Bronco Billy's Casino in Cripple Creek considering adding 70 more rooms to hotel project

Owners of Bronco Billy’s Casino in Cripple Creek are looking at adding more rooms to what already will be the city’s largest hotel.

Las Vegas-based Full House Resorts is studying whether to accelerate plans to add an additional 70 rooms to the Chamonix Casino Hotel, now under construction adjacent to Bronco Billy’s. The two-block-long expansion would increase the size of the hotel to 370 rooms, making it the second-largest hotel in the Colorado Springs area when it opens in late 2022 or early 2023 — replacing the Hotel Eleganté Conference & Event Center that is slated to be converted to apartments.

“We’ll make a decision in the next couple of months on whether to go to (the Cripple Creek) City Council and get those approvals and get our board approval and so on, but (there’s a) pretty good chance we’ll try to upsize the scope of this because the market seems to be there for it,” Full House CEO Dan Lee said in a conference call last week with investors and stock analysts on the company’s second-quarter financial results.

Plans for the hotel included the additional wing, but Lee said the early success of the 101-room Wildwood Hotel in Cripple Creek that opened in July and the 516-room Monarch Casino Resort Spa in Black Hawk that opened in November, along with record second-quarter profits from Bronco Billy’s, prompted company officials to think about building the additional wing right away.

Lee said the revenue from poker, blackjack and other table games in Cripple Creek has jumped 35% since betting limits in Colorado were eliminated May 1. He said Full House could make profits of up to $60 million a year on a $230 million investment in the project, which is “driving us to think, ‘Well, the most efficient way to add the extra wing is to do it right now,’” since contractors are already working on the project.

Construction is still in the early stages on the Chamonix project with foundations underway, but Lee said early bids for the work have “come back a little higher than we thought,” likely pushing the cost from the company’s $180 million initial estimate to nearly $200 million. Full House is putting more of the project out to bid to get a “firmer grasp on where we are versus that $180 million. I don’t want to increase the scope of it if we’re not having the costs contained.”

The hotel is part of a larger project that will nearly double the gaming floor of Bronco Billy’s and add upscale hotel rooms, restaurants, shops, a spa, rooftop pool, convention and meeting space and a parking garage.

Full House also plans to close Bronco Billy’s for up to four months for renovations after the Chamonix project is completed. Lee said the company “has more than enough money, even for the expanded project,” from the $281.5 million in cash it held at the end of the second quarter.

On Aug. 10, Full House reported second-quarter profits of $5.48 million, or 15 cents a share, compared with a year-earlier loss of $6.7 million, or 25 cents a share, when its casinos were closed during the COVID-19 pandemic for much of the quarter. Revenues during the April-to-June quarter more than tripled from a year ago to $47.4 million. The results are a major improvement from the same period 2019, when the company lost $1.01 million, or 4 cents a share, on revenue of $41.7 million.

Without the additional wing, Chamonix Casino Hotel would be the largest hotel in Cripple Creek, eclipsing the 158-room Double Eagle Hotel and Casino.

Chamonix is among several hotel projects coming to Cripple Creek. Triple Crown Casinos General Manager Larry Hill said the company plans to start construction next spring on a 103-room first phase of its hotel, planned to open in late 2023 or early 2024. Plans by Century Casinos to convert and expand the historic and long-vacant Palace Hotel into a 30-room boutique hotel remain on hold.