Station Casinos started July 1, 1976, as The Casino, a 5,000-square-foot property with 100 slot machines and 90 employees.
Attached to the Mini Price Motor Inn on Sahara Avenue just west of the Strip, The Casino quickly expanded into the Bingo Palace in 1977 before becoming Palace Station in 1984.
As the locals casino giant — founded by Frank Fertitta Jr. and now run by his sons, Frank Fertitta III and Lorenzo Fertitta — celebrates its 50th anniversary, it operates 22 properties across Southern Nevada and has nearly 10,000 employees, including a handful whose careers have spanned almost the entire history of Station Casinos.
Ida Johnson, Bernice Boykin and Paula Barrett were hired by Station Casinos in the 1970s and still work at Palace Station.
The Review-Journal sat down with them and Frank Fertitta IV, senior vice president of operations at Red Rock Resorts (parent company of Station Casinos), to recount their careers with the company as it turns 50.
“Nothing has really changed,” said Boykin, who has worked at Station for 47 years. “Our machines are still loose, we’ve got free parking and the food is excellent in all our restaurants.”
‘Go to your family’
Boykin was a waitress on the Strip looking for a different job in 1979 when a friend told her the Bingo Palace was hiring.
“As I walked in the door, I could feel the atmosphere that I wanted to be here,” she said. “I was met at the door with a smile.”
One of the first people she encountered was Fertitta Jr., who started in the gaming industry as a dealer at the Stardust. She said he hired her on the spot to be a change person and a month later moved her to the casino cage.
“One day he said, ‘I like your service.’ We went to the cashier’s cage and he said ‘I want you to count my money,’” she said. “All this money was really frightening. But they trained me well, and they treated me really well.
“From then on, I just moved from area to area. I’ve done everything in here.”
After almost 40 years working in the cage, Boykin moved into a promotional and marketing role and now serves as Palace Station’s guest ambassador.
“I feel when my guests come through the main lobby, they’re in our hands,” she said. “We make sure they’re comfortable and come back to see our family here at Palace Station. We’re one family. (Fertitta Jr.) taught us to be family.”
Boykin said she learned a lot from Fertitta Jr. about life and customer service, including the 10-5 rule that dictates employees should make eye contact and smile when a guest approaches within 10 feet, and they should offer a friendly verbal greeting when they come within five feet.
“He taught me a lot because he loved everybody,” she said. “He’d go to church every morning and then he’d come in and talk to every guest to make sure they are comfortable. He had that personality.
“I’ve seen him pay for a lady’s surgery and feed a lot of people that were hungry. One guy was homeless and he fed him and then he hit the Megabucks. And that guy spent all the money right back here because he had to take care of the man that took care of him.
“We had a flood, we had a fire and everybody kept their job. He made sure everybody fed their family. That’s the kind of man he was.”
Boykin has no plans to retire.
“This is my life — I lost my husband and daughter — and they take care of me,” she said. “I lost my daughter five years ago. Her last words to me were ‘Mom, go to work. Go to your family. I’m OK.’ Because she knew how much I love this place. And 30 minutes later, I got the call.”
‘Golden girl’
Johnson, the longest-tenured Station employee at 49 years, has worked for the company since 1977, serving as a cook in the employee dining room since 1983.
“Number 1, I love what I do,” she said. “My grandmother said I’ve always been a nurturer. So I like taking care of my co-workers. I enjoy coming to work and I love it for the things it has done for me and my family.
“Growing up, I always liked watching this show called ‘The Love Boat,’ and now I get to take a cruise every year, sometimes twice a year.”
She is grateful that when the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2009, it didn’t take her vacation time before it successfully emerged from bankruptcy in 2011.
“I thought that was great to have them not take away something like that,” she said.
Johnson also has fond memories of Fertitta Jr..
“On Fridays, that was his clam chowder day. And he always had to have his jello on that day also,” she said. “He was always like part of the team.”
She said she’s just about ready to retire, but not before reaching her own 50-year work anniversary on Sept. 1, 2027.
“One more year and I can be the real golden girl,” she said. “I’m at 49 now. I want to make 50 next year.”
‘It’s home’
Barrett began working in the call center at Bingo Palace in 1977 after graduating from Valley High School before taking time off to travel to Europe. She was re-hired on New Year’s Eve 1979 and has been at Palace Station ever since.
“It’s been an incredible journey. I would never in a million years believed that I could stay here as long as I’ve been here,” she said. “It’s a phenomenal company. The people, the management. It’s home.”
She worked in the personnel department for a few years before becoming a cocktail server in the early 1980s after learning that her friend made twice as much as she did by serving drinks.
“So I’m like, ‘Hey, Frank, can I transfer to the cocktail service?’ He said, ‘Absolutely.’ So then I came down to the cocktails and I’ve been here ever since,” she said. “It was overwhelming in the beginning because I’d never worked with the public. But it was incredible. My guests are my life. Everybody’s family here.”
Barrett was grateful to be gifted $10,000 from the company on her 40th work anniversary, and was pleasantly surprised that guests returned in droves after Las Vegas casinos shut down for 78 days in 2020 for the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We thought that nobody would come back in after COVID,” she said. “They were knocking the doors down. It was crazy. Our business was unbelievable.”
She said she is known for talking.
“I talk more to my guests than I work, which is good for some and bad for the others,” she said with a laugh. “They look just as forward to coming in and seeing us and gambling as we look forward to seeing them come back time and time and time again.
“I have been so blessed and honored to have worked here as long as I have and am so thankful to Station Casinos for allowing me to stay as long as I have. I mean, on the Strip, to be a cocktail waitress, don’t you have to have a portfolio?”
Besides the family atmosphere that has kept her at Palace Station for 47 years, Barrett said the company offers great benefits and the executives are approachable.
“They’re so human and they’re still so genuine with all of us every time they see us,” she said.
Barrett isn’t in any rush to retire, either.
“I hope I’m not a 70-year-old cocktail waitress,” she said. “But it’s such a joy to come here. It’s like a playground.”
‘Family culture’
Fertitta IV has fond memories of family dinners at the now-defunct Fisherman’s Broiler restaurant at Palace Station with his two older sisters, mother and father, Frank Fertitta III, chairman and CEO of Red Rock Resorts.
“It was always important to him not to ever miss family dinner,” said Fertitta IV, 31, during an interview in The Charcoal Room, the former Fisherman’s Broiler space. “There’s a booth in here that he and my grandfather used to sit at together. They used to have a little landline phone connected to it so they could pick up calls while they were having dinner.
“It was a lot of good times.”
Fertitta IV also recalls his father telling him more than once about his first job working construction on Bingo Palace.
“He would always tell me about when it was hot in the summertime and he was doing construction on the roof and he was 14,” he said. “All those early stories of him working with his dad always made me want to work with my dad.
“So I never really questioned whether or not I wanted to do anything else.”
Station Casinos, a publicly traded company through Red Rock Resorts with a market cap of roughly $6 billion, now operates seven large properties in Durango, Red Rock Resort, Green Valley Ranch, Boulder Station, Palace Station, Santa Fe Station and Sunset Station. It also operates Barley’s Casino and The Greens, eight Wildfire Gaming locations and five Seventy Six Taverns.
While Las Vegas has changed over the past five decades, Fertitta IV said Station remains a family-run company committed to offering hospitality and value.
“If you’re a local in Las Vegas, this is where you come to create memories and where you get value and you get treated well, and there’s a family culture,” he said. “I know my grandfather used to walk the floor and ask people about their families and how their day is going and try to make a genuine connection with people. I think that makes a big difference to customers when you care on that level.
“We have a good group of people who care deeply about this company because of the culture that’s been built here and because we all care about each other on a personal level. Over the next 50 years, I think people will still be saying the same thing about Station Casinos.”
Contact reporter Todd Dewey at tdewey@reviewjournal.com. Follow @tdewey33 on X.
STATION CASINOS TURNS 50
Founded: July 1, 1976 by Frank Fertitta Jr., now run by his sons, Frank Fertitta III and Lorenzo Fertitta
Properties (22): Durango, Red Rock Resort, Green Valley Ranch, Boulder Station, Palace Station, Santa Fe Station, Sunset Station, Barley’s Casino, The Greens, Wildfire Gaming, Seventy Six Taverns
Employees (9,700+): 1,341 with more than 20 years in company; 1990s hires: 398; 1980s hires: 34; 1970s hires: 7, including 4 who still work at Palace Station
