd chances! 
5 Likes
