How Did This Vegas Hotel Executive Use His Power to Serve His Employees and Customers?

On this episode of Our American Stories, Mike Leven was President and Chief Operating Officer of Las Vegas Sands Corp, and one of the greatest hoteliers of all time, and a legend in the industry. He’s also what you’d call a “wise man.” Today, Mike shares how he learned the importance of putting his customers in charge.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:10):
And we continue with our American stories. And up next
Mike Levin, who was the president and chief operating officer
of Las Vegas Stands and an all around hotel superstar,
one of the great hotel years of all time. More important,
a personal friend and a wise man, and wisdom my
goodness in short supply these days, and he transfers his

(00:32):
wisdom through story. A Jewish guy who loves storytelling like
almost nobody else. Up next is Mike telling a story
about how he puts his customers in charge.

Speaker 2 (00:46):
I can tell sales stories really for the rest of
the time we have together, but at the end of
the day, I really like the customers, just like my father.
My best lesson was very early went and I think
it's in my book. It talks about the New York
State Savings Association. It's a guy named Bill Bodine and

(01:06):
Bodine was his last name. It was my first booking.
It said, funny you're in here, He said, did I
need a lunch for sixty people? He said, can you
find out? I said, sure, it was around the corner.
He was on Fifth Avenue too. On the corner. I
went back checked the book with a guy banquet guy,
and we had a space. So we hed with the
Madison room with the Rosehill held sixty people for lunch.

(01:29):
I went back to him, didn't use the phone. You
never had the cell phones or anything. It went W W.
Walked back, said I got the room for you and whatever.
It's four dollars and twenty five cents for lunch for
whatever was at that time, plus catuity. And he said
finally said I need ten tables or six. And I said, okay,
now we doll I know ten table do I didn't
know ten tables of six. I didn't know twelve inch

(01:51):
round twelve foot rounds from ten foot rounds. I didn't know,
and no one taught me anything. So I I I,
I go back and I say to herber H'm in
the back. I said, I need ten tables of six.
Can't do it. But do you mean you can't do
it my first booking? I mean you can't do it.
What do you mean you can't do it? Can't the union?
You gotta have tables of ten. I go back to

(02:14):
see Baudaine, and Boudein says to me. I said to him,
you gotta have tables of ten. He looked at me.
Like I'm looking at you. He said, Mike, I'm the customer.
I want ten tables of six or you're not getting
the business. I said, mister Beaudaine, I will try to

(02:38):
work it out. So I go back. I have to
understand I don't know anything. I go back to Ermine
and I said herb. I said, why do I have
to have Why does the union want tables of ten
instead of tables of six? He says, because they have

(03:01):
to get the gratuity from ten people per table. I said,
what's the gratuity? He said, fifteen percent. I figured out
fifteen percent on four dollars and fifty cents is sixty cents, right,
So ten tables sixty cents on two extra people is
a dollar twenty? Correct? And I don't know if my

(03:23):
mask I'm doing it in my head. Okay, the dollar twenty,
I said, I'll tell you what. Suppose I get the
customer to pay a dollar twenty for every person for
sixty people. Does it make a difference whether they have
tables or six or tables of ten? He says, no,
they'll take it for the money. The money's the same, said,

(03:44):
Let's do that. He says, okay, I'll do it. I
go back to Bodine, I said, the bust of the day, listen,
I can't short the waiters a dollar twenty two forty
two dollars and forty cents a table, So you got
to if you pay me the extra, I can do
the tent dables. He said. It's a deal. So I

(04:04):
made my first deal to get my first booking. But
here the lessons that it's so easy for people to
turn the customer down, to play the game their way
rather than to play the game for the customer. And
I can tell you, for my whole career, making it
work for the customer came up almost all the time,

(04:27):
even later in the holiday end days and the days
and days because the franchise. I'd say to people, who's
the customer in a franchise operation? And you know what
they all say, most of them, Well, the person who
buys the product in the restaurant or in the hotel
is the customer, said, you're wrong. The franchise is your customer.

(04:48):
If you make that person happy, he or she will
make the customer happy. If they're happy, and if they
make the customer happy, the end user happy, then we're
going to be happy because we're going to be collecting
more royalties. Isn't that the way it works? Well? But
that all came from trying to make it work in
the first first deal I ever made, and you know,

(05:11):
after that, Lee, I always wanted to be in charge
because the basic situation in business or in everything is
the people who want top wanted to be done their way,
but when they wanted to be done the customer's way,
they are ultimately successful. I made some marketing decisions along

(05:33):
the way that was sort of customer oriented. I think
I did that. But when I was fully in charge
at the top of it, and then when I was
executive EP of Operations at Americana Hotels and had the
whole company, I could I could make those decisions, or
at least teach people to make those decisions, you know,
because they knew what my philosophy was. And then ultimately,

(05:57):
as president of days in and holiday in in these
kind of situations, I could eventually develop that particular situation.
So I think that the difference for me from what
I see from many other executives or many other people
is that my power, if you had power, was really

(06:19):
to make it happen for the customer, not to make
it power for power's sake, for myself, because the ultimate
benefit of the company is to have satisfied customers, and
if you don't have satisfied customers, you can't be successful
for long. And what you see when you read and
see what goes on in business in general or in life,

(06:41):
even in politics, it's no difference, you know, I mean,
how in politics do you service your constituency? The successful
politician is the one whose constituents he makes happy. That
can be positive a negative, depending up on what makes
it happy. But the point is making them happy means
that they've both for him and and or her or

(07:04):
it so my And you know, it's funny because I
always treated suppliers the same way, and I always treated
the hotel media the same way, even though we were
buyers of their product. I always looked at them like like,
how can I help them to be successful? I always

(07:26):
treated employees the same way. And so I think I
think that if you if you you know, if you
summarize all this stuff and roll it into a little ball,
I think I think if my success, if I've had any,
has been the number of people, both customers and employees

(07:49):
that have gained an advantage or gained something because I
was involved that benefited. I think gains maybe is a
bad wad benefited from the involvement with me.

Speaker 1 (08:00):
And you've been listening to Mike Levin, by the way,
go to Ouramericanstories dot com put in his name, and
I love so many of the things he shares with us.
So many of the stories about people. And in the end,
businesses are about people. The local restaurant. Look, you go
in two or three times to that local restaurant in
a row and they serve you up a bad mood
or they're rude, and ten years of dedication to that

(08:23):
restaurant are over. It is about the customer, and it's
about choice, and that is the free enterprise system. The
customer gets to choose. Leave it to the guy at
the top. He'll just say something like ten tables of six.
That's just the way we do it. And it was
beautiful that the guy, the customer said to Mike, I
want ten tables of six or you're not getting the business.

(08:46):
This is what makes in the end, free enterprise home.
The customer gets to choose. Don't take care of the customer.
There goes your business, Mike Levin's stories, my storytelling, a
hotel legend and in the end a friend, and Mike
will forgive this a real mention his storytelling. Here on

(09:07):
our American Stories.