blonde poker forum

My WSOP diary was seemed to be enjoyed by a few people so I am going to keep a diary on Blonde (updated each day) in the same format as the WSOP one. I said I would do this once we had secured the poker premises.

AS WELL as this diary, up until the opening date of the club, I will be asking people to help with for ideas so that we create a Club for the SERIOUS POKER PLAYER, but I will do this on SEPARATE threads (eg. Club Rules & Etiquette - what should they be?).This way I can print out everyones ideas by subject and analyse them in an organised format. I'll probably post a subject every few weeks so I can collate the largest sample of feedback possible.

This diary will also allow me get rid of some of the stress and may make interesting reading for keen poker playersr. I anticipate all sorts of problems as well as the local casinos trying to prevent this club getting a gaming licence. I''ll give you an honest account of everything that happens each day.

Cheers Rob

I know that I have done a lot of background work over the last 6 months, but its not been organised or focussed. I've been liasing with an awful lot of people, the Gaming Board, gaming solicitors, property agents, software programmers, potential employees for the club, "names" in the poker world and my own financial advisors.

Everything has been a bit woolly as without the premises, I'd have been wasting everyone's time and I've sort of done a lot of work but got nothing to show for it at the moment. Also, I was pretty ignorant about the gaming laws which took up a lot of time listening to so many different interpretations.

Anyway, I need to do a proper project plan now, like I used to do when I was working in my recruitment business. I'm playing the £1,500 in Walsall tomorrow so I'll do it on Sunday after I bust out on Saturday. When I play poker I'm pretty reckless/useless, but when it comes to business, I'm the opposite for some reason.

Today I've had a meeting with our IT Manager, Pete Langley, who has been recruited to head up systems side of the business, he's been full time for 3 weeks and is working on a specification for the club. Me and Nick "the Shrew" have also ran through the refurbishment specification of the club which I had orginally costed out at about £500,000, but it looks like I may have not budgeted enough. We've arranged for an architect to redraw the plans next Tuesday so we'll know more then. Nick runs my property business and has experience of all this type if thing.

Two web sites contacted me today, one to do an interview about the club, and the other to ask me about the incident at Notts Gala on Monday. I hope it doesn't look like I have been slagging off Notts to benefit the poker club venture. The link is below if anyone want to read the interview:
 
http://uk.pokernews.com/news/2005/11/rob-yong-interview.htm

good luck mr yong ,and i think i speak for everyone there :cheers: :dd: ;ifm;

ok vinni you have drinkers :cheers: dancing :dd: and dinning ;ifm; where is the poker?

what would that mug know about poker ironside ??  :D  :D  :D

hey vinni kiv said that not me
i cant be bother chip chins this week

all you have to do with him is stand infront ov him and he cant see you :tikay: :tikay: :tikay: :tikay: :tikay: :tikay: :dd: :dd: :dd: :dd:

ROFPMSL

I woke up this morning coughing and spluttering with brochitus. This means I'll miss the Midlands Masters main event today which I was looking forward to playing. Got to stop smoking today. At 7.30am, I chucked 19 cigerettes in the bin and smoked the last one, sort of a "last cigerette ritual". I took all my ashtrays up to my parents, got to stop.

I've asked Tikay and Paul "Action Jack" Jackson to come and have a look at the club premises with me next tuesday. I want to put a dedicated press room in the Club for live updates etc so wanted Tikay's opinion of the best place and what sort of facilities would be needed (network points etc). We are also going to put a TV studio in the Club so need a bit of advice on that aswell.

I also wanted to catch up with Action Jack (after his 600k win in Monte Carlo) to see if he/his business would be interested doing "poker lessons" in the live club, particulary as we be looking to target new internet players. Although Paul has never been able to win anything in my home games, he is very knowledgable on the game and he's great at hand analysis. Above all, he loves the "techncial side of the game" which is great for teaching new players - and believe me, to fill this place we will need to generate new players!

I see the club being run on a day to day basis by a General Manager, Bar Manager, Card Room Manager (x2) and Restaurant Manager. In total I expect to have 50 employees running the club on a day to day basis. This seems a lot but if you are open 90 hours a week, with people working 37.5 hours, you do need this many staff. However, I expect the strategy of the club to be steered by the opinions of Poker Pro's and the Club Members.

Anyway, I need to get on with this project plan, I'll copy and paste it into this thread for anyone that's interested. Good luck to Barry from Sheffied at Walsall today, he came round to visit me when he heard I as ill today...heart of gold..

Cheers Rob

Out of interest, is there a hotel near the site?

It's only 10 minutes at the most by car from the city centre Robert.

I was thinking more of a drunken stagger.

nothing that you would walk to, buy a camper van and you can kip in the car park!

have you spoken to your new neighbours about poker discounts and suppling the waitresses

behave ironside

This suppling of waitresses  sounds interesting  ,I presume you mean eating  two at a time   Yummmeee.                                                                                 On a more serious note, a side line you could organise is Bootcamps for pokerplayers , like helmuth runs in the US.The money u could generate from these by controlling the whole package  tutor, hotels,meals,lectures, T shirts ,book sales.    people pay lots of money to learn to cook in Provence why not poker with you. just a thought to kick around, every litte bit helps when trying to get in the black,and if the TV is going to be there sometimes thats  a magnet

taxis are cheap in that part of the world rob the briefstar. But it's a good point.

Been ill all day with some sort of cold, Tikay managed to get hold of me to tell me that he couldn't make it to see the premises on Tuesday as he's doing the 425 TV show. No big deal, there is plently of time to sort these details out.

I emailed Mike Wiseman, the local Gaming Commision Inspector to confirm a meeting for 13th December at the premises. I've met this guy once before and at the moment he seems really positive about the club, and I need to make sure he stays that way. I've never really been too stressed out about getting the gaming licence (I've always felt the property was more difficult) and I guess i'll find out shortly whether I've been a bit complacent in this area. You can't apply for a licence UNTIL you get the premises, so what the hell is a man supposed to do? Gamble.

Every now and again I consider the worst case scenario, we spend £600k on a re-furb, TV room, 50 tables, internet cafe, committed to a 3 year lease of £300K per annum AND our licence application gets rejected 3 months before we are due to open...............could be a problem, have to make sure we get the licence then. No point worrying unless the bad news happens. Could do a Gutshot, they don't seem to be scared of the gaming board.

 

Rob, hows your brown cart horse, and have you had a fag yet?

I was woken up by my mobile ringing for the 10th time, it must be important for a person to ring this many times. Still feeling pretty rough I answered and it was FHP, the agent of the premises complaining that I had not returned the key last week. This was the the ONLY set of the keys for the premises and they were not happy. I said I would come down and see them this afternoon.

No key means not access tomorrow for the architect, and I really wanted to show a few people round as well. Thats a pain...........but at least this means that FHP can't show any people round the premises and my offer get gazumpted at the last minute.

I drove to town and spent 1hr knocking on all of the offices on the same road as FHP to see if I had posted the keys throught the wrong letterbox, no results. On way home I called Nick to cancel architect and was pretty fed up, typical, the ONLY set of keys and I have to lose them. Then the phone rang, it was the a very apologetic FHP receptionist saying she had found the keys under the phone book. praise the lord.

When I got home I started wrting a project plan of stuff to do, see a few examples of the list below
Type                   Description                                                   Contact                  Resp                    Date
Re-Furbishment   Drawings for current layout of Smilin Sams                                  Nick "The Shrew"   Dec-05
Licencing                   Pre-liminery meeting with Mark Wiseman   Mike Wiseman   Me                   Dec-05
Licencing                   Instruction meeting with Poppleston Allen   Andy Woods   Me                   Dec-05
Marketing                   Name for new Club to de decided                   Blondepoker Forum   Me                    Dec-05
Financial                   2  Ltd Companies Set Up                                      Rebecca Warwick   Jan-06
Financial                   Bank account for 2 new companies set up   Richard Altoft   Rebecca Warwick   Jan-06
Re-Furbishment   Planning permission for re-furbishment                                   Nick "The Shrew"   Jan-06
Recruitment   Marketing Consultant, Poker Host/s, PR Cons?                                   Me                    Jan-06
Committee                   1st Meeting held                                                       Me                    Feb-06
Web Site                   Specification complete                                                      Pete Langley    Feb-06
Legals                   Completetion of lease subject to licencing   Susan Baigent   Me                    Mar-06
Re-Furbishment   Full re-furbishment costs to be finalised                      Nick "The Shrew"    Mar-06
Marketing                   Web Site live                                                      Marketing Director   Jun-06
Recruitment   Appoint General Manager                                      Me                    Jul-06
Recruitment   Card Room Managers x2 appointed                                      Me                     Jul-06
Recruitment   Bar / Restaurant Manager appointed                      Me                     Jul-06
Recruitment   All remaining staff recruited and trained                      General Manager    Nov-06
Opening                   Xmas party for grand opening                                      General Manager   Dec-06

            
It started to dawn on me as I compiled this list that this is going to be a full-time job, sorting all of this out. Since I burnt myself out in business 3 years ago all i've been doing is playing poker and sorting out my charity, not really stressful stuff (except the odd beat beat in crucial situations). When you put this stuff down on paper this is a reasonable sized business, a board of directors, management and 50 employees, a lot of potential hassle for no reason what? Not money, for sure, although I'm sure some idiots will accuse me of making millions out of the place when asked to pay the £5 juice of a £50 freezout! This venture had better be fun, and that means no dickheads involved in, around or near the club. Just mates and decent people, then it will be worth it.

Louise's Dad just phoned and asked me how things were going, I've never met him or spoke to him but he's been keeping up to date on Blonde, wow, the power of Blondpoker. I told him that its looking like a lot of hard work and I'm really struggling to see it ever breaking even, and he sort of made me feel better when he said, "people who buy football clubs expect to lose money", he's hit the nail on the head. I feel better already.

Yeah yeah, but did you stop smoking?

new name for club

how about "the blonde scots rule and the english drool  poker club"

Reg Dog, not had a cigerette for 3 days now, but I'm feeling really ill so I guess it doesn't really count. Not sure whether I am going to give up totally yet, may try these "ultra light" fags as I do enjoy a smoke. I'm a vegatarian aswell, so i sort of feel its unfair if i can't have a cigerette.



Ironside,you scottish fish, I really need some genuine help with a name for the club, as I want to start on the web site etc. Can't think of anything decent, I said "Diamonds", but everyone thinks it sounds like a lap dancing club! This might be my first thread asking for a name.

how about "the fish pool" or "the fish tank"

get people coming in with a possitive outlook on how they will leave

whats wrong with "Yongsta's" ....  or how about   "Suited Connectors"  or  "Runner Runner"

I will just call it HOME :)   and im sure a few others will too LOL

The River Club?
Tilters?
Aces & Eights?
Lady Lucks?

hmm. tough 1

I have to go with Kev on this one .."  Yongsta's"

we'll open a new thread on this one, as I need a name pretty sharpish

I like all the one's kev said!!

Been trying to follow this as closely as possible but I feel like I've missed something while I was away on holiday. Has a venue been found? If so is there any info on location?

The venue is Smilin sams oppopsite the Showcase Cinema in Nottingham. We have secured the premises subject to contract etc

Thats dangerously close to where I live.  :dd:

Good work Rob, can't wait for it.

Busy day today, we all met at the premises at 2pm and had a look round. I had never met our architect before, he is wheelchair bound and has an assistant who does his measuring for him. I was hoping we would have got all the measurements done but unfortunately we only managed a small area for some reason, he's going back on Thursday to finish off.

Action Jack seemed pretty impressed with the place and I had a coffee with him to discuss his possible involvement with the club. I don't know Action that well really, but I just think I can work well with him because he is straight and loves analysing poker like me. He told me that he would have played the Monet Carlo millions even if there was no prize money involved, just to play against that field, and he meant it. This sort of attitude is exactly what I'm looking for in a venture like this, people who just dont see the £££ signs.

After the property viewing I went back to Petes', the IT guy, and had a coffee whilst running though the online specification he is working on. I've known Pete for 22 years, he's a C sharp programmer who plays poker at a pretty basic level (I give him 5-1 odds at heads up). He packed in his full time "secure" job with Northgate Sofware 3 weeks ago and has taken a risk to join this venture full time, bearing in mind he's a pretty conservative guy, its a big risk for him (which he annoyingly keeps reminding me about). Technology is going to be very important in this venture, I could have used the IT resource in my recruitment business, but I just felt I needed full time help.

My team of people is slowing coming together, there is possibly room for one more person, a poker pro, and then I'll have a full strength team going into next year. Most of the club employees I have "tapped up" are currently still in full time employment around the UK (some even outside the UK!), and I guess a few of them may get cold feet when it comes to joining next year, but this sort of makes sure we get the right people in the end. Its nice that so many people want to be involved, and noone I have approached has told me to get lost....yet.......although I intend to pay the highest wages in the gaming industry so maybe thats why........

Its also nice that people have offered to invest their own £££ in the project, but I feel more comfortable risking my own cash in something volatile like this and rewarding individuals for there contribution to the venture down the line. Everyone in this venture needs to be passionate about poker and be willing to put themselves out for their customers and eachother, I think I'm assembling a team that can do this.  Its my job to put everythng in place and deal with the authorities, and I need to remain focussed on getting the Gaming Licence whilst moving everything else in the right direction.....not getting a Gaming Licence is simply not a option, I cannot allow this to happen or consider it not happening.

One of the key criteria to get the licence will be proving demand, which means getting as many people to sign up before the hearing with the magistrates court, this will be Simon "Chuuby" Nowabs first job when he gets back from St Kitts (although he doesn't know it unless he reads this post tonight!).

Thanks for all your continued support on this site, its much appreciated, and I hope you don't mind me plugging you for ideas - WE NEED A NAME FOR THE CLUB...KEEP THE SUGGESTIONS COMING, I QUITE LIKE "THE BUBBLE"????? I thought we could have a vote on Blonde when I get back from Vegas.


PS - I've removed the "Collusion in Nottingham" topic I started for 2 reasons.

1. I don't want to get on Gala's wrong side, this is going to me NO favours when applying for the Gaming Licence, I want to keep a good relationship with Gala.

2. It's been debated to the hilt and Nottingham Gala have taken positive action in the Card Room, which is all we can ask for.

Cheers, Rob

The internet is an amazing thing, yet the many government bodies seem to be slow in embracing the online revolution and just send you reams of paperwork to fill out, which I guess they just input into another computer. I paid my last parking ticket online so why can't I fill all this crap out online aswell, instead of repeating my name and address on hundreds of bits of paper, sticking a stamp on the envelope and sending off to some anonomous mailbox in the government machine. Each form has a reference number on it which bears no logical resemblence to the other, and my forms are 50% tipex by the time I have rectified my errors.

Had a phone call from a guy who I have been speaking to over the last 6 months. he called me out of the blue 6 months ago and told me he's setting up his own Online Poker Skin (goes live in next 2 weeks). He's been monitoring the progress of my club as he is looking to hold big comps in the UK to promote his site but is struggling to find a venue. Seems like he's pulled off a major coup to hold a high profile comp next june in a great location and I'm sure it will be big news soon in the poker world. I've agreed that I'd discuss the possibility if holding a comp for him at our club in the future (even though I remember him strongly advising me against a venture of this scale - in a very nice way though).

I see this as major focus for our Club, to be THE facility to hold the biggest and most prestigous tournamants in the UK and Europe. We will have capacity for 500-700 runners, and we will open negotiations with a number of organisations as soon as we are granted our gaming licence. I see us holding at least 5 major festivals per year, 4 with other organisations and 1 managed by ourselves. This is why the we intend to invest in a state of the art TV Table Studio, Press Room and extensive hospitaility facilities. We need to create by far the best facility in the UK to hold Poker Events, because Nottingham does not have the "pull" of London, our place needs to blow people away. However, the airport is only 15 minutes away and the M1 10 minutes way so we have a good travel network.

I need to pack for Vegas now, taking my camera to get plenty of photos for ideas for the club layout. I'm staying at the Bellagio for a week, playing a few comps and meeting a friend of mine who is just learning how to play hold'em. I also want to find out how £much those fancy shuffle machines that they use on the Bellagio cash tables cost, and have a look at that "automised plasma screen cash game system" that the Wynn use (you can put your name down on a cash game from your room, and moniter your position on the TV!). People who have been to my house will know I love gadgets, and our club will be full of them........and those palm tops that the waitresses use in Denny's to take your order.......

The plans we have will mean that we will be offering an entirely different product from a normal casino cardroom, we will not be a threat to local card rooms in the Midlands, we will not be catering for people who like to play Blackjack and Roulette, so I'm sure we can all exist together (and none of the Casino's will object to my gaming licence application please...................)


Cheers Rob

isnt it about time you got yourself a secretary rob ?

I like to be hands-on (not on the secretary that is, espcailly if its Colchester Kev)

I arrived in Vegas at 12pm with my body clock adjusted to US time (I did not sleep last night and slept the whole way on the plane, flew BMI Manchester to Vegas, so convenient). I was lucky to get on the flight really, I got to check in at 8.45am and the plane was leaving at 9.05am. First guy I bumped into was Neal Channing on the blackjack tables, Neal used to work in the Spreadbetting and I tried to get a few free tips off him but he's giving away nothing.

So much for adjusting my body clock, I'm knackered and it's only 7.15pm, still feels like 2am. Lawrence "dry humour" Gosney is somewhere in the Bellagio but I couldn't spot him, I was hoping to change a few $$$ with him. The Bellagio card room is heaving with a waiting list for every table, no matter what the limits. There seems no be a never ending conveyer belt of sit-and-go's and I can't help thinking we should provide these in the club. I just saw a guy call all-in for £6,000 on the 25-50 NL table on a flop of AKJ, he had AK and the other guy had QT, river card A!! I'm gonna have a go at playing the $100-$200 NL game here when my money arrives by wire transfer. Its $800 to see a flop so I guess my normal starting hands will have to be reviewed before I play in it.

I'm racking my brain for a name for the club, there's been plenty of suggestions on the thread but nothing except "poker in the rear and liqour in the back" really bowls you over. Its annoying me now, and I keep sitting up all night writing down names, but I know a name is important so I must be patient. I want to get the new membership forms up on the web site but they just look stupid with "Poker Club in the Midlands", anyway, must decide on a name before xmas, thats the deadline.

I sent an update email to one of the well known UK pros before I flew out, I can't really say who it is because he's a very private type of guy but he's someone that I'd like on board and have had a couple of meetings with already. I want him to be a sort of "Live Poker" consultant to help orgainse the major festivals and do some "Poker School" courses at the club. I see the day to day running of the club being done by a management team, and the strategy and direction of the club being decided by a committe of respected poker players and the members. I also want to get that committee in place to work on all of the set-up, even down to the detail of the colour of chips/tables we use. The set up is a huge job and Nick The Shrew Whiten will have his hands full managing our motley crew of tradesmen - these guys work BETWEEN breaks if you know what I mean.

I'm getting some very interesting and positive PM's from people who I have never spoken to before, offering various advice, support and ideas, this is great. There is quite a lot of people involved in the casino industry who read Blonde but cannot post due incase their bosses see them mingling with the customers.

Anyway, I have my laptop, printer and modem all set up in my room in the Bellagio, so I can keep the momentum going, every day I am trying to achieve something, even if its just a few thoughts about the restaurant menu or the music system in the bar. I'm really happy with the way things are going, especially the people I have managed to get involved, everything just seems to be falling into place nicely.............I guess its about time something went badly wrong like the property falling through or the Gaming Board ripping up my application............I just have this nasty feeling that something bad is about to happen, I can't explain it. On that positive note,

Cheers Rob (and keep the names coming please)

Don't worry about that feeling Rob. It's something between fear annd excitement. You can't play NLHE without it, much less build Europes' biggest card room from scratch!

Thursday @ 10am was my fourth visit to the premises and it gets bigger and bigger every time.
Another meeting for me with our Architects  KMS design and Managment, what started with a couple of hours turned into another day wondering around measuring, drawing and generaly getting a feel for the place i even got some lighting on which made the torch redundent and gave me a few more ideas, this place is awsome.
We need some outline plans for the meeting with the Local Gaming inspector on the 13th of December and as our overall budget is in excess of £1.9m we made the wise decision not to turn up with it drawn on the back of a fag packet.
Saturday is going to be the third visit for Andy and John from KMS and they have advised me that the bulk will be finished then with just one more visit early next week to finish off.
By the end of next week i am sure we will have our footprint and then the fun starts.

wow!
its really coming together! - great work guys!

When reading these updates, does anyone else get the feeling they're reading posts from an expectant mother?

"Woke up with a bit of morning sickness, but then I felt the poker club kick for the first time"...

Here's hoping for a successful birth.

Not sure how to take this one!

With a little pethidene

Got permission off the Bellagio to take some photos of their 2 card rooms and bars. The layout here is fantastic. They have the "original" cardr oom which holds 350 players and have now converted the Fontana Bar to hold another 250 players. The final table is on a raised stage and looks fantastic, I watched the $3000 NL final today when Scotty Nugen finished second holding 45 n a T45 flop, unfortunatley his openand was holding T4 and all the money went in!

Met up with Lawrence Gosney for a coffee, he's loves it out here but he's bubbled twice so far. Lawrence is a good mate of mine on the poker circuit, he says things the way they are and it very opiniated, maybe he's someone who could be involved with the club?

Not played any poker yet, but I've kicked their asses on the blackjack table for $35,000. That must be over $200,000 in the last 2 years that I've won on Blackjack, unfortunatey I've just re-diverted in into losses on football spreadbetting. The key here is to give the casino just enough action on the tables so that you qualify for a free room, food and drinks. My bill will be about $6,000 so as long as I only lose $5,999 I'm in profit. To qualify for these freebies you have to play for 1hr with an average bet of $500, or 3 hours with average bet of $150. Quite a lot of people think that I should have Blackjack and Roulette in the club to subsidise the poker (as the licence will allow that) but I just think it complicates things, I want to everyone to be focussed on making the best decisions for Poker.

Its 9pm in Vegas and I'm off the the Mandalay Bay for a chinese meal and to see if we can get tickets for the boxing tomorrow night, Lawrence has got a freebies ticket but we'll have to pay. He says its WSOP Bracelet perks!

Spoke to Chubby Nowab in St Kitts today who wants to fly out to Vegas to pay the main event, unfortunately I wont be there as I have loads of meetings next week. I really need to sit down with Nowab and calm him down, he's reckons he's halfway to organising a 500+ player event next year in the our proposed Club (currently a non-inlicenced empty building) with Thomas Kremsner, you can't knock his enthusiam but he's forgot that we won't be open till Dec 06.

Got a text from Nick the Shrew who is in love with the name "The Club" (with a club card as  logo), not sure myself.

Cheers Rob

Cheers Rob

I'm gonna fly back from Vegas on Thursday and pass on extending the trip. I would like to play the WPT event next week but I've just got too much on and an appointment with The Gaming Board that week. I havn't really played much poker over here (only  2 hours of cash and 1 STT). I've been spending my time talking to people and checking out how the card rooms operate.

I did try and get on the 25-50 NL game that Daneil Alayai and Antonio Estandfari were sitting down at, but after 4 hours on the waiting list I gave up. Its amazing here, they could fill another 15 cash tables easy, if they had the space.

Its poker crazy here and one thing that you really notice is the large amount of women players compared to europe, maybe this will follow suit in the UK. They have had to put an extra nightly £500 NL tourney which gets 150 runners to satisfy the hunger for poker. They do really rake the hell out of you here though, its $35 dollars juice to play a $300 STT and $14 per hour to play a 10-20 NL game. BUT, demand still outstrips supply.

NL STT and NL cash games are so popular over here, as they are on the internet, but the "type" of players are different. Here the average poker player does not play any of the casino games where as in the UK, we find a lot of players graduate onto poker from the casino table games, that's how I started anyway.

The BIG game has been pretty busy in the Bellagio, Gus Hanson, Chip Reese and the boys have been playing round the clock. In fact, I when i went to bed at 1am on Monday, Gus Hanson had been playing at least 7 hours, when I returned to the cardroom at 5pm the next day, he was still sitting in the same seat and same clothes, which means he'd been playing $4k-$8k blinds for over 20 hours, what must the swing be in that session ??? You hear all these stories that he's skint, but you need $1m to sit down at that game for that period, so if he's skint what about the boys on the $1-$2 limit game!

I met Scott Fishman at the Blackjack table yesterday, he seems one of those people I just keep bumping into, I played on 3 tables with him at the WSOP and then on the Poker Den this year. He said he loved touring Europe, especially England. This guy loves poker, he's played 300 tournaments in 2005 so far which is more that 1 a day, I guess this includes online as well. He asked how that "Chubby guy who never stops talking was", I wonder who he could mean???? Wouldn't it be great if these sort of guys came over to play in our Club one day (and we didn't have to pay their airfare!).

I've taken some great photos of the Bellagio, got told off using my camera in the cardroom, but it really helped looking at the set up here. We've got 15,000 sq ft to fill so we need the ideas. Maybe "Bellagio-On-Tent" is the winning suggestion for the club name?

Cheers Rob

Sorry, had to share this bad beat as got noone to moan at - Its got nothing to do with the Poker Club but I'm on tilt in my room at the Bellagio.

I sit down at the $50-£100 No limit cash game with $25,000. All players on the table with at least that in chips.

I get AA UTG and limp for $100

Seat 3 raises to $600

The button flat calls the $600

I call the extra $500 and re-raise $2400 (I know I’d get action as I’d done this with pocket 2’s 3 hand earlier and shown when the guy showed his poker jacks and passed).

Seat 3 passes

The button flatcalls.

Flop 2 4 7 (2 clubs)

I bet  $5,000 and he flat calls, I think he has JJ or QQ.

Turn comes another 2, perfect, I weak bet $8,000 and he goes ALL-IN and I call in a flash

OVER $50,000 IN THE POT

He shows QQ and I flip over AA

XXXXXXX QUEEN ON THE RIVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anyway, back to the poker club diary........................................

 

URGGG!! We will forgive you that one

I feel sick just reading it.

that's so much cash omg... now you have to call your club 'the two outer'....

Damn that's sick, many more of those and you'll end up like this  ;tk; ;tk;

Having slept on my $50,000 2 outer bad beat in the cash game,I've now completely forgot about it and will never mention it again. The end of the year is approaching and all the gambling disasters of 2005 will be written off when the new year starts.

Over the whole year I'm £31,547 down on what I call "recreational" gambling, which is a combination of Poker, Blackjack and Football Betting + expenses. Its sort all started going downhill from the WSOP after a promissing first 6 months. However, my "business gambling" has gone alright in 2005, so on overall, we're in reasonable profit.

I draw no distiction between business and gambling, as far as I am concerned, any activity that can win or lose you money, is "gambling". "Business" just looks more respectable from the outside, but I can promise you it is not. In poker you have to beat the rake, the moodies and your own personal discipine, in business you're got the banks, lawyers and certain employees making life difficult for you, its all the same thing, its all "gambling" - which gives me my adrenaline kick.

One of the highlights of the year for me was my WSOP diary, whick TK persuaded me to write, I'm dead chuffed that people who I have never met or spoken to enjoyed reading something that I wrote, believe it or not, I'm quite a private person. I guess this and general "niceness" of people on this site, and the people I have met over the last 2 years playing poker, are the reasons why I want to be more involved in poker by opening a club etc. I admit that some of the poker community are pretty selfish individuals, but I've met some top people who I would never have come accross if I had not played poker, and the club is a chance to bring all these people together.

Anyway, I'm all packed and ready to get my flight tomorrow. The trip has been a net profit of $20,000 after all expenses, so I can't really grumble about the $50,000 2 outer last night (that I will never mention again...). The Bellagio have paid for all my drinks, food and a beautiful suite looking over the Vegas strip. My casino host even agreed to pay $5,000 to cover my flight costs from England...........all this to get me on their Blackjack tables.....................so a profit gives me a warm feeling of accomplishment inside. Being a degenerate gambler I need to take a minute to savour moments like this, treat myself to the free mochachino in my mini bar (normally $8) whilst posting on Blonde via their internet connections (normally $10.95 per day).

Chubby Nowab is coming round to mine on Friday to discuss his role in the new venture, he's offered to put £50,000 in himself but I can't see the point, as over time this money will be mine at Heads-Up anyway. Seriously though, Simon used to run his own advertising and marketing company before he became a full time poker pro, so he can bring key skills to the overall venture. I think he also wants to get his teeth into something else, as he's been doing the poker circuit for some time now. If we can agree something, he'll be the Marketing Consultant.

I also need to draft up something for Action Jack, who I am trying to persuade to be the Online Consultant. I'm sure I mentioned in a previous threads that we are going to have our own online poker software, and we have taken on an Applications Programmer to head this up, Pete Langley (the big guy at my home game). This way we will be able to allow people to spend/withdraw their "online cash" in the club so people don't have to worry about carrying cash etc. It also means that people can enter comps online so they know they have a seat. I am very consious that we should try and have the least amount of cash in the club as possible for security reasons. There's a load of work to do here, and I estimate this won't be operational until 12 months after the club has opened. This is a massive challenge, similar to what I did few years ago when I bought an IT software company to develop my own recruitment software, everyone who was anyone said i was an idiot to do it (the result was it costs loads more than I thought, was a massive ball ache, was finished 1 year late BUT was worth all the pain in the end).

I'm being pretty open and honest about what my thought processes here, talking about money and even mentioning peoples name etc but I don't see the big deal, when this club opens I want the members to know what it has taken to get in off the ground and I quite like documenting my thoughts. It may seem a bit strange to people who don't know me, but I like things this way. People who read my posts have been great, PM'ing me with ideas etc. I may not the most confidential guy in the world but everyone who works with or for me trusts me implicity. This is the greatest compliment anyone can be given. I have over 700 people employed in my businesses using this honest approach, but I do get slagged off for it! This venture will employ over 60 people, so its no small beer either, and without the support of its members it will fail miserably. I'm getting over 150 people reading this thread everyday, thats 150 potential customers, nearly 20% of what I need to break even, so I don't see it as a problem telling everyone what's going on.

I am getting a bit nervous about the premises again now, we were supposed to sign Dec 1st, mind you, I was in Vegas so couldn't have signed anyway!


Cheers Rob

fascinating stuff rob,
please keep spilling the beans!

Rob

I'm not usually so sycophantic but for you I will make an exception

I admire people who break the mold or buck the system, I admire those who do it with dignity and compassion even more, a hard head and a soft heart is a great combination

If you find the time, please continue to write, your stuff is inspiring, uplifting and breathtakingly honest, you have a rare and wonderful talent

Good luck

Tom

We had a meeting at my place last night to try and decide a name for the club. This had even more importance, because we finally received the sign off for the premises yesterday - HOORAY AT LAST.

Both sets of solicitors have now been instructed and subject to gaining a liquor licence (which we have been told is a formaility), we FINALLY have secured our premises. This has been a very protracted process and I have always had a niggling doubt that they may be playing me off against another interested party, but, its seem that there were just very slow.

SO, THIS CLUB WILL HAPPEN (IF WE DON'T GET A GAMING LICENCE WE'LL JUST PLAY WITH NO JUICE OR RAKE!)

When I first posted on this site my intentions of this venture, I always said that the toughest part was the RIGHT premises, and we have now achieved that. We have also managed to negotiate a reduction from the £325,000 per annum asking price, to £200,000 per annum. We will also pay nothing for the first 12 months, while we have no revenues and are refurbishing the place.

These premises, in Nottingham, opposite the Showcase Cinema compex, are absolutely perfect. It would be impossible for anyone to find us a better place in the future, D2 planning, 226 parking spaces, 10 mins from J24 of the M1, 15 mins from East Midlands Airport, already with restaurant and bar facilites. We have a lease for 15 years with a 10 year tenents break clause (ie. we can leave in 10 years if we go broke, but they can only chuck us out after 15 years). A good result.

Anyway, we printed off all of the Blonde thread ("Name the Club"), and pooled all of the other suggestion together. After 3 hours we have decided to call the club:

"from DUSK tilt Dawn"

...............because:


- after the Quentin Tarantino film "from Dusk till Dawn" starring George Clooney. There was a rather interesting Club in that film for those who haven't seen it.
- The club will be open from around "dusk" until "dawn".
- part of poker is about finishing a long session and walking out of the casino at "dawn", your eyes hurting from the light
- and the "till" can be changed to  "tilt" which is a poker term we all know about (and I do after the £750 Lunton comp tonight!)
- its one of my favourite films

I hope you will all like it in time, its a bit strange but I'm sure it will catch on in the eventually.

Simon "Chubby" Nowab has now become the newest member of the "team" to help with the venture, after a meeting at my house today. Simon will be helping me with the "Marketing" of the venture on a full time basis from January 2006. After a lengthy and tough negotiation process of 30 seconds we shook hands on a deal, on the basis that he should try something else since he was pretty crap at poker.  No, seriously, Simon will still be seen playing tournaments accross the UK but for pleasure, which means he will be playing even "looser" if that is actually possible (he nearly lasted the 1st level at Luton tonight, but just fell short).

Because, of the crazy costs of running this place, (over £120,000 per month) the "Advance Marketing" of the club before it opens is absolutley critical to us no going bankrupt too quicky, and if manage to do a good job, will hopefully delay it for as long as possible. Marketing Guru, Chubby Nowab, I have faith...........


Cheers Rob

;applause; ;applause; ;applause;

Though please make sure none of the staff are vampires.

Oh and if you can, get Salma Hayek in to do 'that' dance. ;)

Rob, Excellent stuff, I am a bit like you dont like showing my feelings but I think you have this spot on , good luck and all the best

Excellent Rob, great news.  I cant even imagine how you feel but this is seriously getting exciting.
 I cannot wait for this to happen and i LOVE the name.  Not on the same scale but i went through that when i bought my chippy - trying to think of a name.  In the end i chicken'd out and left it as it was (the name of the bloody road)!  No balls.

Anyway - keep the updates coming mate, you have no idea how exillerating they are to the average jo.

One more thing if there was a way round not being banned from all casino's then i would work for you like a shot!

Chilli, if you work FOR or IN the LIVE CLUB you cannot as an employee or director you cannot play poker in other casinos (without the permission of me and the other casino organisation - mine would not be a problem). However, there might be other work available outside of the live club but related to poker so you never know. I can't promise anything, but there may be, I'm not sure yet but will let you know if anything appropriate comes up as I want as many poker fans to be involved as possible. This is an issue that I will be taking up with the gaming board on Tuesday so I will let you know after that. Also, its something that really cheeses me off, but I must not and will not break any of the Gaming Board rules, period, full stop, non negotiatable, end of story. We must not play into anyones hands who would not like to see this club happen!!

Cheers Rob

Great news Rob.

When's the party ?

The opening night is going to be one hell of an occasion.

Can't wait to see which jumper you'll be sporting  ;)

On such an occasion, my best one of course

I've been reading all about your endevers regarding the opining of the DASK TILT DAWN club,
I ca'nt wait till it opens.
As a wheelchair user, i'm feeling really relaxed, cos i know that even with everything you have on your mind, because of your family circumstances,you'll still manage to make sure you accomadate poeple with the stortcomings we posess.
My heartfelt wishes go to you to hope you overcome all the problems that are bound to dog your progress with this operation.
Lets hope you'll be able to get chubby to proclaim in his advertizing.

Britains premier poker club......Dusk tilt dawn

Eric, I was not aware that you were in a wheelchair but rest assured, full facilities will be provided for wheelchair users. How far do you live from the club? It may be possible to provide transport for you as well. We are planning to buy a limosine for the club and I am sure we can make that available for anybody who lives locally and uses a wheelchair.

Cheers Rob

It is going to be a massive sucess - the planning and detail is better than I've seen with some major co's in the city - his customer service will be second to none and wil leave the casino card rooms reeling - can't wait!

Well, now we have the name and the premises sorted the next stage is to tackle the Gaming Board, who I am taking round the premises on Tuesday at 12pm. I have sent the Inspector an email before the meeting so he is fully prepared for all of my questions. Speaking to him over the last few months, I think there is a good chance that some of the restrictions that casino's have to live with "may" be relaxed for my club..............anyway, there is no halm in asking is there? We've had lost of discussions about what is and what is not the law, so I am just going to ask all the stupid questions I can get away with. I have pasted the email just in case anyone gets really bored and needs somthing to read (hey - I had to write it).


We will also be working on our logo, I'll put the various options on the site for people to express their opinion. It was nice to sit with "dingdell" last night at Luton, she really seems genuinely enthusiatic about the prospect of a club dedicated to poker. So many people ask me what is going on everytime I go anywhere to do with poker, they are the genuine people that we want in the club.

Cheers Rob

Questions for Mike Wiseman and The Gaming Board

Before our meeting I thought I would email you some of my questions so would know what you are letting yourself in for. This will be the 1st poker club of any serious size in the UK that is set up legally, so there are no precedents for me to consult. I really need your help and advice on this as there are almost no similarities to how a Poker Club runs compared to a traditional Casino, although I appreciate that I must have a Casino licence to run the club. Although, I do not expect this club to turn a profit (running costs are £1.4m per annum), any help you can give me in not burdening the venture with unnecessary costs and restrictions would be greatly appreciated. I am committed to doing everything legally rather than doing what the other 30 poker clubs in the UK have done, but any latitude you can give me would be such a great help. Eventually, I expect there will be separate legislation for how a poker only club is run, but I am the guinea pig here! I apologise in advance of some of my questions are naïve.

1.   Definition of a Casino Employee
What are the criteria for a definition of a “Casino employee”, I need to employ people to work on the marketing online side of the business before the club opens, they need to have poker expertise, would they be considered casino employees and therefore be restricted? Also, I will be employing 35 people who work outside of the Card Room gaming area (on the bar, restaurant, cafe, administration etc), will they considered “Casino employees” even though they had nothing to do with the gaming?

2.   Employees of my Club playing Poker in other Casinos
I have a number of applications for jobs from poker players, mostly recreational. Legally, would they be able to play Poker in other UK casinos if they were an employee of the club?

3.   Employees of UK Casinos’ playing Poker in my Club
I have a number of emails and phone calls from employees of UK casinos asking me if they would be able to play Poker in the club. Would they be able to play in my club, would they be able to come into my Club and not play poker?

4.   Employees of my Club playing Poker in my Club
What is the legal situation here at they will not be playing against the house, it is just a game against each other.

5.   Me playing poker in my Club
We are bringing some televised events to the club, including a WPT (World Poker Tour) and EPT (European Poker Tour) event to the club. These are world ranking events and I would like to play them, would this be breaking any laws?
6.   Poker Seminars and Lessons
The game of poker is growing at an amazing rate in the UK but a lot of younger and less experienced players do not know how to play properly. We want to run “Poker Schools” for these novices in the Club, done by some of the top professionals in the UK and abroad. Again, will these people be considered “Casino Employees” and therefore be subject to restrictions on where they can play poker in the UK. You can see, there is a common problem here, opening a serious poker club requires in house poker expertise, but if I tell players they will be restricted from playing poker elsewhere, I will not be able to draw on their expertise and attract the customers into the club.

7.   Club Shareholders
A number of people have asked me if they can invest in the Club as shareholders. The total cost of setting up the club will be £1m refurbishment + working capital of £1m. Clearly, this may help me, but obviously they want to be able to play poker in the club, and still in other UK casinos, where do we stand legally on this

8.   General Manager
The GM of the club is called Darren Whiten. He is a General Manager of a retail business called Halfords, and has 50 staff working for him. This job is not relevant or of interest to a current “Casino” GM as we will not have any of the casino games taking place, just poker. What licence will you require him to have, if any. He will not be making any poker (ie. gaming) decisions, just running the banking, hospitality and staff side. 75% of the staff will be non-gaming staff.

9.   Card Room Managers
I will need to recruit 2 Card Room Managers, with experience of working in Casinos. They will be making the all of the gaming (ie. Poker) decisions on their shift. Will you require then to have further qualifications? i.e a Grey licence? Again, with no gaming tables, this seems excessive.

10.   If the Club does not get a Gaming Licence
If I am turned down for a Gaming Licence what can I charge in terms of an entrance fee or membership as just a Private Members Club? I am committed to doing this so I will have to look at other ways of generating revenue apart form a % of entry fees or an hourly rate charge. Poker players don’t really mind how they pay, even if it is for drinks and food but this will be less “transparent” and reflective of what they are paying for.

11.   Hours of Poker
Poker tournaments can sometimes overrun if people play slowly. What are my maximum gaming hours and what would happen if we went over. For example, if it as Sunday at 6am and a final was not finished, what would I do, I can’t ask them to come back on Monday as they may be at work.

12.   Entering Tournamants
Most of the players who enter tournaments will be from outside of the midlands and in fact the UK. They will want to email or call us and enter the tournament by wiring the money/sending a cheque/paying by credit or debit card. Ideally they will want to enter over the interent through our web site. They cannot just come over and “buy-in” beforehand as they are so far away. Also, we need to know our entries before the day of the tournament to know the amount of dealers needed (casinos do not have this problem as they can make mix/match their casino dealers on the day). What procedures will I be able to put in place legally for accepting entries?

13.   Holding Players money on deposit
Poker players will want to avoid bringing large sums of cash to the club for security reasons. Casinos can hold money on deposit for players to avoid this. How can we do this practically? Could members transfer money by wire or the internet and we hold it as deposit for them so that they could withdraw it when they got to the club? Some of the big buy-in poker tournaments will be £10,000 entry, we can’t hold that about of cash on site (eg. the WPT event will have 400 entries; we cannot and must not have £4m cash on the premises for obvious reasons – and we would never get insurance!). Casinos do not have this problem as they do not have the capacity to hold a WPT event (all WPT events are at least ten thousand entry fees).

14.   Sponsorship of Poker Players
To market the club properly across the UK, Europe, USA we will need to sponser poker players to enter events wearing out marketing materials (eg. Caps, t-shirts etc). Are there any restrictions on this?

15.   Advertising
I understand there are some restrictions on Casinos advertising to prevent addiction to gambling. We will not have any “house games”, what restrictions will the poker club have on advertising?

16.   Disclosures To The Gaming Commission
What reports/information will the Gaming Commission expect us to disclose them and over what periods. I will have to set up recording systems in advance to make sure we keep accurate information of anything the Gaming Board may need.

17.   Online Poker
We will be providing internet terminals in the casino. Poker players will use these for general internet use (browsing etc) as well as playing online poker. What are the laws on playing online poker on sites such as Pokerstars, William Hill, and Betfair in the club? In the future (maybe 3 years time), we may have our own online poker software, would there be any additional laws that come into place if we did this? Would people who worked for the online poker business be considered employees of the Poker Club (eg. software programmer) even though they worked for a separate Limited Company.

18.   Proving Demand to the Magistrate’s Court
We are setting up a web site so people can join the club in advance of it opening in 2006. They will input their name, address and contact details. Will this information be sufficient to be put forward as some evidence of “proof of demand” or will we require written signatures on a physical application form? This will be more practical as most poker players use the internet nowadays.

19.   Certificate of Consent
The club is Ltd Company called “From Dusk Tilt Dawn Ltd”. Who applies for the Certificate of Consent, me or the Ltd Company? Who will be interviewed by the Gaming Board before the certificate can be awarded – most of the Management will not have commenced employment, and are working for Casinos, I can’t really ask them to be interviewed for employer confidentiality reasons.

20.   Timescales & Decision Making
How long will it take from sending the application to your head office to gaining a Certificate of Consent and what are the steps between? What are the timescales from receiving the certificate of consent to getting a court date with the local magistrates and will the Gaming Board attend the hearing and make any recommendations to the court?

What a coincidence, I was just writing about you when you posted that!

Rob, thx for the offer, but I live near London,And drive myself , so transport is no problem.
By the way, Ive only been useing a wheelchair on and off for four years. But contiually since Sept 2004,
I am desperatly trying to respond to physio, to get be back to using crutches. but i'm sure I'll be able to avail of help from any member of staff at the club.as required :)

Wow a lot of thought went into that email, very impressive in itself.

Rob

ive got transport too but i really do fancy a hurl in a limo. are you charging for the limo or could i go to the local pub and give you a ring and the limo comes and collects me?.....this sounds greatttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttt.........

mad :)

Yes, no problem. Any other jobs you need doing, maybe your back garden needs mowing?

Mine does Rob, will expect you at midday tomorrow, £3 tip if you are on time and work fast!

rob

my back lawn is neat but there are a few odd jobs i need doing like the lightshade thats been lying for 2 years, the cast iron fireplace thats still not in and my shower needs mending. theres no hurry but id prefer you sorted me out before royal flush...lmao

let me know when you got a spare couple of weeks and write a list

mad

I need someone to get the christmas tree out of the loft....?!

Seriously - that email will really have put them on the back foot - it's great - by asking them questions you actually lead them your way.....impressive and well done!  cant wait for the first card to be dealt!!

Tracey

I'm just glad I live close enough to play there EVERY night

if you promise to wear a short skirt i'll come over and hold the ladder

Speechless!

That's another +

We need a smiley of a cold bucket of water I think Trace..

Watch out for the extra rung on your way down.

Will someone come and get mine down too.  Oh but you have to put mine up as well.

I really really really just can't be bothered.  I've got a right old bah humbug on me this year...

Oi! 

Thanks for putting up that email to the gaming board Rob, very interesting read. A great choice of questions as you say, some seem straightforward but tis best to be erring on the side of your safety. Looking forward to reading the response (if you are willing to put it up).

i dont live that close but i will definetly be making the trip up there now and again.

just like everybody else i cant wait

Things are moving on nicely now, Chubby Nowab is the most enthusiatic person in the world as expected, he is working on the club logo, membership form etc. I have a head office for sf group that does all of the marketing, accounting and human resources, so we will be intergrating the poker business into that infrastructure.

I've had some positive feedbak on the name. One person PM's me and said he was concerned that it didn't flow off the tongue and explained that this was intentional. I wanted a name that would be different, and a bit quirky and different. "from Dusk tilt Dawn", it will catch on and stick in peoples minds after a few months.

Who would have thought Chubby would be going down to my head office on Wednesday to meet my sf group Marketing Director, Michelle Hill, when I slowrolled (so he claims) KK on him 3 years ago in Luton! This club is going to bring together so many people from different parts of my life, its going to be weird, my old schooldl/college friends, business clients, employees, gambing friends, sports friends, my bank manager, poker players, my Dad, total strangers.......people that would never had met eachother as they mix in totally different circles, strange. Sxxt, I hope they all get on........its gonna be like a huge home game but a bit more expensive.

Went to Notts Gala last night, there has been quite a lot of changes, english only, plasma TV, new rules, the atmoshpere was friendly, well done to Nightfly for getting his own way at last. I'll miss that place when I get banned. Kim Costa, Pete's brother, had a nice few words with me last night, offering to help out with anything. Somon Trumper was on the phone at 3am offering his support, I'm really finding that I've got some good freinds in this poker world.

Right, go to make sure I am 100% ready for gaming board tomorrow, i'll get The Shrew round to check with him that I'm not missing anything.

Cheers Rob

Good luck tomorrow rob.

good luck tomorrow rob x

kick ass and slowroll the gaming board tommorow good luck mate
aka Chubbs

first time ive read this thread........wow this is awesome.
the things that dreams are made of.

think ive seen u around at luton rob but you dont know me but i hope that everything goes ok and this club is a roaring sucess.

a club solely for poker players absolutly awesome

your living my dream rob

good luck

Good luck tomorrow Rob.

I haven't filled a form in yet - should I wait until you know whether you can do them online or whatever?

Classic

The forms are being redone on the internet, they will be on a web page. Chuuby Nowab has not taken on this responsibility. we'll let you know when its up.

Good luck today Rob.

Knock 'em dead - not literally of course, that would put everything up the swanny!

T
xx

Good Luck Rob, no pressure, just the poker community banking on ya :D

I met with the Gaming Board inspector today. Nick came with me and we met at the premises and went for a drink across the road, after a tour of the premises. The meeting lasted about 2.5 hours.

It was mostly good news with a bit of no so good news. Breakdown below:

Good News

1. He said he can see NO REASON  why I will not get a licence. In fact, I asked asked him the odds, and he told me 100% for the Gaming Board Consent, and although he could not speak for the Magistrates Court, he said "he could see no reason why and would be shocked if I got turned down"

2. ONLY Gaming staff working in my club (dealers, supervisors, cashiers and card room managers) will be prohibited from visiting other UK casinos. That means someone working in marketing or doing poker lessons, for example, will not be prohibited from playing poker elsewhere - or even in the our club. Basically, anyone who does not hold a "gaming licence" can play poker elsewhere or in the club.

3. He thought the premises were IDEAL for the purpose.

4. My General Manager would NOT need a "White Licence" as in a normal casino, as the Card Room Managers will be making the gaming decisions.

5. In 2007, there may be NEW rules for poker clubs, rather than them coming under the casino regulations.

6. Employees of other casinos CAN play poker in my club as long as they have PERMISSION from their employer (I guess this will be hard to get?)

7. We will be able to discuss ONLINE payments into tourneys with the Gaming Board, they will be open to debate and will try to be practical.

8. Timescale from application to granting of full licence should be less that 6 MONTHS (instead of 12 months as originally advised)

9. I CAN put forward my Card Room managers for Grey licences - cost £300 per person

10. He thinks objections will be WEAK from other casinos as there main income is not derived from poker, they need to prove "significant loss", which they cannot. The courts are unlikely to be sympathetic to any objections.


Not so good news

1. I NEED a Grey Licence holder on site for all of the gaming hours.

2. I need to employ a "compliance officer" to ensure all regulations are being carried out in the club -extra COST.

3. He thinks there is a good chance that I will NOT be able to play poker in the club, but he is open to discuss this further as poker is not a "house" game.

4. There may be internet legislation coming into place to prevent people playing "OFFSHORE" internet gambling or poker sites in a casino. This would mean that people could not play Partypoker for example (or most of the rest). Even if the "skin" is based in the UK. Apparently there is a huge enquiry going on into this.

5. There are serious RESTICTIONS on advertising the club in public places.

6. Gaming hours are stict, if a comp does not finish by 6am we CANNOT continue


Overall, a good meeting. Another small step further in the plan.

Cheers Rob

well done mate!

Thanks for the update Rob..

Sounds Okay to me Rob, far more positives than negatives.

Especially that casino employees may play, that's great !

Well done Rob.

I too had a long walk back after my busfare slipped into the fruity just to see if it was going to hold for the 3rd time?
To this day I tell people that the buzz comes from when you have lost everything and the fear after you have over it.
Most times I walked, but occasionally I got a taxi back!

If the buzz comes, why take a taxi?

So my mom never beat me for coming home late! :D

I have a busy day of meetings tomorrow, sf group and poker related.

At 9am I meet with my accoutants, Grant Thornton, to set up "From Dusk Till Dawn Ltd" of Birmingham. Due to the gaming laws this is not straightforward.

Then have go meet with the Managing Director and Finance Director if sf group, my recruitment company, to sign of the 2007 budget, which I am not very well prepared for as I have been spending all my time on the poker club.

While in Birmingham, I am planning on hooking up with Action Jack to see if we can agree for him to come on board. I have not spoken to him for a couple of weeks and I am not sure if he has been following my posts.

After that, I am travelling down to Oxford to interview a Card Room Manager who has applied to work in the club. I want all of the key people lined up before March 2006, as I think they will have to start well in advance of the club opening to get everything organised, dealers trained etc. The problem with recruiting people into a new venture is the uncertainty, they are often in stable jobs with mortgages and families to support, and if I sense that this is a concern for them, I won't pursue their application. I don't want people to join just because I am paying higher wages.

I am hoping Womble and Nowab stick around tomorrow night so we can play a bit of poker at my place, relax and have a few laughs. The debate on membership fees is niggling at the back of my mind, and I could do with a few people to bouce it off face to face. I was using the fee not only to generate some income, but to deter non poker related people / or undesirables from coming in. Because we are out of town we will benefit from more leeway on the licence, we could even get 24 hours, so we could be a nice stop off the people who want to carry on boozing in nice suroundings without any entrance fee.

I'm not opening a general public drinking establishment, its a poker club, how do I keep people out who just fancy dropping after a shed load of drinks on the town cause we have a late drinking licence? How do I keep it exclusive to decent, repectful poker players? Is there another way apart from fees? I want a place where I can entertain my clients and employees from sf group, have a nice meal with my girlfriend in a friendly atmosphere with nice people.................I would never do this is a "casino type environment" ........................I'm not feeling too good about the poker club today.

If fact, the image in my head of a "poker meat market" type business where my job is to drive volume through the door is a place that I would not want to even want go in myself. Maybe I should have been looking at a smaller club with lower overheads? Maybe I should have assessed what I really wanted properly before I went ahead with these premises? I need to re-assess I think, because I do believe that I will not be able to get the required volume of people without comprimising what I want the club to be like. Of course, at festivals and major events, that "homely" feeling cannot be there as there will be so many one-off visitors, but the rest of the time, I want it to feel like a big home game.

I also think, after refection, I have miscalculated how much poker players actually want to get a dedicated poker club, if people on Blonde have reservations about the costs, your average jo who doesn't even know me is going to have even more.

I think I will re-vist the costings, the refurb specification, and what I actually want to get out of it. I'd still go for that property, its just too good, but I can scale down other costs for a "smaller" customer base. I'll re think the membership sheme aswell.

Been reading the posts but not had much cause to comment.... however my wife is a manager at GT birmingham... if by chance u are meeting her tomorrow rob.. can you tell her to play big PP with more aggression in her cash games pls!!  :)  ty

All the best BTW!  takes balls what u r doing and hope it works out!

"invited members" only late bar?

Could be one way to keep people who just want to drink late away - they won't be able to unless they've been approved!

edit: I actually came to say "don't get disheartened" but thought of that and posted it in a rush.

Rob,

Those of us that argued against the membership fees system did not do so for selfish reasons, most of expressed a willingness to pay whatever you decided would be a fair price.

We are concerned the numbers do not add up and we are doubtful that a membership scheme will raise sufficent funds, in fact we think it would cost you business.

We understand that you want to create a different kind of club and we want to help you to achieve your goals.

You asked for our opinions and we gave them honestly.

Do not be disheartened, you have friends around you and however you proceed you will have their support and I am confident that you can make the club a success.

Have a good day tomorrow/today.

Wardonkey

Its 6am and I've just finished a new membership proposal taking into account the comments on the thread, which in fact has helped loads. Feel a bit better now, I think I was just frustrated that I had not thought it out properlry before I put it on the form, I have now, but I hope people are dead honest with there YES and NO votes. Off to bed for 2 hours sleep.

Long day today, but a lot of the foundations and structure of the club have been sorted out, I think.

Grant Thornton, my accountants, were a little shocked at my latest business venture, but even they are aware of the growth in poker. Apparently they had a "poker night" for some of their clients in Birmingham last month and it went down a storm. I told them that it would be in ther interests to puchase "corporate VIP" membership to the club if they valued my business!

Grant Thornton have gone away to set up the club Ltd company and the "financial loan facility" between the club and my recruitment business, sf group. Basically, the club will be able to loan money from my recruitment business of up to £4m (hopefully we will only need £2m but no halm in having a bit of spare capacity is there, I changed it to £4m at the last minute!) at a 'commerical' interest rate, 1.5% above base rate.

It needs to be structured as a loan or the Inland Revenue will add PAYE and NI to all of the money I use for the club. For example, if it would cost £1.12m to draw out £0.6m, if we did not set up the loan facility correctly, where as this way I just pay the interest on the money we use, and its very flexible, payback whenever (or never!).

I had another meeting afterwards, with my Finance Director and Managing Director of sf group. After we signed off the sf group budget (took 10 minutes), we discussed who we would manage the club's adminsitration (2hours), including payroll, accounting, suppliers,banking,  VAT etc. It was decided that we would employ an additional administrator in the accounts department and that the club would be set up on our CODA accounting system as a new company.

In most businesses the MD and FD would be a bit concerned that the owner was going to blow the company's money on some hair brained sheme, bleeding" the main business of cash, but these 2 people have known me for 25 years between them, so they are used to expecting odd things and have always supported me. Tony , my sf group MD, plays online and live poker himself, and can't wait for the club to open. Also, I can't help thinking they want me to be busy so I won't come back and interfere in their jobs or sf group.

Unforunately, Action Jack had to look after his son so we were unable to hook up, so I drove down to Oxford to meet a potential card room manager. We had a good chat and got on well, he is very enthusiastic about the club and we arranged for him to come and look round the premises in the new year. He also agreed to do a report on what he believed the poker activities in the club should be. Really nice chap.

When I got back to my house Chubby and Shrew were playing heads-up and Womble was sleeping on the sofa. We all spend a good few hours going through the re-furbishment of the premises. Womble is so knowledgable on this, he had managed set-ups for Mecca Bingo, Millers Barn and TGI Fridays, and his comments highlighted my lack of knowledege and expertise. I hope he will find the time to help us on this project.

Its 7am in the morning and I've just woke up on the sofa, not sure why I never made it to bed. I have meeting with our IT Manager later today. After last nights Womble conversation, I can't help feeling a bit apprehensive about the re-furb of the club, Womble has highlighted stuff that I had never thought of, more expense and logistical problems. The Shrew had also told me that our currrent "property project" has fell behind schedule due to the roof, which doesn't help either with the timing. I need his team to start ripping out the club in April.......more complications.

Okay, where are we, I know I have achieved some stuff but I feel there is just so much to sort out, we................

........have a Club name
........have secured the premises..........
........have got positive news from the Gaming Board.........
........are well underway with the recruitment of my Committee, General Manager, Card Room Managers, Bar Manager etc............
........have a Marketing Manager and IT Manager working full time already.............
........have a draft Membership Sheme,
........sorted out the money to finance the Club

What else? I need a shower to clear my head.....this is a full time job. Am I out of practice after spending the last 2 years playing poker, or this really such a diffiult job?


Cheers Rob

Just wondering if at any time you might be able to post a few piccys of the premisis, for us to have a gander at?

Just to say, this is exactly what is needed Rob ,well done on taking up the challenge....just a small one !

Every success.

PS. can number two be near London !!?? ;D

Gratz to hear it's all going full steam ahead. Love the name, and the location/premises sound tip-top. Should hopefully be dealing poker full time when I head over to Canada in the new year. They have a spangly 24hr card-room latched onto the Casino, with leagues with PRIZES!!!!! How's about that then? A casino in tune with their market!! I shall report back in the New Year with any findings.

Till then, best of luck with the venture, I have no doubts!!!

SKA

Personally, and this is just my opinion, I'm not a big fan of the name.

-- it's not very catchy.
-- People will keep missing out the tilt bit. (as tikay has done, and like you have done yourself on the title of the other thread)
-- the tilt part sounds like someone from up north is saying the name.
-- I think just 'Dusk til Dawn' is pretty good on its own.

I'm pretty sure you've settled on this title, but I thought I'd air my views anyhow. You said you wanted some negative feedback, so here's mine.

Nothing major, I don't think the title makes too much difference. Plus, it just snoppy's opinion, which is generally pretty worthless.  :D

Good luck with all this. It seems as though plenty of the blonde faithful, including myself, will be making the trip up to Notts.  :)up

I agree.

Dusk 'Til Dawn

I have to agree with this. "Dusk til dawn" is much classier to my ears. The pun in the middle isn't necessary in my opinion - it makes the club sound a taccier, and I think it would also just cause confusion as the t is easy to miss. The three words don't really have any connection with tilt in the middle, and its actually also quite hard to say (whereas ith just a 'til' it rolls of the tongue. Although I may have just unearthed a dormant speech impediment...)

As ever good luck with it indeed Rob.

Jim.

totally agree with you snoopy and i made EXACTLY  the same comments to rob..

yeah me too

me too

any of you guys been too yorkshire they speak like "from dusk tilt dawn"

or "i've been up tilt 10 every night this week"

change the name, change the membership sheme........................................god knows what people will be like when the club opens........change the sign, change the dealers, change the reception......................what have a let myself in for here.

what colour are the carpets rob?                   ;scarymoment;

My apologies, Rob. I was just expressing an opinion. Didn't mean to stress you out.

As I said on the other thread, you already have my support with the venture, whatever the signs, name, etc.

Forum posts can be very stressful Rob, as a huge % of communication is non-verbal - and thats lost on here. Remember that everyone wishes you the best of success when you read the ol posts, and they shouldn't seem so bad. I reckon everyone who writes on here want you to succeed - they post as friends on blonde, not punters at the club. (After we'll all be down to support it whatever ;))




Apart from that Snoppy. He's a troublemaker.

 ;applause; :goodpost:

Cancel that dog's free subscription  :D

Jammer,

If you have read my diary you'll have noticed that I have got more stressed this week. In all my business ventures consulting people has been used effectively, but you can't please everyone all of the time.

And there is no point in going over and over the same stuff. In terms of the name, there is no cost or domain issue, I also own www.dusktildawnpoker.com and www.dusktilldawnpoker.com. I'll have a think about it, its not a major change.

There is so much happening at the moment since we got the green light on the premises, and as I said when I started the thread, I'd like to use the following procedure so I remain organised and focussed:

1. Debate 1 single issue every 2 weeks on forum (openly, but I will always get annoyed when the same person keeps posting the same negative point over and over again such as IFM over membership fees)

2. Make a Final Decision (it has to be mine and wont keep everyone happy, but that is my job)

3. Move onto the next subject

People who want to work with me on these threads are welcome, I want as much bad/good feedback as possible, as you see, the membership scheme was formed from using Blonde opinions. Bu using this approach the club can only better for the members, and this approach will continue when the club is running, with constant contact with members.

Over the next 9 months, you'll find me in "up" and "down" moods, sometimes "on tilt" with the hassle, but we'll get there in the end. However, I'm not going to have any time for "trouble makers" and "serial negative posters", why should I? -  I owe them nothing, nor do I need their custom, my living does not depend on the success or failure of this club, so I do not have to suck up to any potential customers.

Thanks for the 95% who are giving me good and bad news and following the theads. I'll keep it totally honest and be open.

Cheers Rob

incase any1's wondering, the poll about the name of the club was removed at the request of the author.

Any comments about the name can be posted here.

Personally, I think 'Dusk til Dawn' would be cool, but it's up to Rob. The important thing is what's going to be inside, not the sign above the door.

Having said that, how about 'SNOOPY'S'?

Has a certain ring to it...

... sort of  :D

ps. please please please don't get stressed Rob and remember that you have the backing of all the Blondites whatever decisions you make. We are merely here to offer feeback.  :)up

Its all fascinating stuff to follow mate. keep up the hard work.

Hopefully blonde can continue to be a place to get support for the downers, and to celebrate when the sun is shinin'. :)up

The url's are great by the way.

Anything that avoids a poker pun has got to be better. I said this in the original 'name the club thread' so no need to go over it again.
I figured as this was the name Rob chose the discussion was over. And I think it is....
Does the name really matter? it will catch on based on the success of the club.

In the long term, for what it's worth, I'd argue that 'From Dusk 'til Dawn' is a much more viable name.

I hated the original choice, although I understand how u got to it. But it is completely unnatural to speak as it is nonsense.

I also think beyond your core audience it is too clever by half and won't work on merchandising or in advertising. I'd hate to try and write promo copy around 'From Dusk Tilt Dawn' and the regional press won't understand it either - or thank you for making them explain what it means to their readers every time they write about it either.

I really hope this club is a success and you listen to the points made by several people on this thread about the name. Best of luck and am enjoying reading the thread.

At the end of the day if you post asking for opinions you shouldn't be upset when you get them, simple as that.
If you feel i should be singled out by you constantly then fine, i don't care but lets forget all the people who agree with me eh?

but they have since gone back on their medication  :D

Unfortunately it ain't funny Robert, if we are asked for an opinion and give it why get funny about it?

'Dusk 'til Dawn' is better, people will call it that anyway.

I think you are all forgetting copyright issues ......  Im sure you will find that From Dusk 'til Dawn is owned by the film company.

It's the same as having a galaxy chocolate bar and a ford galaxy car, as long as you can't get the 2 confused it's OK.

I got the written confirmation for the premises from Fisher Hargreaves Proctor, the property agents, this morning. My solicitor at Freeth Cartwright send me a nice email informing me that there will be £19,000 stamp duty payable on the lease, charming.

We won't actually complete on the premises until the liquor licence comes through. This could take 8-12 weeks, but we should "exchange" subject to contract in January. The actual building is built on a methane site so we will need to have a structual survey and sumbit our plans to building control at the council. Lots of fiddly admin and red tape.

I've had a few posts asking about the poker schedule in the club. I have asked the Card Room Managers who have applied for jobs to come up a complete monthly schedule of what they would like to do, as part of the application process. All I can say at the moment is that we will be avoiding crapshoot and re-buy events and looking at catering for early starts. We may even look at running 2 comps each evening with less runners and different start times to achive these objectives.

In terms of cash games, I am sure hold'em, omaha and dealers choice will be catered for at various limits We have planned to have 2 cash game rooms of 13 tables , one high limit, separate from the regular tournament area. Of course, what we end up putting on will untimately depend on the what the members want, and external competitions we are able to attract. There is so much to around setting up the club, we probably won't know the details of the poker schedule until 2 months before we open.

I've had a lot of requests for membership forms (which is positive), we will be setting up a web site where people can log in to join. This should me up some time in January. No money will be collected, people can just indicate which type of membership people want and enter their details into the site. Everyone who joins will be invited to the opening night party and be given their membership cards on their first visit. All fees will be able to be monthly. At £1.25 per vist for Gold Members I have no concerns at all that this will put off the type of players we are trying to attract.

Cheers Rob

I'm very tardy in catching up with this thread, but one point you made a few pages back surprised me, not so much in the point you make, more the fact you have made and and thus appear to be perturbed by it.

You say that public advertising will be very seriously limited.

Can I just say that your target demographic are online, reading all about the club (they may not be agreeing with every decision you make - but hell it's your sandpit), and are getting massively excited about it.

How many people who you don't know from Adam (not you AdamM!), have approached you either by email, or in person and spoken to you about the plans for the club? For every person that has posted on this thread, hundreds of others have read it, lurked and spoken to their friends.

IMHO you don't need to advertise "publicly", WOM of mouth online will do you just fine.

Not a big point, but one worth mentioning if it aids your sleep at night.

Heid
xx

 :goodpost:  :goodpost:

I went to play the £50 re-buy in Nottingham tonight, the club seems to be improving all of the time, Card Magic on a plasma screen, enforcement of rules and decent structure. If I'd known all this was happening and I could get all this locally, I might not have come up with this Poker Club idea in the first place.

I think the management of Gala know about about my plans, and they've not banned me yet. I'm sure my club will generate extra business for Gala by bringing in players to Nottingham who may use the gaming tables at Gala after they've played poker at my club anyway. At some point I guess I'll speak to the management to ensure good relations going forward, I've been a member for 15 years so hopefull they can.

The interest in the club is growing, I can't get to the bar at Gala without 3 or 4 people asking me how things are going with the club and my inbox on my hotmail is constantly busy. Its nice that so many people are interested. I think a lot of people have read the posts on Blonde, and at least 10 people came up to me tonight and said they think the membership fee is a good idea, and they would have no problem paying it. I'm aware that people who would have a problem are unlikely to say this to my face, but it's still positive feedback.

I went out with my old school friends on Saturday night, and they couldn't stop talking about the club, although I strongly expect they are expecting free VIP membership and a free tab in the bar and restuarant! Everyone is poker mad.

It's also nice that so many people have expressed an interest in working for the club, I still feel that it will be a tough job to recruit 50-60 great staff, but we probably have over 40% of that number "earmarked" already, although when reality happens, I'm sure some people will have second thoughts. I really want to pay people good wages but have not finalised what the pay structure will be yet.

I won't be trying to pinch staff, dealers etc, from Notts Gala, as a few people have suggested to me, the dealers in club will not need "licences" to deal poker, and we will have plenty of time before the club opens to train people to deal and work in the hospitality areas. Its more important to find the right personalites, and there is a huge student population is Nottingham, so we should be able to get plenty of part-time help aswell, maybe 25 hours per week, 3 shifts. I've had 5 poker players ask whether they could wrok as dealers in the club - they are sick off bad beats!


This week I'll be spending time planning the layout of the club, meeting with the Gaming lawyers and writing job specifications so that I can show "potential employees" what their responsibilites will be. Its just chipping away each day, working down my "to do list" and ensuring that the people who are already on board are doing their stuff.

I still want to recruit 1 professional poker player to assist the card room managers planning the way that the card room works, and running "poker schools" in the club etc, but there's no rush with this. This is probably the last appointment I need to make for the "committee". I want this person to be a househould name in poker but be prepared to reduce their current poker travelling schedule. Ims sure I'll find the right person over the next 3-6 months.

Some people may wonder why I am recruiting for the club so soon, maybe 12 months before we open the doors; the reason is twofold, so they can be involved in the setting up stage and also so that I can give them plenty of notice, as some people may have to relocate to Nottingham to do their jobs.

Cheers Rob

Me and Nick spent a few hours at the premises today, measuring up and brain storming ideas for the 1000th time about what should go where and how it should look etc. Nick keeps warning me how much everything is going to cost everytime I suggest something. We have to submit these plans to the owners for approval by January 2006.

My property business, run by Nick, is called Marix (after my favourite film). It employs a mixed bad of people, including old school friends and young offenders from the probation service who we are trying to "re-habilitate". My girlfriend, Louise, works with young offenders and if she sees someone who she believes really wants get out of crime, Nick interviews them for a job. I admit, it does provide cheaper labour, but that's not the reason we do it, scouts honour.

I am hoping Matrix will be able to do as much of the refurbishment as possible, especially as the professional opinion of the re-furb cost is £1.5m and our budget is less than £1m. I think we will need to employ more people to achieve an opening date in 2006.

For people who do not know Nottingham, the building used to be a sports bar/restaurant/pool hall/arcade. It is a detached building painted white set back from a 225+ car park. There is nightclub/lapdancing bar next to it, a Megabowl and Showcase Cinema opposite, and 2 restaurants, Frankie & Bennys and Cinquento on the same complex. Entrance is from a slip road that leads onto the A453 that continues for a few miles before reaching juntion 24 of the M1, the East Midlands airport junction. The complex is about 3-4 miles outiside of Nottingham Ciry Centre where the nearest big hotels are.

I have just finished doing the project plan for the set up of the club. I've used an excel spreadsheet and listed tasks by type and by person and deadline date. I'm handling the key recruitment, finance and legal issues. Nick is handling the re-furbishment, Chubby Nowab the marketing and Pete the technology. Its a pretty long list and is only going to get bigger as we find out all of things that we've forgot to include.

I've been feeling that I should be paying something towards Blondepoker for using their site to promote my club, but Tikay and DC won't take anything off me, so I've emailed them to see if I could maybe sponser the "Blonde Bash", put some money behind the bar or add a few quid to the prize pool. Something anyway, cause there is no doubt that I am benefiting from their site. We're all friends but Blonde's not a charity service. I'm hoping there will be lots of good stuff the club can do with Blondepoker when it opens, live comps, social nights etc.

Chubby emailed me a few promissing logos for the club today, he's been working with my Marketing Director of sf group, Michelle Hill, on the design. Apparently he turned up to my head office all decked out with a suit, briefcase and posh accent and everyone said "what a nice polite young man".

Now I've finished my project plan, I feel a lot more organised and on top of everything. Just gotta get back into the groove after 2 years of bad beats on the poker circuit.

Cheers Rob
 





 

That's a fantastic gesture!!

Indeed.

A very nice gesture Rob :)up :)up :)up

Shame I'm not going

The more i read your diary rob more i feel like a kid at xmas who cant wait to open a prezie (or in this case a pot) I really wish you well in this venture and i will only be more then willing to show my support by spending as much time as i can there.

And with your gesture for the blonde event you will only get more of us turn up. Make sure you bring some membership forms to the event.

Rob's excitement and enthusiasm is oozing off the page and getting me all giddy too.
I'm just mad as hell I live too far away to apply for a job myself!

I'd certainly love to be there for the opening night.

Great work Rob, I'm loving this thread.

T
xx

I keep looking at the vote on the club name, looks like nearly everyone thinks "tilt" should be "till" or "til" and the "from" should be dropped, Nick won't be happy, he thought the "tilt" was a nice poker related term into the club's name. At 1pm tomorrow the thread will have been on 48hrs, so we'll know then.

My horse pulled up today in the 3.40pm at Fontwell, when I thought is was an absolute cert to win. Tony Mccoy, the champion jockey, was riding it and he said after the race that "I have a problem horse". ie. it doesn't like racing. Typical, as well as my bet of £6k, a number of people had rung me up for a tip and I've been getting abusive texts since the race finished. Apparently Barry "from Sheffield" Neville backed it pretty big aswell AND didn't even know it was my horse before he put the bet on........he just noticed that it had been heavily backed for 11-1 into 6-1, unfortunatley for Barry this was due to me putting 6 bets of £1k in this morning with 6 different bookies.........sorry Barry, you should have called me.

I emailed everyone with their task list from the project plan last night, Nowab was straight on the case today, visiting a web site designer. He' gets a 10 for enthusiam but I can't get any peace, he's either on my mobile, home phone, email or messenger, he's got me cornered! Just joking, Chubbs, if you can convert the energy into results the sky is the limit.

Our site will allow people to join the club online and we hope it will be up by the end of January. We need these memberships to prove demand to the Magistates court for our gaming licence. Hopefully, the membership fees won't put too many people off, we'll see.

I'm going to the premises tomorrow and taking a few photos - I'll put them up on this thread. You'll really be able to appreciate the potential of the club when you see them, although most of the inside will actually get ripped out in the refurb.

Thanks for all you nice comments on this thread (even my favourite poster "IFM"!)

Cheers Rob


 



 

 :D

If you need a simple online membership form put up rob i'd be happy to do it for free, would only take 10 minutes or so anyway.

(http://bonanzaworld.net/kiss.gif)

Keep up the good work rob.

the missus leaves uni this year and asked where i would like to live as she looks for a job... i expressed a keen interest in nottingham.  ;D

you're welcome, don't tell the mrs about the lap dancing club next door though!




Thanks Bongo, I've emailed Chubby, if he needs ay help he'll give you a PM.

The Building is set back in the left hand corner of the complex. It measures approx 100ft x 50 ft. We plan to re-paint the whole building, probably white and put a large "Dusk till Dawn"  illumianted sign on the front. The building has been empty for 4 years.

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Looks ideal Rob, plenty of parking anyway.

does the dog come included in the price?

£15 a head in the resturant and i am having a leg

The entrance has a revolving door with 2 side doors leading directly into the reception area. We may be able to keep these, they are very heavy duty and secure. We'll probably keep the pillars as well, although they are not part of the supporting structure.

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The car park has 226 spaces around the building. Its needs some tidying up, trees and bushes removing etc. We would also like to secure the whole perimter of the car park but the complex landlords may not allow this.  Part of the VIP package, some people may be able to "puchase" they own car parking space with their name on it, but I need to review what the VIP package actually is next year.

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Our 5 neighbours on the complex are Senorita Night Club & Table Danicing, Showcase Cinema, Megabowl, and two restaurant bars, Franky & Bennys (Italian) and Cinquento (Mexican). Each of these has huge car parking capacity, so if we ever get really busy at a festival time, they will be other places to park.

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For Ironside, the lap dancing club and night club, Senoritas. I think they have a night club downstairs and "adult" entertainment downstairs. I haven't been there for 5 years, honestly! I'm sure they will be over the moon that we are moving in next door....

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The reception is a poor quality timber frame, with very small cloakroom. This will be all ripped out to provide a spacious lounge area and electrical locking security doors into the club - only by activation from behind reception will any person be able to enter the club.

[attachment deleted by admin]

These are the men's toilets, there are also 2 separate disabled toilets and female aswell, but I thought 1 photo would suffice. Ther're not actually in that bad condition, but we'll totally re-furbish them in line with qualitiy of the fittings in the club.

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The main bar area is on an elevated floor which we will keep, its nice to look over the gaming area. However, we will be ripping out this bar and  building a longer new one linking directly into the bar cellar. There is ample room for seating,  internet terminals and couches. The bar has a walkway into the restaurant area. There will be the usual fittings, plasma TV's etc

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The restaurant is also elevated above the floor. We may actually close this area totally off with glass panelling to keep out the noise but still provide a good view for people dining. This will be a "proper resturant menu" - people will be able to eat from a bar menu in other areas of the club. The ceiling will be lowered in this area to make it more intimate.

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This room will be totally enclosed with single door access. This will be specced out to the quality of the "prive bar" at the Bellagio (I took loads of photos in Vegas). There will be a small dining area, bar and private seating.  There will be a poker table in the corner just incase anyone fancies a game of heads-up!

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Although not an enclosed room, we will dedicate 10 tables for cash tables or sit and go's. The area will be separate from the tourney area to prevent any railbirding. This willl be for small and medium limit games.

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This room will be for higher limit cash games and be an enclosed room (as per Bellagio). Will be specced out very high and have 3 or 4 tables. We will have a relaxation area here aswell for players and their guests. This room may not be used on a daily basis, but we will look to arrange and hold the biggest cash games in the UK here.

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This area will have a raised Final Table with a plasma TV so everyone can see how the final is progessing. We hope to have capacity for a minimum of 500 runners and the ability to run 2 or 3 tournamants at the same time. Everything on this and the next 2 photos will be ripped out and moved to ground level. We ill use 2 large projector screen suspended from the ceiling for the tournamant clocks. Lowered lighting will be used for the poker tables.

The specifcation of tournamant poker tables and chairs will be the same as the Bellagio (but with drinks holders!)

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Tournamant Area 2

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Tournamant Area 3

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Obvioulsy we will be removing the bowling alley. This area will have a relaxation/interview area and TV studo with a "WPT camera table". We will hold some of the finals tables here and have a live feed onto our web site and into the bar. We will also look to arrange "match-ups" with high profile players so we can see how they play their hole cards.


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About 3000 sq ft is dediacted to amenities including locker rooms, offices, stores, CCTV room, cellar and kitchen (see next few photos as examples). These will be the engine rooms of the venture and will all be totally refurbished.

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CCTV Room

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Bar Cellar

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Kitchen

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Store

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Plant Room

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Staff Kitchen

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Staff Lockers

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can i be in the tv room full time please i like a little bowling

and surely you can invest in new lockers for the staff

Great pictures Rob i've been to the club 3 time with a tourch and the shrew as an escort i did'nt know the place was in such good condition or maybe you have enhanced the the images for the blondites but i cant wait to get on e-bay me and the shrew have a few business plans with the antiques lol! great photo's by the way
chubbs

I think you can see from the 15 photos I have posted on this thread that this is a seriously ambitious project - and on a much larger scale that a Gutshot type operation. Before returning the keys I wanted to put a few pics up so people could visualise what the layout of the club is planned to be.

This is not the sort of venture that could hide below the radar of the Gaming Board and is going to cost a bomb to set-up and run. We think we can do it in 9 months, but nearly everything will be getting ripped out and replaced to a high specification.

Putting this amount of money and effort in is a bit daunting, but exciting. That's why is is critical to me that we attract the right customers who will respect and enjoy the club - only if this happens will it all be worth it and get the right reputation. The task with such a large place is to make it comfortable and intimate when the place is only at 20% capacity, which I expect it to be at least 80% of the time.

A lot of posts have focussed on the economic vialbility and risk of this club, but what a great place it will be even if we only get average numbers of paying members. I know that the Nottingham (or East Midlands ) market will not support the club alone, so the task will be to attract players from all over Europe and the UK, corporate customers and extra business through the restuarant (players bring their partners for a meal etc).

However, the priority will be a great place to play poker and I believe we can create a better (but inevitably more expensive) alternative to what currently exists in the UK casinos........also somewhere where I want to spend my time, there are selfish reasons for doing this aswell, of course.

Things will slow down a bit now over Xmas, I go to Hong Kong over the new year for a "non-gambling" holiday. I guess I'll be thinking, planning and working on this venture though, I'm really enjoying it at the moment, and I can see things coming together. Hopefully the people who I have brought in to help will "do the business" over the coming months, there is so much to get done and we all need to be professional to make it work.

Cheers Rob 

Rob you mentioned the Broadway casino in one of your earlier posts and your plans to visit it, i played there for the first time on Tuesday evening and can honestly say that the whole place is superb. Great decor throughout all of the casino, helpful & pleasant staff, the card room is very well run with more than capable dealers.

I would highly recommend a visit !

Steve Read.

Fantasic pics!! Will be good to see how it changes over the months. I have a few mates in Nottingham who used to work at Smilin' Sams, including Odin-Dealer who I'm off to Canada with!! Small world. He's glad to see it being put to good (better) use.

I honestly believe this place will be a huge hit. All business projects borne out of passion seem to be more succesful than projects started up because "there's a niche there" or "that will provide a nice return".

Look a great venue, just spent ages catching up on all this as works been manic leading up to xmas and its the first time ive been on the pc for days...
Good luck Rob on this venture it really is looking good.

Had my sf group company xmas do last night, we have a small but growing poker playing base, 6 people went to the poker4 charity event we sponsered a few weeks ago (we managed 2nd and 11th places).

I did a presentation to my employees on the progress of the charity and it was nice to tell everyone that we've raised £3k from my home games. As part of their employment contract, every employee in the new poker business will also have to donate a minimum of 1% of there basic salary to the charity aswell (the total amount raised will then be matched by me). People get full tax relief on the donation so is costs them less than 1% in reality. This should raise another £25k per year to help disabled people.

Theres lots of interest at sf group in the club aswell, mainly because we will be using the hospitality facilities to entertain our employees and clients - one of the reasons why the club needs to an "exclusive" and "upmarket" place. When I picked the £11,000 bar bill up at the end of the night I couldn't help thinking it would have been easier to get my credit card authorised at my own club!

We now have a full floor plan for the club, Nick emailed it to me this morning and it looks great and utilises the floorspace very well. I just need to send a copy to the owners of the building to get it officially authorised but they have already told me that will be a formaility.

Everyone who is helping me seems very motivated and after a lot of groundwork I know we are putting in good foundations in all areas. When I looked at the floorplan it gave me the bigest buzz so far since we commenced the project.

Its nice to work on something that you are genuinely enthusisatic about, I've never been scared of hard work, but I've not always been passionate about some of the business ventures that I've been involved in. I'm very conscious that this should remain fun for everyone involved and not become a "real business, I don't think I could cope with that pressure again.

Have a nice xmas everyone. I'll be doing my shopping tomorrow last minute as always. Some things never change.

Cheers Rob

Have a great christmas Rob and dont think about the club too much!  Yeah right!!!  Give my love to Nick.

Have a GREAT Christmas Rob and kick your heels up on hogmanay. I am one of many I would assume silent watchers of your threads and so wish you ALL the best in your venture. I almost feel like going round with a mop and bucket just to say ive been a part of it  :D Good luck and I wish you all the best for the coming year.

Hi Chilli,
your luv is well received, have a good un all.



A christmas quiz how many poker tables can you fit into 517sq mtrs or 5556sq ft. answers on a postcard usual address.

Merry Xmas All

30

55

Just a guess after reading this article

http://www.kesq.com/Global/story.asp?S=4275662&nav=9qrx (http://www.kesq.com/Global/story.asp?S=4275662&nav=9qrx)

Well, 30, 55, whatever, I hope that in asprirng to reach a big capacity, the tables are not cramped together, that is THE worst thing about most poker rooms.

Ideal spacing between tables? Deauville & Monte Carlo were PERFECT, though temporary venues. Baden & Helsinki, perfect also, & these are permanent venues.

The Broadway has it spot on too, as you will see in January.

Capacity in comfort is far more important than capacity in this case. Poker players will only accept being cramped together - as they are now - for so long. The way that players are squeezed into cardrooms, qute unable to exit unless 3 other people move, is not just plain wronmg, it contravenes Fire Regs, & it's a miracle none of them have been issued Prohibition Notices by the Local Authority or Fire Service.

WHen you can tikay get up to see the improved blackpool cardroom, there is space to move between tables, quite amazing!

The Broadway is ok but still not ideal.

The Western Club was perfect in every way. It would be worth a visit to there Rob.

There are some fantastic bars here in Hong Kong, giving me plenty of ideas for the 2 bars in the club, the VIP bar and the main gaming room bar. I'm not back till next Wednsday so I'm gonna get plently of photos.

The layout of the club is very important, I want people to feel that they are coming into top notch facilities. I think we will need some help on interior design and the fittings, so if anyone knows anyone who has an eye for style and understands hospitaility, please get them to contact me.

When I get back I intend to do a "tour" of the poker clubs and casinos in the UK, as I'm sure they will give us plently of ideas. I have heard the Western and the Broadway are the most impressive, but everyone has different tastes.

I see a few posts on numbers of tables, room etc. Our plan will to be provide capacity for 500 runners within the 15,000 sq ft of premises. However, realistically this WILL ONLY be used if we managed to land a huge event such as a WPT or poker becomes massivley more popular in 5 years. On a day to day basis I have only budgeted for an average of 100 players per day including cash, STT and tournaments, so we are planning to have tables set out as follows:

1. A Main Tournamant Area : 25 tables with over generous space used for STT, Tourneys and Cash Games, open evey day

2. Surplus Tournamant Area : This area will have 25 more tables, 250 chairs, but will be CLOSED OFF with a partician on a day to day basis and is just there for increases in demand outside of the "norm", which may NEVER happen. this does however allow us to run 2/3 different comps at the same time, but in reality, its just spare capacity for the future.

3. High Rollers Cash Room : like the Bellagio, there will be 3 or 4 tables here for higher limit cash games, probably £1000 min sit down level. Initially I expect not to use this room on a daily basis, maybe only at festival time, but it will give the playershwho want to play high stakes a private luxurious area to play in. I really want big high limit players to come to the club, and we will be actually being pro-active in ARRANGING games in this room, ringing people up etc (just like my home game). When younger players see high limit games it gives them something to work up to, this is the culture in the US, you work up the limits as your bankroll increases.

4. TV Room : This will have the WPT style "peek" camera system TV table and have an interview/relaxation room attached. We can use it for some of our own finals, put a live feed into the main bar and maybe even online in the future.

So, it total we'll have 50 ish tables and use the remainging area to provide hospitality.

An 8ft x 4ft table is 32 sq ft + room for chairs and a walkway

To get a general guide, although tables DO VARY is size. I spoke the the card room manager at the Bellagio, who told me based on "their" tables that it was a absolute minimum of 100 sq ft for a 10 seater table with 10 chairs (this is what I worked the Vic Club and Luton at - yes I measured them, sad I know, but that is so so cramped).

So, if we used 150 sq ft as a guide, +50% on Vic and Luton, (although this is overestimated due to table around the perimeter not need the 1m walkway), that would be about 7,500 sq ft for poker, and 7,500 sq foot for the rest, sounds about right. We havn't even chosen out tables yet, or chairs, or anything, but with 15,000 sq ft, we play around with things to create the best of everything. These premises are bigger than a lot of casinos, so is we can't provide a poker club with space and luxury, we 're not doing out job.

I sort of know that 150sq ft is about right and my bar in my house is 260 sq ft and we had 2 table in there and it was a bit too small, although we had seating for spectators and room Colcherster Kev / Simon Nowab.

I've posted a picture of the VIP bar in the Bellagio, this is the level of spec we need to be going for.


Cheers Rob

The VIP bar, called "club prive" in the Bellagio. We need to refurb our premises to this standard to give the members a place they are proud of.

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The tour starts mid January any ideas on best place to visit please post.

Ta

Just got back from Hong Kong. Managed to cover the trip costs with a bit of online poker and backing Liverpool to come back at half time versus Bolton. Would have been even more profitable if my internet connection had not gone down in a £7,000 pot when I flopped the nut straight with 3 way action V KK and AA, but hey, I knew the connection kept dropping and still played on, what an idiot.

Looking forward to the Blonde Bash this weekend, read some of the posts and it looks like everyone is up for a good weekend. It will also give me a chance to kill 2 birds with 1 stone and visit the Broadway, which seems to get very positive feedback from poker players in the midlands.

Loads of administration for the Club to get on with this week so I plan on locking myself in my office and ploughing through it.

Happy New Year to everyone.

Rob

Happy new year Rob

I just found out that this is the Chinese year of the dog, and also that I was born in the year of the dog

I'm going to take it as a good omen

That's probably an omen for my luck with the ladies this year  ;reallyamsorry;

Today I went the the premises to show round my solicitor, Andrew Woods. He's a nice down to earth bloke and although I am yet to part with any hard cash to him, he's been doing his homework.

He even sent one of his assistants  down to London to watch the Gutshot case. He's really keen to get involved with this project as he has seen the growth in poker over the last few years and thinks that using us as a test case could bring him future business in the poker licencing area.

Hopefully, he will bear this in mind when I get the final bill, which he has estimated at at around £80,000,  £40,000 legal bill + £45,000 licencing fees (more negotiation need here I think, an an element of the fee to be success dependant). Our licencing targets are:

March 2006 -  Certificate of Consent from Gaming Commission
April 2006 - Liqor Licence (we are applying for 24hrs under new legislation)
April 2006 - Hearing with Nottingham Magistates Court for Gaming Licence

After that I popped in to see our IT guy, Pete, who was waking up from an afternoon nap after working through the night. He's making steady progress with the plan we agreed but the results are still hard to measure at this stage. I'm a massive fan of using technology to make peoples jobs easier and control a business.

Tomorrow Chubbs is coming down at 12pm to work on the marketing stuff, then I'm doing a guided tour of premises for a few people who have asked, then back to work on more marketing, then some HEADS - UP, then Blonde Poker Bash on Saturday.

I can't believe the amount of people who know about the club plans, even when I play online, players are asking me how its going and wishing me good luck. Word of mouth spreads quickly in poker and I'm sure this diary on BP has helped loads. I've had 3 requests for interviews from newspapers (but thats Chubbs job) as well as loads of emails from people I have never met or spoken to, its getting real interest which can only be a positve thing and hopefully mean we wil be able to meet out target membership.


Cheers Rob

Yes Rob you are quickly becoming a poker super god. Enjoy  :D

Bloody hell I didn't know I had a second job, i'm Andrew Woods as well!!

Can you reduce your fees please

I'll settle for a years fee membership when you open how does that sound?

P.S. I might be wrong but I think you may be the same Rob I bumped into in vegas recently? I'm the random bloke from Nottingham who came and said hello while you were playing.

Happy New Year, Rob, and good luck!  ;cheerleader;


I can't wait to play at your club. With the accessibility of online poker, playing live is often too much effort. However, if everything goes to plan, and you get your place looking as aesthetically pleasing as you suggest it will, I'll be there in a shot. People often forget that you don't have to gamble to go out to a casino or cardroom. If there's a friendly atmosphere and pleasant surroundings, then some folk are just happy to go out for a quick drink. If your bar, restaurant,and seating area look as stylish as the Broadway or Bellagio piccy, then you should succeed in attracting more than just the poker players. Sometimes you wanna go where everybody knows your name, and they're always glad you came. Bit like Cheers!

What a great do Blondepoker put on. I was planning to come home on Sunday morning but ended up watching the quiz, battering Flushy at head-up ("he's not ready" and reminds me of Ariston), and playing 15 minutes of the £100 freezout.

When we first arrived people were a touch apprehensive as they had never met each other "live" before, but everyone soon loosened up once the bantor started. It must have been a bit daunting for people who had come on their own but those who knew eachother went out of their way to may others feel welcome.

Me and Simon had a really good laugh with the Jocks from the Cincinatti club, and spent a lot of time at the bar with them. What a great set of lads, and we're gonna get up there at play at their club soon. I could go on and on about the Blondepoker do and how much I enjoyed it and I really hope that we can have a strong link with Dusk Till Dawn and Blondepoker when we get up and running.

In terms of the Broadway, what an superb place, excellent decor, great staff and wonderful facilities. They have gone to great lengths to make that Casino "classy", even with touch button toilet flushers. I was a bit surprised with the management attidude to ex casino staff though, not allowing Dik 9 to join us and banning Foxy Minx (even though she has left Grovesnor), mind you, the latter is not a dad decision overall!  I also got a warning for celebrating loudly when I won £2k on roulette for Nick Singh. Hey, its their place and they make the rules, and an absolute super facility it is aswell....the best I have been to in the UK.

Thanks to all the people who asked me and wished me all the best with the club.

Cheers Rob


PS. Boderham, you're on the hit list.

An interesting read Rob & nice to meet you

Im sure this will be a big success given your ideas and the speed at which poker is growing
I look forward to becoming a member and wish you every success !

 ;goodluck;

it was a pleasure to spend time in the company of yourself and " the edge".   i think you must allow  some time away from working on your club , so that you both get in some practice for the rematch.


boo  (undisputed  heads up champ )

Rob offered me 6/4 heads up for my entire bankroll

I refused, but i will play him heads up off evens, my entire bankroll against his entire bankroll  ;)

Booderham, you are much smarter than you look, which is not difficult.

Catching me and Chubby after 4 bottles of champers (and god knows what else) and only giving us 20 BB to play you was a sly move which you will be punished slowly for (1 bluff and we were XXXX ed) .

I noticed the next day, you sat directly behind me for 3 hours peeking at my hole cards while I analiated another "fellow fish" of yours, Flushy, and never once asked for a rematch. We tried to temp you again later on but you "hit and run" on us again.

Only joking, Bodders, but we'll be back.

Rob

Cheers Rob, you & Simon were class  8)

It would be great to have you boys up at Cin Cins, I'm sure DC will get something organised  :)up

Stevie

At my trip to the Broadway I managed to get the name of the company that designed and managed the refurbishment of their wonderful casino. I contacted them yesterday, Redgate Contracting Ltd, and arranged that we would meet when The Shrew (refurbishment man) gets back from Tenerife.

Our motley crew of joiners, brickies and labourours are good at grunt work and taking plenty of tea breaks, but we could never achieive the cosmetic finish that is required, so we need to use a 3rd party in this area and we'll add Regdate the the list of potential contractors.

Nightfly (or Rob from Gala) handed his notice in in Nottingham on Sunday. I doubt whether it will be a suprise to anyone that he is joining Dusk Till Dawn, as I have always had a good relationship with him at Gala. The reason he is joining so early, is to ensure that we do a full and thorough job on planning, designing and recruiting for the Card Room, which is the most important area of the club.

Rob is a very diligent person, and cares passionatley about what he does, although sometimes he takes critism and bit too personally - exactly like me, so we should work well togther.

So, our little new company has now become five: me (finance), Chubbs (Marketing), Shrew (Refurbishment) , Bigpete (our IT guys name on Blonde) and Nightfly (Cardroom). We have a few more potential joiners but nothing confirmed yet. Unfortunately, when I did my budget I started from when the Club actually opens, and ignored the fact we would have to take people on early and pay wages with no revenue coming in, I didn't want to make the figures look even worse...........

Our web site is being written. we looked at the Gutshot, Fox Poker, Full House etc and designed our own. Phase 1 of the web site is just to allow people to provide their details for membership online and we hope to launch this end of January. The rest of the content will be worked on until the club opens in late 2006.

Now Simons job really starts, as he needs to collect the details of members so I can show the Magistrates Court at the end of April 2006 ("prove there is demand"). We have finalised the Standard and VIP membership scheme for Dusk Till Dawn and this will be up on Phase 1 of our web site. I noticed that the Fox Club, who have also applied for a gaming licence, put an article in Poker Europe that they will be charging fees of £275-£475 per annum. This just backs up the argument that a UK legal card room cannot be operated without a membership fee due to the additional costs associated with the Gaming Commission etc.

Cheers and thanks again for the weekend. Hopefully Dusk Till Dawn and Blondepoker can have a close relationship going forward.

Rob








 

The Broadway reminded me a lot of the Fontana Bar at Bellagio...I loved the seating areas at Broadway, and it's head and shoulders above anything else in this country casino wise.

If they do as good a job with your club, Rob, you will be onto a winner.

Add me down for membership - and Sarah, she was raving about the place to me today on the phone, and said even as just a nice club it looked fantastic.

After reading that, I think Rob can charge what he likes for membership and it will still be full...

Rob.

I think the interior design of the Broadway, especially the bar and snack area, is superb.

I think you've taken a wise step in working with that company.

It'll be productive for people to think they can come into Dusk Till Dawn just for a drink and a bit of a chill out, rather than to play poker.

Please steal some of those dealers too. They were superb.

and the valets...

... preferably the female ones.  :kiv:

 ;iagree; ;iagree;

 :goodpost:

Great news, i don't know Rob very well but whenever i have spoken to him he seemed to know EXACTLY how a cardroom should be run but so hugely restricted by gala.

Well yes, as well as the broadway's valets all being extremely good looking, they were all incredibly courteous. (and often foreign I noticed).

In fact all of the staff are incredibly friendly and polite whether you throw them a large tip or not.

I find this a huge plus point for a casino/card room - its something that I personally do not find at most of the casino's i've been too - and if Dusk till Dawn can operate at as high a standard as the broadway in this area, I can only see it maintaining a high clientele base.

Aye yous are not bad lads yourself lol

Looking forward to saturday night now, hit the town eh.

Nice to see all those good luck comments on Nightfly in Chiill's thread, strange how I'm calling people by their Blondepoker names rather than their real ones aswell! "robyong" wasn't a very creative forum name was it, should have though of something more snazzier.

Andew Woods, my gaming solicitor is coming round to my house tonight with reems of licencing paperwork to fill out. My sister, Patricia, stays at my house on Tuesday evenings and Wedndesday day times every week, so I am unable to do meetings during these times, not a bad thing really, it gives me a break and allows me to review things.

2 years ago my parents and my sister moved next door to me which allows us to manage the transition to Patricia living full time with me, my sister needs a lot of help due to her disiabiility and it makes sense to do things gradually. It also makes it easier to liase with my mum who runs my disabled chairity. I'm terrible for having things geograhically close to me, I even moved the head office of sf group from Birmingham to Nottingham and it is now in walking distance of my house.

I intend to visit the Cincinatti Club, in Glasgow, this weekend to play the £10,000 Littlewoods guarenteed tourney, its a bit of a hike from Nottingham, but after meeting the Jocks at the Blonde Bash, I'd like to support their event. Chubby and Nick should be coming with me and it won't do any halm to see what the clubs like, maybe pick up some advice / tips

Then tomorrow I have a meeting with Richard Altoft, my Nat West bank manager, to sort out the bank account for the club etc. He's a good bloke, although he's not really jumping up and down with excitement about this venture! These types of people are often very safe and risk adverse, but I'm gonna spends some time explaining to him exactly what we are doing, even though we're not asking him for any loans (yet!), Bank Managers just like you to keep them informed, it makes them feel comfortable and you never know when you might need them! No matter how you are doing, going broke can be just around the corner for any entreprenneur, there were times in my recruitment business when I expanded it too quickly that I could not even afford to pay the VAT bill and Richard bailed my ass out many times.

I feel there is a fundamental difference when I do business projects nowadays that make things run a lot smoother, mainly cause I have managed to build long term relationships with accountants, lawyers, banks etc. You need these guys behind you, they ask the difficult questions and cause they have become tied into you financially they actually have your best interest at heart for a change. Above all, they trust you and you trust them, they are more like friends than business contacts. I used to hate paying them extortionate professional fees but now I realise their importance.

Admittedly, the poker business is new to me, and I have found that its been harder to get people to trust me, even Nighfly keeps saying "whats the catch, you gonna pay me more wages and give me my dream job, there must be a catch". Other people I have talked to in poker have also been sceptical about my intentions, but you just gotta gain their trust over time or walk away, as the bottom line is, most employers and business people are actually out for themselves and there is nearly always a price that they will shaft you for, but hey, XXXX them.

Bit of a waffly post today,

Cheers Rob

Rob.

Fascinating read as always.

You could always ask Ironside to change your alias if you're feeling left out.  :)

We could have a name my new name thread.  :D

I'm keeping it simple. How about Yongsta?

 ;applause; Again!

You can actually change your own name...

Have fun in Scotland!

Got a 9.30am appointment with a shop and bar fitting company at the premises tomorrow and then another marathon session with my gaming lawyer at 12pm.

Seems like all of the admin and running around is falling on my shoulders and the list of crap to go through gets longer instead of smaller. How much would I pay to wake up tomorrow, relax, and nip up the club for a beer and a heads-up match against some fish like Flushy - A LOT! I havn't selpt for 48 hours as I write this, which can't be good for you.

Still fully intend to get to Glasgow on Saturday to check out Cin Cin's, just need to sort out travel arrangements and hooking up with Chubbs who lives in sunny Burnley. I want to have got round the main card clubs by end of March, and there's no reason why we cant all co-operate together, for example, supplying dealers for Festival etc. 


When I explained my plans to the Bank Manager he was nodding at me politley, but I could tell he was thinking "this isn't going to work, poker is just a fad on TV". His first commnent after my detailed enthusiastic redition was," so your worst case is losing the £1m on the re-furb, and having a £250k per annum lease around your neck for 15 years, okay, I'll set the bank accounts up, but don't expect any overdraft or loans for this project, how's sf group doing?". Charming, no VIP membership for you me thinks!

A lovely chap on Blondepoker going under the name of TVB PM'd me and offered to give the club the web domain www.dtdpoker.com, how nice is that? Its not often that people go out of theire was to be so generous. Its much appreciated.

Anyway, that Crypto is a strange site, holding AA I am all-in in a £12K pot on a AA7 flop, the other guy has 77 of course, how does a 7 come on the river?

Cheers Rob

Hi Rob did you check out the gaming lisence required for the dealers or have things fundamentally changed in the last few years.

Had to check the dates again, it really is Friday the 13th, no wonder Chubby Nowab's first draft of the web site was like a horror story. Never mind, small acorns and all that.

Today I met with some contractors and also scheduled a meeting with the company that did the Broadway for next Friday. Ideally I'd like 3 companies to compare service, prices and ideas etc but I'll see how things go next week. The company I met today do my office fitouts but have a licencing division aswell, so I know them, but that damn Broadway looks so good.

Its looking increasing unlikely that my property company, Matrix, which Nick runs, will be able to contribute much to the Poker Club refurb, due to current committments on a development they are working on.

This means higher costs and relying on someone else, but thats life. I think I was being a bit unrealistic anyway, sort of "cross that bridge when I come to it" and "we'll sort something out" type of thing. Now that reality is here, and we have to start work in April to open in 2006,  these slight problems are surfacing.

There's quite a few other things that I conveniently "forgot" to give proper consideration to before commiting myself to the £3m 15 year lease, such as not costing in price of the cash and tournament chips (50p each chip and we need a load of them) or providing for any flooing in the gaming area. Never mind, my accountancy is bit rusty.

Me, Nick and Chubbs are setting of at 11am tomorrow for our 1st poker club trip, The Cincinatti Club, one of many over the next few months.

Cheers Rob

Hi Nomad,

A licenced dealer MUST deal the final table of a tournament I am told, but my solicitors and the gaming commission are sorting all of that out now. I'm actually hoping to hold "dealer tourneys", its not illegal, just need permission off the employer of the dealer.................................

Cheers Rob

GL Rob, ..
Whish I had your balls...

NO rephrase that....


...........................

Rob.

What date do you intend to open? Is this still a realistic date?

Apologies. I'm sure the answer is in this thread somewhere.

cheers

snoops

Hi rob I think you can get a better price than 50 or are they the ones with the microchips in the so chipping machines can recognise them these u dont need I would of have thought .      Heres the answer to your wage bill  If a dealer doesnot need a liscence he can accept tips same as doormen valets etc therefore they should be paying the house to get on the table, same as US and Austria, the only problem with that is the UK players are notoriouslybad tippers you only have to see them playing away its not that they are naturally mean but since 1968 they have got out of the habit.Players have to be trained to tip but cannot see a british floorman explaining to a playerwhy he must do so they just dont know how. So thats a nice little chicken and egg problem.        get another quote on the chips they saw you coming........   

Microchips in chips? I think someone has fed you a line there Nomad, unless there was some sarcasm in it :D

Gaming Law states that no person can accept any gratuity with regards to gaming. This includes soft gaming i.e. poker, unfortunately. With the new gaming commission, and de-regulation this may change in the future, but I believe that it is way way in the future. Fingers crossed though, hopefully not too long.

It's true but mainly to prevent counterfeiters (can also track gambling habits though).


Quite rightly too!

Rob,
Whoever you finally choose to be your Tournament Director/ Cardroom manager , I hope you consider sending them to America for  a week or 2 during one of their major Festivals (as in a busmans holiday).
I truly believe that the experience they would gain is priceless in seeing how they handle things on a large scale.
I remember last year at the Rio, there were 6 tournys , sit & go's and cash games running simultanously with out the slightest hitch. Had to be seen to be believed.
The Americans are really streets ahead when it comes to running tournys as well you know
Keep up the good work
Craig

Hi Dik9    there is definately something in the chips to enable  electronic recognition I just thought it was a microchip,     Why do you think all my sentences  are joined up  I am a technophobe :blonde:

There maybe microchips in chips in casino's outside the UK, but i can safely say that there are non in this country that are used in casino's. The gaming board just wouldn't allow it for a number of reasons. However there are measures to counteract fraud in some cash chips. Microchips not being one of them.

The reason chipping machines identify and sort chips out is due to what is called a "Magic Eye", which is a fast strobe that picks up on colours and assigns that colour to a programmed sleeve. Sometimes if the "Eye" is dirty it cannot read colour properly and so gives out dirty stacks.

Which brings me to a funny story, when a trainee asked how the machine sorts chips out before ever going onto a table. The manager told him it was voice activated. Amazed the trainee went onto the table and threw 2 stacks of blue chips down into the machine, and proceeded to shout "Blue Blue" down the hole :D It was not till he asked how it picks up different colours at the same time did he cotton on as we couldn't keep straight faces :D

The cost of chips depends on a number of factors, weight, size,material, patterned design, inserts, and basic customization, quantity and of course quality.

All the chips at Wynn have RFID technology in them now..but I imagine they have a lot more of the exotics in terms of chip sizes than a lot of places.

Must be interesting at the security checkpoints at Mcarran!

Rob, this is a MUST attend, to see the latest technology, if you order anything from the exhibition, it is usually heavily discounted.

http://www.ateonline.co.uk/104/203/

Just FYI, I brought back some of the low denomination Wynn chips at the end of last year. No bother at LAS.

so did i, and my card protector had a magnet in it, quite fun checking who uses what chips!

What a journey to Scotland, I borrowed my mums car, I knew it had been having a few starting problems (but did not mention this to Chubbs and Nick) and sure enough we broke, after we stopped for a break off the M6 at Kendall. Luckily Nick had his AA card and we were back on the road an hour later, and we rang DC to tell him that we wouild be late.

I had a good weekend at Cin Cins, its a nice friendly place and has a great mezanine floor where they play their biggest cash game. After 4 rebuys I managed to get knocked out with trip A's V a straight and the guy couldn't apologise enough. I resisted saying "how can you call a 5x BB raise with QT off" and said "nice hand". They had 77 runners in the comp (could have took 100) and by 12pm there were 3 cash tables running.

I got battered by DC in the Omaha cash game (6 cards!) and then he proceeded to batter me 2-0 at heads-up (my tactic was to hit a hand and get paid, as I knew it would be tough to bluff him after he called me with J high on one of the first hands!). Everything was in very good spirits and Chuubs gave him a heads-up lesson after me, coming out the winner 2-1. We ended up not leaving Cin Cins till 6am but there were still cash games going after that.

I'm glad we went, the jocks love the bantor with the english, and we gave them plenty of that. I wish Tony G and DC all the best in the new venture and I predict it will be a success, especially after they get their new poker tables and word spreads about the place.

Cheers Rob

Yesterday, I appointed a General Manager for the club to commence employment on July 1st. His name is Darren Whiten and he is Nick's brother who I have known for 25 years+. He as at my first home game "railbirding", so some of you will have met him.

Darren has experience of managiing 50+ staff in a customer focussed retail environment (we will have about 55) and I feel that he will look after the employees in the club. I've opted for this profile of person rather than the traditional "casino manager" because I need someone I can trust, a person that is hands-on, and most importantly, very good with people. I've never met as Casino Manager with this profile, most of them seem to me to wander round the casino like policemen casting suspicious looks at their staff and customers, or maybe I'm a bit paranoid.

Darren will manage the overall running of the premises BUT will not be able to make any gaming decisions, only the Card Room Managers are allowed to do this under the gaming act. So many regulations and restictions, do's and don'ts, its frustrating having all these shackles for a venture which bears no real resemblence to a "normal casino". I bet the laws get relaxed the day after I hand of the £37k for the gaming licence..........

I have always surrounded myself with people that I have a long history with, I'd rather have someone I trust than a person who has excellent experience BUt I do not know. Many people have said to me over the years, "do not mix business with your friends etc etc" but I've continued to do it and so far it hasn't backfired to much, but I admit, its is sometimes not easy to give one of your mates a hard time and then have a few beers straight afterwards.

Okay, only a couple more key appointments left (including a Poker Host) and we'll have a full project team to work on the set-up of the club. We've really got to get our skates on and spec out the club in minute detail now, these plans have to be approved by the owners of the premises before we sign the lease, so I'm looking to have everything pulled together by Week 1 Feb. Nick is working on this as its more his cup of tea, I'm not very practical unfortunatley.

In the meantime, maybe see some of you guys in Luton at the weekend. Hoping to see a prototype of our web site later today, Mr Nowab's "new improved" version..............


Cheers Rob

Rob if you want ill be your face of poker for the club, a club of your stature needs a handsome fella for the posters?  8)

What's a "Poker host" Rob?

Couldn't agree more!!

or i could just be your resident drunk Jock at the bar!

Hi rob, Hope all is going well with your venture. Been reading your diary with alot of excitement.

Just a quick couple of quick questions.

1. Do you plan to do a lot of poker playing tournies ie freezeouts/double chance with big starting stacks and decent clocks. Or will it be alot of bingo rebuys ie small stacks quick clock? (i dont excpect you have got this far forward with your planning yet)

2. How bloody quick can you get the place open? Cant wait to get there and get my membership

Red Dog - an "Poker Host" is a professional player who will be the face of the live club. This person will advise on how the card room should be run for the best interests of players (eg. structures, comps etc). They will also do a "poker school" at the club for beginners and be involved in the planning and management of major festivales. I suppose a bit like what DC is doing for the Cincinatti Club. Anthing to do with Live Poker basically.


We will be avoiding rebuy comps to enable a level playing field and ensure we do not get crapshoot poker

Membership should be available from February by registering online through our web site.

We are targeting a Dec 06 opening party for all people who have joined up as members. To join all you will have to do is supply your details, then being photo ID on your first visit. After your first free visit the next time you come you can choose which membership scheme is most suitable to you. Fees work out between £1-2.50 depending on frequency of use.

VIP membership is about 4x more expensive that standard and a benefits package including airport and train station pick up etc

Cheers Rob

I went to Luton yesterday to have a meeting about the club with a poker table supplier. I had told myself that I would not play the £750 NL event and purposely did not take an overnight bag. However, I ended up playing and going out 11th, typical. I was 2nd chip cleader and clashed with Geoff Duvall, the chip leader, getting all my chips in with a set of 5's v top pair only for him to hit runner runner gutshut straight and knock me out. I think I was around 96% favourire when all the money went in on the flop and I'm gutted. On the positive side it shows me how much the game still means to me although the club has sort of taken over most of my time the last 6 months. God to play with a few blondites aswell.

Tournaments at Dusk Till Dawn will be significantly different from the current structures and rules that exist at the current festivals. In fact, some of the rules may be quite controversial, but we'll make the brave decisions to implement them. I'm not knocking what is currently out there, I think Blackpool, Luton, The Vic and Walsall do a great job in their festivals, but we will be looking at what is best for the poker player in the long term and although there will always be luck in a card game, we must try and make the outright winner of the tournamant most likely to be the best player in the long run.

For example, if Dave Coleclough and 8 random players played 10 final tables, I do not believe that the current structures would yield an accurate result of the % differences in poker ability. There are a number of variables that effect the outcome of the winner, the clock, the blinds and the possibility of a deal being done.

We will have our own club rules. Dare we say "NO DEALS ALLOWED or you are BANNED FOR LIFE" Who knows, we may not have the guts to do that, but anything is a possibility with a blank sheet of paper. In other sports do deals happen? Could you image Stephen Hendy saying to mark Williams when he is wining 11 - 8 (first to 13), "hey Mark, you take £20K and I'll take £27K" and we'll play for the £3k, okay?"

I can here you say "but deals always go on, you'll never stop it". Thats rubbish, it CAN be stopped, but only if the payout structures are adjusted to disincentive deals being done, and once we have the balls to ban 1 person for life (some poor souls would have to be made an example of), believe me, the deals will reduce by over 95%. I can also hear "but you'll never be able to prove it". Thats the same with many other rules, BUt we still have them. Hey, these are just thoughts, everything will be up for debate.

On a very positive note, I had a phone call from a professional poker player who I have offered the job of "Poker Host" to. This is a person that I have been speaking to for over 9 months, and we have now managed to agree for him to join the Dusk Till Dawn team, on a part time basis in 2006, and full time when the club opens. He will be ensuring that the Card Room is run for the PLAYERS, arranging major festivals, running a poker school for beginners, teaching all forms of poker, doing seminars and much much much more. He will be the "face" of our Card Room and should be a great help to our card room managers. "Who is this person?" - I can't say at the moment but as soon as I can, I'll let you guys know.  He's not really a guy who Blondites will know that well, but I know he'll do a good job in this role.

Anyway, main event at Luton tomorrow, maybe do a little better in that. Spoke to Nick today and he said the meetings with the refurb contractors went really well, so overall, not such a bad day (how the hell can you hit a runner runner gutshot with top pair top kicker?)

Cheers Rob

You can't ban one unfortunate person for doing a deal, there has to be at least two

but you get the point, numpty.(ps. nice photo)

i understand what you are saying about stopping deals I dont like taking them my self.

But iI think barring someone is a little bit over the top.

An easy way around it is to not have the payout so top heavy.

A tournie i won the other night i took down 1200 and 2nd took 800 but 3rd only 300. So as you can imagine as soon as we got to last 3 or 4 players start asking for deals. When i got the old evil look when i declined. What i cant understand when i held 70% of the chips.

Thats why I would like to see deals stopped but unless the payout becomes more level. so deals dont seem so appealing.

If it is made clear to the players that dealing is not permited and then they deal and are caught then barring is absolutley necessary. It seems over the top and harsh but it sends a message about quality, fairplay and standards. As Rob rightly says you only need to do it once and everyone toes the line.

I agree. But if we have rules they will be enforced. What the penalties are will have to be decided. I was just quotng an example, not reality.

Do you think i would be right in saying that you would probably be the only poker club/casino in the world that bans deals?

Thats a big break from the establishment.

I do 35% , 25% , 15%  then flatten out a bit, seems to work good

y'know a lot of deals get done because its fricking 5am and you've been playing for 10 hours straight, and people are losing the will to live. There's only so long you can function. I remember chubbs doing his nut at me 3 to go in a walsall festival a few years back 4am in the morning when I was a wee poker beginner. I wanted to play though to the end, but with burnley jon giving us grief because he had to wait for a lift, I finally acceded to the chubbster's cries... 

If anything else an understanding of a good tournament structure helps preclude deals. I look forward to this at dtd.

IMO Rob, unless you are adding money to the prizepool,

I don't think anyone has the right to tell players what to do with what is after all their money.

Of course if one of the remaining players does not want to deal there can be no deal.

Jammer you finally acceded to the chubsters cries did you, ok cant wait till i bust your ass again blind like i did in luton but instead of the bubble this time gonna do it in the first level so you got plenty of time to lick your wounds
But if you remember right i had 60 % of the chips and only wanted to do a deal for the young lady who was 9 months pregnant because she was skint and you had outdrawn her a few times with your hit & hope tactics. Now if you can not show a bit of compassion now and again then you are taking your poker to serious,please come back to the real world Jammer you fish

Now we know how to tilt 'The Chubby one'

So what your saying is, before i play you heads up, i should fall pregnant first?

No Dave dont need to go to them lenghts but if you bring your misses who i believe is pregnant i will show you some compassion maybe even drop the odds a little.

yes mate she is pregnant, however im not that type of player, id rather beat you fair and square, so you dont have any excuses!

And you wont have  8)

Bloody hell Dave you have really surprised me now, i never knew you was a player.

and nor i you......anyway, back to the topic in hand

Whats happening with the web page for Dusk till Dawn mate? looking forward to having a scan through it....please remember to make the web page Jock friendly tho!

dave so you think you are ready do you
might have to set up a game online with flushy for you to qualify first though

i told you before i aint qualifying via no Darn fish...ok

Dave the website design is nearly there about 95% so it will take about 7-10 for programming, so second week of feb should be launched, What do u suggest to make it jock friendly ?

Maybe the opening page should have the option of languages.... then they can read it in their ocks and nou's!

 ;hide;

oi

free bottle of stella with every log in!

Just a tip, don't use the word Jock, that might help, it's often taken as derogatory.. Try "The Scots" instead... other than that, we're a happy bunch ;)

it was actually me that used it first, so its my fault.

I'm no bothered on this board, proud to be referred to as a jock in fact. (Even if I'm not "top jock" with extra sticky hair and a name beggining with 'D')

Decider may have a point though, maybe best not to use the word on your website.

Is "Jock" really taken badly by the Scottish ?  I thought it was friendly term, I have heard many a Scottish person proudly refer to themselves as such ??

Ps. Roll on 10 o'clock when i can be first in the queue for a Tesco breakfast :)

Fking good idea! Theres no better way to celebrate last nights triumphs than with a tescos brekkie.

BTW, Jocks calling Jocks is allowed. But when those English ba****ds call you a jock, it starts wars.

It's akin to calling an Irishman Mick.. some take it badly, others don't.

Like most things, it's not what you say it's how you say it.......

True

well personally i have no problem being refered to as a Jock, depending on who says it, and how its said. (Hence my Sig)

So as the majority suggests, leave it off the web page, however you can still call me Jock to my face, or behind my back! Which ever you prefer.  8)

I was'nt going to put it in anyway just having alaugh with u dave

anyway, back to Robs last point.

As a definite member, at least silver maybe gold, depending on the calender, I would be in full support of a no deals policy, especially as I have confidence the structure and payouts would be put together to encourage that. I am also encouraged by the statement that you intend to be bold and break with convention where you see necessary.

cant wait for this club

i know mate, i think others thought differently tho.

You have email

I read the full thread on the Luton main event final and see again that a deal was done. Most of us have been in positions when a deal has been done, personally I have never wanted to do a deal, but for one reason or another I've have agreed to it. Whether it be that I was being colluded against, made to feel guilty, or the majority wanted it...............most of the time I agreed, to reduce the "hassle factor".

Deals are part of poker currently but I am not sure whether they are hear to stay. Eventually I believe there will be a common set of rules for all poker tournaments decided by some commitee that gets set up. Poker is just too big money for certain people that is will become regualated in the future. Dusk Till Dawn will have a set of rules and all tournaments will be run by them, with no exceptions. What those rules will be I am unsure of, but they will clearly displayed and enforced without prejudice and exception.

Now that I have a full team of people to help me set up the club I need to make sure than everyones strengths are utilised and that we have a organised and systematic plan all the way up to our opening date. I am finding doing this plan quite difficult, as there is so much to do even though we have 11 months to do it.

I think the best approach is to focus on one thing at a time and not get distracted by things that are too far away to worry about. When you bring a number a personalites together everyone has loads of ideas and its my job is to ensure than we get the job done well, don't miss anything, and its on time. For example, what the point of talking about "types on tourneys" when we haven't even got a card room yet, or who we want to get to play in the High Limit Room, when we havn't even specced out what we are going to have in there? Consequently, the team need to focussed on the "phsycial specification" of the club during the next 8 weeks, and nothing else.

The more I discuss this project with people, the bigger and more complex it gets. Sometimes I feel like I am really on top of things, and then the next day I don't know where the hell I am. I think I have good experience of start-ups, and reasonable business skills, but this damn thing is tough. I guess Gala and Grovesner have teams of people who set thier casinos up, experts with experience, we just have me and a few mates from the poker world, so it's bound to be tough, right?

Theres no backing out now anyway, I'm "pot committed". Everywhere I go there are people asking me "how the club is going" but there are some people sticking the knife in with sarcastic comments. Everyone seems to have a view on how the club should run, what we should charge, what we shouldn't do etc etc I don't mind the people who are genuinely trying to help, but I feel like saying to some of the "negative" people, "why exactly are you telling me this?". Here are just some examples of comments in Luton:

"What are you going to do if the Gaming Board turn you down, you'll be really in the XXXX then, won't you"
"Did you know that The Vic are expanding their card room to 300+, this is going to be a real problem for you, isn't it"
"If I were you I wouldn't bother, look what's happened to the Gutshot"
"You're premises are too big, your're wasting your money"
"Noone knows where Nottingham is, why don't you do it in London?"
"The Casino's will shut you down, I guarentee it"
"Poker players don't care where they play, as long as they don't pay for anything, it'll never work"
"You're going to lose all you money, my mate has looked into it and he knows what he is doing"
"Why bother with a gaming licence, you only need soft gaming permission to do poker, my mate looked into it"

Bearing in mind I went out in the £750 and £1000 after hitting sets on the flop (which has really hacked me off), it takes a lot of self control not to tell these individuals where to go and say, "I can do what I want with my money, so why dont you stick your views up your XXXX", but hey, I just grin and nod and try to get away from them as quick as possible.

If it doesn't work we'll have a hell of a place to play a STT instead of my house, altough the bills may be slighly more expensive!

Cheers Rob

I'm not a big fan of deals, especially the bubble saver ones, if you're going to deals like that then why not give everyone their money back and just play for bragging rights. Flatter structures are better, maybe even Crypto are learning, the Half Million last night only paid $50500 for 1st, which is only 10.1% of the prize pool.

Rob, quality post mate, your so right tho!

your doing this because you WANT to do it, not for any particular reason, except to bring some entertainment to the country, some real entertainment by bthe sounds of it.

As you said its your money and you can do what the hell you mplease with it, i bet these same players that said these comments to you will come running to you, after a year or so when they hear all the other players in the circuit ramble on and on about how amazing your club was when they visited it.

forget them, go for the glory mate.

Scottish Dave

I think the only thing worse than allowing deals in a poker tournaments is not allowing deals in poker tournaments.

Players who's financial situation makes them keen to divvy up the spoils prematurely in a tournament will still try and do so whether it is outlawed or not. They may discuss savers etc in the toilet during a break or by other means, through a 3rd party perhaps. Their tactics will change accordingly and it would become unfair on those not involved, still at the final table. There is no real way to stop this.

Rather than go down this path, I feel it's much better to allow any deal discussion to take place openly.

Just my two cents on this issue, I certainly don't want to be one of those "naysayers" that are a bane on your bottom at the moment. Hopefully all the negative comments will make you more determined to succeed in this venture.
If your club is a success it can only be good for poker in the UK and I sincearly hope it does  :)up

Thanks Tank, the deal issue is a tricky one, and will not be made by me alone. It will be a "committe decision" and will be thourughly dicussed. However, the argument that you cant stop them doesn't wash with me, any rule in the club will be possibly "breakable of course", including collusion and slowplay and insulting staff, but that doesn't mean that we should not try and stop it. Its up to use to create the right prize and blind structures to deter deals aswell.

Cheers Rob

Rob - as I have always said to you - it is going to be great - it will be a great club - you have great vision for the various rooms and the layout and it will be great. I personally cant wait for it to open, it will make a change to head northwards for a game and meet different players.

Poker players want a good game and if its good they will come. The marketing is key, and everything you are doing is getting the players talking which is all good.

A great opening evening/week, some club players for the cash tables if it ever gets quiet, an ongoing marketing strategy and a positive attitude.   

As for comments such as 'the casinos will try and shut you down' I see that as a positive comment - it means that the speaker thinks your club will be a viable threat - isn't that great?!?

You are right to be focussed on the detail of the building, dont discuss the other stuff - we're already doing that for you !!  8) 

I repeat - it will be great - good luck for the next eight weeks and look forward to hearing about progress as and when.

Tracey   

Rob - I've been following your enterprise through your posts & I can only wish you the best of luck. I think your ahead off the game. Your ideas & strategy seem well thought out, you obviously know what your doing, & i think your enthusiasm will carry you through to success.

I certainly will become a member (of sorts).

Looking forward to the end of the year when the talk within the UK (& worldwide!!!) poker community will be of the fantastic success of Dusk till Dawn.

Tonji.

 rotflmfao

Rob

Would it be possible to levy a house tax on any deals done, say 10% of the prize money remaining. This money would be put into an accumlative pot and added to the prize money of an annual tournament. I am not sure if the gaming board would allow you to do this but it would discourage deals from taking place without barring them totally.

great idea but so hard to police espically when they turn round and say but it was a saver not a deal, plus the gaming board would have a hissy fit and no way in the world allow it

it would be good though....

aye it would be good

Rob your doing the right thing with all these prophets of doom, just smile & nod & get away from them as soon as poss. Anyone can see you know exactly what your doing.

In Rob we Trust  8)

rob

when things start getting overwhelming, its time to take a time out, clear your head and go back to your systematic plan. ie  one thing at a time. all your energy on the next step. i sometimes get overwhelmed at work and find it hard to focus. a quick jog round the block or day out/whatever your poison, and refocus comes quick. good luck and best foot first

mad

I hate this idea, I think it wouldn't discourage deals, but it would discourage repat buisness.

Perhaps only allowing deals in tournaments with a prize pool of >£x?

I managed to get kicked out of the Broadway Casino this afternoon, I was having a meeting and I think the Manager overheard me talking about casino licences and a poker club and asked us to leave, I'm not sure if this means that I cannot play in their festival in 2 weeks time, guess I'll find out if I try to get in.

I suppose its fair enough to eject me as I know they have strict policies on things like that. I asked him for a reason but he said I had to write into the General Manager to ask as they do not need to give a reason. Its not the first time I've been kicked out of a casino (previously was for card counting accusations on blackjack) and I guess its not going to be the last, still, was a bit embarrassing. We left with our tails between our legs....

The casino exibition at Earls Court was amazing, most of the online poker sites such as Playtech and Tribecca were there. The technology was very advanced, including a computerised poker table which did not require a dealer or a set of cards, you could play tournaments or cash games on it. Everyone who was anyone in gaming had a stall, and was handing business cards and loads of freebies out. We made some good contacts and managed to get to see all the stuff that was relevant to us. It was a long draining day for all six of us, but it had to be done and has helped us get a much better understanding of the systems and fixtures we require.

I want to be in a postion to select the Contractor who will fit out the club by the end of February, Nick is interviewing them all at the moment. The design keep changing as people come up with new ideas, in fact, everything keeps changing, the only consistant thing it that the estimated cost keeps increasing!

I'm also shelling out plently of cash on wages and set up costs (eg. professional fees etc), by my reckoning, I've spent just over £125,000 so far. Its all cash out of my own pocket at the moment, the loan from sf group hasn't been set up yet, so its hurting my pocket big time. I expect these miscellaneus pre opening costs to be over £350,000 on top of the re-furbishment bill. Basically, I'm paying these out of my gambling bankroll for the moment so I need to stay away from big football bets and high buy-in poker comps this year.

I'm surprised how many people outside of poker who know me have been reading this diary, I went out last night and 3 people who have never played poker said they had been reading the diary on blonde, all with a knowing smirk on their faces. The power of Blondepoker eh?

Our first official project meeting in scheduled for the 16th February, at my place. At this meeting we will review our current position and allocate tasks to each person for the next 4 weeks. I know I keep mentioning it and repeating myslef, but this is harder then setting up any of the businesses I have done in the past, god knows why, but it is. Either the brain is growing old or I've had an easy ride to date. Feeling tired and stressed.


Cheers Rob

Good Luck on your quest Rob, really hope it goes 100% well for you, living in the South I know I will attend as often as possible, and when its up and running and Im positive that the rest of blondepoker will support you as well.

 ;goodluck;

Glad to hear from you Rob.

I was starting to worry. You've not posted for nearly a week.

I'm under a pile of of paperwork Ralph (occasionally wondering why I got myself into this)! Thanks for the concern though!

 occasionally wondering why I got myself into this)!
That is my thought on my Internet  at the moment....

Awwww gizz a hug Maureen  ;technophobe;

Hi Rob,  could u explain to me the full reasoning behind you being ejected?

Surely they cant kick you out for having a private conversation.

they can kick you out for any reason they want including having green eyes

Unfortunately they can ask you to leave without giving an explanation.
Think it has something to do with being a private members club
Always dissagreed with that rule

It's true with pubs too of course, in fact pretty much anywhere.

Seems a bit petty!!

Jim, as I said the manager refused to give a reason when I asked him. I can only assume that he overheard our conversation but its up to them, its their place, but it was a bit embarrassing at the time. Maybe he checked my name at reception and has read my diary!

O.K  Thanks Rob,

Good luck with that hectic schedule,

And i thought running a small decorating buisness was hectic but its nothing compared with what you got on your plate at the moment

All the best
Jim.

They can't kick you out for any reason, ie they can't kick you out because you are black or because they don't like you or even because they see you as a rival

But they can kick you out WITHOUT GIVING A REASON

You can be asked to leave if they dont like you. 

But they can't say its because they don't like you

They can if they have an alcohol licence. I do it all the time.

We have now instructed 3 fit out contacting firms to come up with their best design and ball park costings for the refurbishment. After the visit to the casino exibition we should now be able to to begin negotiating on prices for the card room fixtures such as chips and tables. This mean at the end of February we should have a more accurate "total pre opening investment" cost broken down into:

1. Pre-Opening Expenses (wages, licencing, professional fees etc) - estimate £250k
2. Fit Out (3 bars, restuarant, flooring, ceilings, heating system etc) - estimate £850k
3. Accoustics (TV Studio, Tv's, projectors, sound systems, lighting etc) - estimate £100K
4. IT (networking, internet etc) - estimate £150k
5. Card Room (tables, chips, etc) - estimate £150k

Total current estimate = £1.5m (needs to be negotiated down and is well over my original costing, but is in line with similar ventures of this scale).

On the upside we have had enquires from various parties regarding holding tournamants at the club, a company in London asking about using the TV room, and many many applications for membership. There is a definate buzz about the place opening and 99% of people are being supportive, even the Shrew seems to have cheered up recently. Nowab is enthusiatic as ever and Pete is pleased that he is getting more involved with the team. Nightfly seems to be recovering well although we're locked in an argument over freezout V rebuys. The professional poker player "Club Poker Host" is really fired up aswell (I should be able to announce the name later on this week, although I'd be surprised if most of you have not guessed his identity after a recent announcement). Most of the "project team" recruitment is now done, and I do hope that I can establish a mutually beneficial way forward between DTD & Blondepoker over the coming months. Blondepoker have been very good to me allowing me to PR my club for free on their site.

A common question that I am asked is "why are you so sure you will get the gaming licence, how can you commit to all of this without one?". Well, I have to get one, cause I'm financially committed, but I am taking a calcuated risk to avoid slowing the process down. Of course, it will be a huge kick in the teeth if we get turned down, but I do have a plan B just in case.

Stilll can't decided on a logo for DTD though, I've been through hundreds of examples a a few grand on designers, but nothing grabs me yet. I want something that looks good on a web site, signage and clothing. Maybe I shoudn't be so fussy at my age, I remember when I first did sf groups logo, I changed it 6 times in the first year.



Thanks for all the PM's offering help, I'm just trying to teach myselff Microsoft Project (Rod!).

Cheers Rob

OOO, OOO, i know, i know!!!

Logo should be a poker player, at a table in silhouette, with the sun on one side, and a crescent moon on the other

Hi  Rob ,nice to read how its going.I think you better get used to being shown the door until you get your gaming liscence. Did you get a good price for chips at the fair.    your man Dik9 seems to think I am an idiot I was not joking tell him to go to Card player magazine this last month   there is an article by shullman about these chips. I am amazed that a casino manager in the UK is not up to speed on all the latest gaming developments. Well perhaps not they are to busy with other things      having  dinner  screaming at dealers  schmoozing AAAs oh and covering their posteriors.    I seem to be getting conflicting messages in your diary,I saw the pictures of you in glasgow it looks like you had a good time very nice suit  Armani was it. I dont know who thoese other scruffy people were but I dont think I will be bringing  any business people I need to impress.     So have you decided on the way to go on this thing.This I think is something you will have to give a lot of thought to. The drift I got from Glasgow was they were thinking of making the games larger for economic reasons theres no problem there but it will reduce the amount of players Mainly the young students, these are the big hitters of the future.   The way  you solve this problem will be the make or break I think and you cannot give it enough thought, the rest is just detail.LoL ;tk;                                                                                                                                                                                 

I don't think you are an idiot and I never said you were. The Chips in question are about, but what I said was that they would not be allowed in this country and I have never seen them in use in this country, and I have worked in many casino's.
As it happened I was at the casino exhibition, and witnessed their capacity. Fantastic to watch, but as said they were for the foreign market not UK.

50p per chip is about right for a quality heavy chip (minus RFID) so god knows what the tracker chips are worth?

thanks for all advice Nomad, students will be catered for, as will all bankrolls and sectors of the poker community. Dik9 is not that bad............and he does know his stuff!

I think a logo is really important.

It's worth getting right.

It was really dissapointing to hear another Card Club, The Cavendish, is being procecuted. When I met with the Gaming Board they did tell me that they will shut every single card club down that falls within UK laws so I shouldn't be surprised. However, I do believe that by 2009 (after the 2007 gaming review), there will be new laws for Card Clubs which make it practical for them to run at a modest profit whilst not operating illegally. Unfortnately these laws will not come soon enough for DTD. In real terms these are the rough costs of being legal in the UK:

1. £100,000 in legal and application fees to get a licence (lining the lawyers pockets) plus £10,000 every year "licence renewal"
2. Employ a "compliance officer" to check that a club runs lawfully - say £35,000 per annum
3. Have a casino grey licence holder (who may know bugger all about poker) for every hour the club is open for gaming - say £100,000 per annum
4. Security cameras, procedures etc - say £100,000 investment and £10,000 per annum to maintain.

This just screws any club owner who does not have roulette and blackjack in their card room. Personally, I believe the reasons are more sinister than the "we want poker to be safe for the public so it should be regulated by casinos" excuse. I honestly believe that the casino groups are lobbying the get all these clubs shut down for 2 reasons:

1. If people go to poker only clubs they will lose revenue from their table games (ie. % disposable income on casino games decreases)

2. In the past players have started playing casino games, and then fell into poker when they have noticed the card room, now poker is getting so big that the casino groups see an opportunity to get more customers on their table games by attracting poker only players into their casinos and hoping that these players then "fall into table games" when they are in their environment. Poker can create NEW customers for the casinos on their tables.

Anyway, its all corrupt where big money is involved I'm afraid. There have been many times in my business career when I have seen bribery and corruption in places that it should not be expected exist. However, my club just has to be done by the rule book or I leave myself and everyone involved exposed to these forces that we cannot see, but do exist.

This is my view how the poker economy should work:

1. People starting playing poker lose money to experienced players for the first few years, therefore ensuring that people can make a living as a professional poker player, ONLINE or LIVE.

2. As these beginners improve, they then win money from the new set of beginners, becoming proftable players, and so on and so on.

3. Companies (TV businesses, Poker related businesses, advertisers) who want publicity from Poker to increase their profits should add money to tournament prize pools or subsidise the costs of holding the tournamant, therefore giving players more value. As you become better your entry fee gives you even more value as well.

4. Card Rooms and Online sites are a FACILITY for this process to happen, and should be allowed to make profits to maintain their facility and quality of service, and a modest profit, say 10% per annum, for the owners, who have invested / risked they capital in the company.

5. Payout stuctures should be revised for tournmamants to prevent too many people going broke and keep the money in the poker economy and prevent too much money going out of it (ie. one person willing £250,000 - he or she may never put this back into the community).

6. Poker staff should be able to get tips and earn wages comesurate with their responsibilies. The do a harder job than casino dealers.

In the long term, this will happen, as market forces always reach equilibrium. however, until then we have:

1. Companies ripping off players for the dream of being on TV

2. Casinos pretending they are poker friendly to get you to lose your shirt on their table games.

3. Money going out of the game due to top heavy structures.

4. The Gaming Commison (without knowing it) acting as secret police for the big greedy casino groups.

5. Genuine poker lovers unable to afford to run their card rooms (even just for friends) under current legislation.

6. Card Room staff being treated the same as Casino staff.


Cheers, Rob "Conspiracy Theory" Yong

Nice chat Rob, I couldn't agree with you more and I don't think it's a conspiracy theory at all.  However, I'm not so sure things will become as green as we hope due to the power the large casino groups exert.  They're consolidating and getting stronger all the time.  It's such a shame because I'd love there to be a 'cafe culture' for poker, where you can roll up to a small bar / pub, have a beer and a nice friendly game..... and of course have the larger facilities for the bigger stakes and tourneys.... we can dream...

Well, it looks like my short relationship with the nicest decked out casino in the UK is over. One of the guys who I got asked to leave with called my today as said he had a letter saying that he was "no longer welcome as a member or guest".

There was no letter in my mailbox so I phoned up to see if I was barred aswell, but they would not tell me, after keeping me waiting for 10 minutes, they said "I had to come to the casino in person to check". I'll take that as a "yes" then. If people are barred just for being with me, then I guess they must have barred the no 1 suspect.

I'm being really nice on the outside but inside I am pissed off, I spent over £1000 on food and drink in the Boardway at the Blondebash, and even made the effort to go and tell the manager this was the most fantastic casino I'd been in. I've been singing the praises of the place in the card room and the staff to anyone who will listen, and they made me feel like something on the bottom of their shoe, typical.

This does however raise the subject of casino employees and card club owners coming to DTD. The law is that I can let them in but they would need permission from their organisation to cover themselves, not me or DTD. Wouldn't it be great if we could hold a "casino dealers / staff" poker tournament in DTD, and Gala, Grovesner, Stanleys and the rest of them let their staff play in it. What halm would it do?

Something tells me that this will not be allowed, but I'd love to do it. On the circuit we've had some great laughs with casino staff playing heads-up back at the hotel and having a few beers, a lot of them love poker, but I know this is actually not permitted either. At DTD, I will welcome any person connected with a card club or casino with open arms and but them a beer.

Well, I guess I had better not let my feelings get hurt too much, I love playing the UK circuit and I really hope that Grovesner dont barr me (plus anyone connected with me) from playing their festivals. I was hoping that I would escape under the radar because we are only doing a poker club but alas, its not going to be so easy. This is why I got out of business in the first place a few years ago, you've got to watch your back 24hrs, there is always someone who doesn't like what you are doing.

Anyway, we had a long meeting to discuss our internet cafe today. We are going to have 50 internet terminals and use will be free of charge. We need to pick a poker room to go with who can run satelittes for the club etc. Everyone will have different opinions on this so I thought I would do a poll on Blondepoker before Simon Nowab approached the poker rooms and see if they can help us.

On another more positive note, Simon "Aces" Trumper will be joining the Dusk Till Dawn team when the club opens to be our "Poker Host". His role will be varied but mainly to ensure that we cater for the best interests of poker players in everything that we do. He will be advisng on payout structres, blind stuctures, the regular monthly tournamant schedule, major festivals - basically everything to do with live poker. He will also be helping beginners on a variety of poker subjects. Simon's role will be full time and he will be moving to Nottingham when the club opens.

I first spoke to Simon about this role before we even found the premises for the club, maybe over 9 months ago, and we have been in constant contact since. He was always been in a very strong negotiating position (although maybe did not realise it) as I only had a short list of 1! He agreed agreed to join before he parted company with UKbetting a couple of weeks ago, as his role won't really start till the end of the year, therefore there is no conflict with his 2006 sponsership.

So, Nottingham is going to be the home of Chubby and Aces very shortly, as their roles are both conditional on relocating nearby the the DTD club. I think most people will agree that Aces is a very good fit for what we need, I always said that I would recruit a professional poker play to ensure that we did things for the players - not for profit or convenience, and I don't think there are many more honest, friendly and approachable pros than Aces, he always makes time for the junior players on the circuit and always gets on with everyone (except Barry Greenstein).

Okay, gotta get some rest, I have put a poll on "What is the best Poker Room for DTD"

Cheers Rob

Rob

Sorry to hear about your problem with the Broadway, first i knew about it was when i got your message. I'm still none the wiser as to the details. Its a pity it also leaves you unable to play in our upcoming festival. I'd also like to thankyou for your compliments regarding the casino and in particular the cardroom here (before last week) and i really appreciated your support. May i take this oppurtunity to wish you all the luck in the world with DTD and i hope to sample the club at the first chance i get.

In regards to allowing casino dealers into cardrooms, i know there was talk about it a while back with the upshoot of clubs like the gutshot etc and there seemed to be no answer, however as no licensed gaming employee can play at a licensed venue currently its a problem. On the continent there is an annual casino staff poker competition held each september that alas will never be held in the UK for these reasons. I was lucky to attend one a couple of years ago in Austria and it was a fantastic event (albeit limit poker) that attracted well over 600 runners, all of which were casino employees from all over europe. I'd love one to take place in the UK but until the current gaming legislations are dragged up to date its not likely its going to happen unfortunately. Oh well at least i can just about get away with attending the P4C events

All the best

Regards


Chris

no problem Bluewolf, it wont be the first I am sure. I would have probaly busted out after 30 mins and put my credit card behind the bar so I've probably saved a few quid. Rob

Compelling reading Rob. Great to get such an insight to the trials and tribulations of an entrapreneur ( I  could never bloody spell but looks about right )

Forgive me if i have missed it but have you sorted out whether you can play in your own establishment ?

Imagine it to be like the local lap dancing clubs....so close yet so far !!!!!

Really hope things go ok and cant wait for me to buy you a drink when liverpool miss out on 3rd place on the last day of the season.

Chubbs has come down Nottingham for this week so we can concentrate on sorting out the online side of the business. Me, Pete (poker name Shrek) and Chubbs had lunch with Paul "No Action" Jack in Birmingham to get some advice out of him as it's a bit of a mine field. Trouble is every time we asked him a question he told us another poker story. When the UK online guru, Action Jack, plays live poker, he told us he gets a bit nervous so he takes his mouse from his PC and keeps it in his pocket, what an honest guy. Apparently it ran out of batteries when he was head-up against Phil Ivey in the Monte Carlo Millions.

You see, this online stuff is not that simple, there is software, cages, skins, affiliates, banking etc. Because we have certain requirements regarding the banking that must meet the current gaming laws (ie. prevention of money laundering) plus the functionality I want players to have (be able to pay into tourneys in advance, withdraw money in live club etc) its not a straightforward job. By the end of the week I want to know exactly what we are going to do. Most of the current online poker rooms don't worry about all these various laws and do not have a "live poker element" so there are some problems to overcome here.

We are awaiting 3 designs and quotes for the refurbishment of the club this week which Nick is handling, trouble is we keep changing our minds on what we want where.............and the prices seems to go up all the time.

The good news is that our next door neighbours, Senatra's Table Dancing Club have contacted Nick to see if they can borrow our car park before we open, and chucked in free membership to all DTD members. Normally its a tenner to get in so thats a result!

I'm really starting to struggle for time at the moment, often going 2 consecutive days with no sleep, so a few things are going to have to be sacrificed. In a normal week before DTD came along my rough split of time each week would be:

1. MD of sf group - 0.5 days
2. Trustee of Charity work - 0.5 days
3. Look after my sister - 2 days
4. Poker - 2 days
5. Sportsbetting - 1.5 days
6. Property business - 0.5 days

Hey, its been a nice life last 2 years since I left sf group. Its impossible to do all of these things effectively now, so everything except looking after my sister will have to reduce or stop entirely. I have a very analytical way of using my time, this may seem a bit over the top to some people but I have to manage myself by a routine and the luxuries of studying the racing post/various web sites to study referees, match form etc are gone. Since I started the DTD venture I have gone from 5 times a week in the gym to never, and just about everything else has gone to pot. Its the meticulous way that I work that causes me these problems, some people are naturals but I'm afraid thats not me, everything has to make sense, have a reason and be logically correct, how sad is that.

Cheers Rob

Your drive amazes me rob.

Will hills have a system where by you can pay into and withdraw from your online account in their shops so a similar system may be the answer for your particular banking requirements.

I also remember reading about poker stars have a unique arrangement with the royal bank of scotland which keeps players money entirely seperate fom company money which also seems like a great idea you may have some interest in (good for the confidence of the punter).

As ever good luck with your endeavours and can't wait for the opening.

Chubbs and me have spent all week speaking to various online poker rooms and all the feedback has been very positive. We sent them all a written specification of the DTD requirements and they sent us their answers back. What was surprising was the differences in their charges. Some rooms want to charge you a helfty price for the set up of the site, some charge a support monthly fee, othes just charge a % of rake and there are numerous scales of rake splits etc. It's a minefield of information that needs disecting and analysing before we make any further decisions. It may be necessary to get on a plane and meet some of these people but we'll cross that bridge when we have narrowed down the shortlist.

Everytime I think I've filled out the last form for the licencing, I get another one from the solicitor, surely I should not have to keep duplicating my name, address, contact details etc on every single form, its a right repetitive process. I'm not even considering the possibility of us not getting the gaming licence no matter how many times people mention it to me, I'm sure the Gaming Board will give me one after all the forms I have filled out, that's good logic.

It would have been nice to go to the EPT at Deauville this week, it was in my poker schedule, but time did not allow it unfortunatley. With being barred from the Broadway my next poker will be at Walsall, hopefully. Playing poker is the reason why I got involved in this venture in the first place, the ironic thing is that that I probably wont be able to play at the DTD club and most of the locations around the UK! Mind you, I've still got my house to play at.

The refit plans have not progressed this week, but we have finally managed to get detailed electrical, structural and mechanical plans from the owner of the building. This will make the job of the 3 designers we have instructed a lot easier. We will only end up going with 1 of them, basically whoever comes up with the best design. From their we select our contractor, who will be most efficient at executing the designers plans. Its a long process as we must get planning permission for our final design, but I am hoping we will be in and starting work in April. The schedule of works from rip out to completion has been estimated at 22 weeks by all 3 contractors, so basically we should definatley open in 2006.

Techology is a key issue in our club. We will have a number of systems that must all talk to eachother:

1. Online poker room
2. Online banking system
3. Internal cashiering and Membership system
4. Card Room management system
5. EPOS food and beverage system
6. Our Web Site

Hopefully Pete, our full time IT guy will be able to get these 6 pieces of software communicating so that we dont have loads of admin and wasted time. He is working his backside off so if the effort converts into results we'll be fine.

I'm gonna have this weekend off and spend it with my family. Too many light nights this week.

Cheers Rob

thats fantastic rob...............very pleased that everything is starting to come together for you,the amount of work you and your assistants are putting in is incredible.i am sure i speak for the majority of blonde when i say that i cant wait for the opening night....i am sure that will give you a high like no other..........look forward to meeting up at walsall(will your cuddly little chubbs be there also ?)

Can I join now Rob

 ;iagree; :goodpost: :ironside:

Thanks for the update Rob.

Can't wait to hear that you've been granted your license.

You know I'm a worrier......  ;)

Paul "The Marbaya Kid" Zimbler popped in to my house yesterday as he is in England for a few days. I showed him round the premises as he was one of the first people to set a card room up in Spain, so it was definately worth getting his opinion.

Problem was I forget my torch, basically when you enter the premises you have 30 seconds to de-activate the alarm (until security is called out), its pitch black so you need a torch to find the alarm console located at the other end of the building, I only had a lighter, so I had to wander round in the dark with the alarm going off, I've got a massive blister on my thumb from the burning myself with the lighter.

Its a sureal feeling standing in the middle of a 15,000 sq for building in total darkness with an alarm blaring and a voice announcing "you have been dectected as an intruder, security are on the way, please leave the premises". I seem to have a problem every time I show someone round the premises, last time I dropped the alarm key in total darkness and me, Chubbs and Simon Trumper were on our hands and knees for an hour trying to find the keys.

We have moved our web site development to another company who Pete knows. The people we used first did their best but we need some one a bit more advanced. Our site needs to link into other systems such as the Card Room Management system so their is some complex programming involved. The look and feel of a site is very subjective and everyone had a different opinion on what looks best, personally I think the best looking poker site in Daniel Negraneau's "Full Contact Poker", although its gone a bit commerical since he sold out to Big Stack enterprises.

We've got our first project meeting tomorrow round at my house. The full crew will be there, all 7 of us. I have completed the full project plan using a piece of software called Micorsoft Project (had to learn how to use it as I am an excel man). Each person has a full list of jobs by type and time deadline that we need to do before the club opens. Roughly, here are some examples of what each person's responsibilities in the set up will be:

Me - Finance and legals , project plan
Nick - the refit of the premises, all fixutures and fittings, planning, control of costs
Chubbs - club membership, online poker solution, marketing of DTD
Pete - web site, membership system, cashiering system, card room system, internet cafe
Aces Trumper - live card room rules and regulations, payouts, structures, procedures, 2007 major festival schedule (5 events)
Nightfly - everything to do with the card room, poker tables, chips, recruitment of dealers/supervisors, montlhy regular poker schedule
Darren - bar, restaurant, VIP club, recption, cashiering, recruitment of hospitaility staff

There's loads more stuff, but basically everyone has an area to work on and a nice long list, including me. I feel pretty organised having done this, but it is still bugging me why this whole thing is such a difficult job, sf group is 10x bigger that DTD, yet setting up and running that business was loads easier than doing this.

When you look down my project team its basically my best mate since we were 1 (Nick), his brother Darren, my local card room Manager (Nightfly), one of my Dads old work mates (Pete). and two of my poker mates (Aces and Chubbs). You can see how I do business, breaking that old saying " never do business with your friends". To me, trust is miles more important than experience or ability, people can learn how to do something, but a dickhead will always be a dickhead, no matter what he smiles and tells you.

The online side is progressing, however I can't help feeling that this is a shark infested industry. I've read up and done a lot of research with Chubbs, but I still feel we need to be really careful not to get bent over by one of these online businesses. They are all keen to tell us what they can do for us, but not so forthcoming in explaining how they will do it (satelittes, buy-ins etc)........sort of a "sign here and sort out the details later approach". What is very apparent is that their is a HUGH difference between "gross" and "net rake", and noone likes to bring this to your attention. You see after software charges, cage charges, bank fees, player fees the % you get is of the remainder, less that 50% of gross rake with some companies, but most of the don't seem to explain this very well.................I wonder why?

Since most od the DTD team are banned from the Broadway ,I'll have to follow the comp on Blondepoker, good luck to everyone that is playing, it looks a good structure and its a pity I can't play in it, maybe I'll play the £1000 in Sheffield this Friday instead, gotta get the poker fix. I haven't been to Gala since I reruited Nighfly, and I miss going there with my Uncle and Nick, and all the bantor that goes with it. I've been told that I can go still go there by friends at the casino, but just don't feel comfortable with it.

Cheers and good luck to anyone playing at Broadway, Rob








 

Interesting post, as ever. The concept of working with friends is one that has had me pondering before. I discussed setting up a practise with a friend some years ago, he felt he couldn't work as an employee and I had this aversion to partners having seen too many go "wrong".

Subject to licencing etc have you got a target opening date yet? this is one date I would hate to miss.

Hi Rob,


Some time in late 2006! Basically, we want to commence works in April, 26 weeks in the approx schedule, so December 2006 is realistic but not definate, depends on how our recruitment drive does (we need 60-70 people including part time staff etc). But, a xmas party is my own personal target.

Cheers Rob

Thanks for that, good luck as always.

Gross and net rake!  One of my pet hates and one that catches a lot of players out with rakeback deals!  Eye cathcing headline figures are not always what they seem.  I stuck a article on my blog about this a few weeks ago...

http://wonkyjim.blogspot.com/2006/01/looking-after-you-margins-pt2-rakeback.html (http://wonkyjim.blogspot.com/2006/01/looking-after-you-margins-pt2-rakeback.html)


Rob.. i see you are using MS Project, just one word of advice... save a new version of the mpp each week or so, once you start changing things as the project progresses it is very easy to cock it up and not be able to revert.  I'm an IT proj manager If you need any help with it feel free to drop me a line.

Very fickle buisness , unbelievable that you cant go to other establishments  coz your setting your own up .

Next time get everyone who is with you to light up their mobiles!  Much safer and no blisters.

Tip for going to the loo in the middle of the night and not wanting to turn the lights on - use your mobile as a torch!

Or, buy a nail, a hammer, a bit of string & a torch.

Knock nail into wall beside the door, tie string round torch, put a loop in the string, hang the torch using the loop on the nail... leave it there so there's a torch whenever any of you go into the building.

 ;tk;

Hi Rob,
I'm a bit new here but I just read through this thread start to finish and I'm fascinated by what you're doing!
I haven't been playing long, but like many who started playing online I'd love to play at a venue such as the one you are building. Good on ya!

It reminded me of a bash I attended last August - it was a launch party for the 'London World Poker Exchange' - and it was a very lush effort at the Old Billingsgate, Lower Thames Street in London. They had some celeb performers (Grace Jones, Dirty Vegas) and 3 tables - Pro, Celeb and Amateur - as part of the launch.

I got invited because I know a guy who knows the guy who organised the event for the company (or something like that). The did everything - guest list, pro's, celebs, marketing for the night, got the press/paparazzi there

So that got me wondering if you were going to host anything like that. I'm sure you'd get a load of Pro/Celebs there for opening night.
Anyway I could find out and PM you the organisers details if you were interested. I guess they'd tailor anything to your needs.

If not, I can't wait to give your club a go when you get going - keep up the good work!

All the best
Jason

We had our first project meeting at my sf group offices on Wednesday. It started at 2pm and we did not finish till 10pm due to the amount of stuff we had to get through. It was the first time that all 6 people that I've recruited have been together and I tried to make sure that everyone felt comfortable. We all had plenty to say and sometimes this made it difficult to remain focused on the key points that need addressing now. However, the enthusiam is high and everyone seems really motivated.  Aces (Mr Trumper) and Nighfly has some really good ideas about how poker should be carried out it the club, and Darren has discovered some great system that uses membership cards for payment instead of cash.

After we finished at the office we went back to my house and played a £20 sit and go which Chubbs ended up winning after beating Nighfly heads-up. I have to say that Nightfly is probably the worst poker player I have ever come accross in my whole life, calling all-in on a AKJ flop with Q2 offsuit to knock Nick out. 

I tried to get accross to everyone the scale of the project that we are undertaking. I have a certain strategy that I feel we should adopt, doing things slowly and in logical stages but making sure we get things right. For example. I am almost certain that when we first open we will not be able to open 7 days a week, because we will not be able to recruit, train and manage the 65 staff that are needed to run a full week operation, nor will we have time between opening times to fix the things that go wrong.

We are not experienced professional in this industry, and consequently, we should not "run before we can walk". We have to know and accept our limitations and set our objectives accrodingly. Of course, in time, I want the club to open every day at 12pm (2pm for poker) till 6am (4am on Satudays), but we can only do this when we have the infrastructure and most importantly, enough competent staff to do so. Clearly this may mean we lose more money that budgeted in the first year of business, but it will mean that we do things right in the long term.

Due to being banned from the Broadway, me, Chubbs and Nick went to Sheffield to play the main event £1000 FO. Me and Nick busted out early, me on an all-in river bluff and Nick with trip K's (Dave Smith said "guess I need 2 clubs" and they came!). The good news is that Chubbs ended up winning the £14,800 first prize so the DTD poker tour is now in profit! When Chubbs got to the final 5 players we had an interesting conversation which went like this:

Chubbs: "They are mentioning a deal, what should I do? What if it make financial sense? We can't really do deals after what you posted about deals on Blondepoker, can we? (I posted that it is likely that DTD will be a "non deal" venue with a flatter payout structure)

Me: "Correct. No deals, whatever happens"

Chubbs: "Cool, we gotta practice what we preach"

No deal was done and Chubbs played fantastic and won it outright - it was great to railbird and all the spectators had a great time. The staff at Sheffield are so friendly and asked me if they would be able to play poker in DTD when it opens,"hopefully, if your boss agrees to it", I replied. Something that I have on my list to do is to contact all of the casinos and invite them to the club when it opens. I will show them that we have no intention to compete with their "core business" and try and persuade with them to allow their employee to come to DTD.

Many casino staff, especially dealers, love playing poker but are not allowed to fo to rival casinos to play. There is no legal reason why any employee of a casino cannot play poker at DTD as long as their employer agrees to it. At the moment this seems a pretty remote possibility, but I will work to make it happen even if we get knocked back at first. If I can just persuade 1 of the casino groups, even a smaller one such as Napoleans, I think eventually we could get over this hurdle.

I'm off to Sweden in 1 hr with Chubbs to meet with one of the online software providers. Its a right nightmare journey but we have got to make the effort to meet these people face to face and more importantly, see their infrastructure and support with our own eyes. It may seem a bit old fashioned in this new world of cyberspace, but I just prefer face to face meetings.

Hopefully see some of you at Walsall at the weekend,

Cheers Rob

 

Well done Chunky!!

And have fun in Sweden.

good skills cuddles!
cu guys at walsall

What a last few days. Reminds me of the film "Planes, Trains and Automobiles" with Steve Martin and John Candy.

We had a meeting arranged in Sweden at 12pm on Monday. Now, I know that Sweden has a population of 8.5m so I figured just get into Stockholm, the capital, and drive to to where the meeting was - bit like flying into London and driving to Brighton. I mean, how big can Sweden be with only 8.5m population?

We had been advised to fly into Copenhagen and get the train, but for some stupid reason I booked the 8.30pm flight to Stockholm on Sunday for me and Chubbs. Anyway, to cut a long story short:

1. We missed the flight from Luton on Sunday night due to setting off late and hitting traffic on the M1.

2. We ended up playing the £20 re-buy in Luton on Sunday night and catching the 5am plane to Stockholm.

3. When we landed we had not caught the plane to Stockholm City, but landed in a remote airport called Vasetas, 600km away from our meeting destination. there was 4ft of snow everywhere and -10 degrees.

4. We had to drive the whole way and we were 4 hours late for the meeting.

5. When I got changed for the meeting in the petrol station I had forgot to pack my tie, cufflinks and shoes, so had to wear trainers with my suit at the meeting. I couldn't take my jacket off either due to no cufflinks.

6. We then decided to get train to Copenhagen and flight back to Stanstead, but missed the last train and had to get 3 different trains to Copenhagen.

7. True to form we got on the wrong train at one of the changes and missed the Stanstead flight and had to stay another night in Copenhagen.

8. The escalators were broke at the last train station and I slipped and bust my leg.

9. To cap it all I got disconnected in the "Sporting Odds" Monte Carlo satelite when we were 3 way and I had 50% of the chips in play.

10.Lawrence Gosney called me on the way home from Stanstead so we dropped off at Walsall last night to play the £200 re-buy, I had 32,000 chips after 3 hours play and then someone told me it was a 2 day event, I  couldn't play the final the next day even if I got there, as I had a meeting at 3pm with some people who were travelling down to see me (this meeting had been planned for 8 weeks ago) - so I stuck all my chips in blind (after a raise and a re-raise I actually had KJ, luckily my opponent had AK and I was out).

11. Finally I got home and my boiler was broken with no hot water and central heating - its as cold as Sweden.

I just feel sorry for Chubbs, who had to accompany me through this! Nothing is ever simple but I guess it will be funny to look back on sometime.

Cheers Rob

After reading that i'm glad i lead the simple life  :)

nightmare stuff  - the only possible consolation after all that is that you must be due a huge slice of smoothness and things going right for you in the karma stakes.

I think it's interesting that Rob puts a £ sign before figures over a million, even when he's not talking about money

Great story Rob, what a balls up

Rob, I think that you definitely need to employ a PA to organise things.

PS. I'm not looking for the job, and hope that the leg is on the mend.   ;)

Good to see you can see the funny side, these things have a way of evening themselves out Rob, look out for a large slice of good fortune coming your way - unless youv'e allready had it that is.

Always good to read your posts

If it was really cold in sweden, did u warm ur hand between two pillows?


:D

"Those are'nt PILLOWS!!!" LOL

Classic ;D

<gruff voice> "So, did you see the game on Saturday?

 :D

It was my birthday on the 24th February, 34 years old. When I woke up I didn't even remember it was my birthday until my Mum gave me a card a present. That trip around Scandinavia has really knackered me and before I knew it, it was time to play the £1500 in Walsall.

True to form I managed to blow a big stack on 3 draws (I had 28k after level 2) and was soon watching the Blondepoker team doing the updates. I realise now why I play poker, not to win, but to say "all-in" and hit my 8 outer every once in a while. That gives me the rush, and why I'll never be a very good player. I think I'm gonna invent "tag team poker" at DTD, when I can build a stack of chips and then give them to Action Jack to win the tourney!

If I had £25 for every person who had asked me, "when is the club opening", I would have got my £1500 buy-in back at Walsall. It seems like people expect me to wave a magic wand and refurbish 20,00sq ft of empty space in a few weeks. My standard answer is, "its a big job, I think late 2006, I'm doing my best", and the questioner gives me a look that says "pull your finger out, Yong, thats a long time away!".

I had a really cushy life before DTD came along, bit of poker, travel and the odd visit to one of my offices to show my face. Malcolm Harwood remarked that "I had taken a bit more on than I originally thought" - he's damn right. You see when I was younger I could do more stuff, needed less sleep and had a lot more drive. I also did severley underestimate the work need to refurbish the premises, recruit 60 staff, put a management team in place, deal with legals (which are a minefield) and accounting and set up an online poker site.

I did get the original diamond $6m classic comment at Walsall though, "You don't need a licence to have a poker club, a mate of mine knows all about  it". I just replied, "I wish I'd known that before, cheers". No energy left to respond to that old classic I'm afraid. I'm just feeling a bit drained at the moment, I guess.

Anyway, onwards and upwards, we have the final prices and proposals from the online poker sites. We have a web site 70% complete. We have some good staff who have agreed to join. We have a full project team recruited. We have 3 designers working on the layout of the club. We have have 3 contractors pricing up the fit out. We have bank accounts set up and Ltd companies registered. We have the applications into the Gaming Board. We have all our guns loaded and ready to fire at the right times, hopefully.

Cheers Rob

Rob, all the best, this will be a fantastic place to play I am sure of that.

yes all the best and keep your chin up. it will be worth it and even if it takes to late 2007 who cares? take your time and try to enjoy your moments  building up to glory

mad

Is the club open yet?...... :D :D

Chin up mate, get yourself to Vienna and try out there public transport system. :D

Vienna was a quick trip, as soon as me, Nick, Chubbs and Aces got knocked out we changed our flights and went home. I was really focucced for the main event in Vienna. After level 3 I have 27k in chips and was one of the chip leaders. If my AA had stood up v QQ I would have had £55k and been in fantastic shape but the poker gods seem to be bending me over at the moment.

Me and DC had a drink after we were both out to drown our sorrows and he told me it still takes him 2/3 days to get over being knocked out of a major tourney - I was hoping the pain got easier! Poker hurts you, I've played 4 comps this year and had big chips in all of them and should have done much better.

Paul Parker had a chat with me in Vienna about the Sporting Odds Monte Carlo sateliite, when I got disconnected with 3 people left and him and Rob Cooper played on. He must have spend over 2 hours chattering away explaining why he did not sit out and what he thinks should happen. It really is not a problem to me what happened, there was no guarentee I would have won and it was a freeroll so I lost nothing.

On the positive side news of the DTD club had spread outside of the UK. Even Dan Goldman, the Marketing Director of Pokerstars knew that the club was in a "little place called Nottingham". It was really nice to speak to so many people who have been following this diary aswell who I did not actually know as they were reading it as "BP guests". In fact, I'm amazed that people actually log in each day to check if I have posted, its a real complement and makes me determined to do my best.

It really cheered me up a bit as it seems nearly all the poker players are behind what we are trying to create. Mick Jones had a good chat with me about the club, what a nice fella. Dusk Till Dawn is definatley big news on the poker world, and we owe BP a lot for giving us this free PR, 3 other web sites have asked me if they could run my diary etc and I told them no, politely, nothing against them.

I don't think I am going to Monte Carlo next week as I have loads to do on the club and my pokers running really bad. I have written a to do list for next week:

1. Submit floor plan designs to landlord and arrange approval meeting
2. Pay Gaming Board licence fee from new DTD bank account
3. Finalise and order DTD logo pokerwear for me, Chubbs, Nick and Aces
4. Transfer all my property accounts into sf group head office and meet Rebecca
5. Recruit Sarah from sf group as my PA to help me get organised (as per Karibiners advice)
6. Choose and agree deal with online poker room and check out legals with Poppells
7. Meet with Pete to review latest web site draft
8. Meet with Nightfly to review staffing requirements and give him more jobs
9. Put project plan on my server so me and Pete can share it
10. Take my sister out on Wednesday and visit my Grandma

I always do these lists in 10's for some reason. The bottom line is that I need to get more organised, as everything is getting on top of me a bit. The amount of interest that DTD is getting is way above my expectations and the pressure is on to deliver what I have promised and I feel like I've been walking through quick sand over last 4 weeks - lots of effort with little tangible results.


Cheers Rob



 

All I can say is that the M1 section from Luton is gonna take a battering from me once this place opens.

Best of luck

Today I chopped and changed my mind about playing in Monte Carlo so many times. I had 5 phone calls from guys who were over there already ribbing me about not going and Ariston hassling me on MSN all day, saying that "that I was a mug to miss the biggest and best tournamant in Europe". I was so close to getting in my car and catching the 18.10 to Nice from Luton, especially with Rumit rang me and told me he had the enough euros to buy me in today.

I played Monte Carlo last year and it was a fantastic atmosphere, structure and set-up. I would love to play it again but managed to control my urge to do a last minute plane journey and chose the sensible option, to stay at home and to do some work. Also, I really couldn't justify blowing another 12,000 euros out of my ever diminishing poker bankroll.

Burnley Jon rang me today and I thanked him for he kind words he put in his latest interview on the pokernews web site. It was through Jon that I first met Chubbs, his ever present poker partner.  I guess things are not quite the same for Jon now that Chubbs is working for DTD and does not have the time to play as much poker as before, but hopefully we will see plenty of the grumpy tea drinking XXX at DTD when it opens.

I sent the first payment for the Gaming Licence today. Its £8,500 just to get your application read by the powers that be, and of course, its non refundable even if you are unsuccessful. If you are granted the "Certiciate of Consent" you then have to cough up £35,000 more to the local magistates court to get their blessing. Double or triple that with legal fees, its no wonder all the card clubs in the UK are unlicenced. What does the governernment expect a small 10 table card room to do, fork out £100k to set up a business that probably wont make much money anyway? Whenever I watch the Robin Hood film with Kevin Coster in, I think nothing has really changed, the average bloke still gets shafted by the government from all angles.

We are now very close to signing up with an online poker room provider after I spoke with their Sales Director today. If you want to set up an online poker room you have 3 options:

Option 1. Have a skin of a skin (effectively you are a glorified affiliate)
Option 2. Have a skin from a cage (eg. Victor Changer or Blue Square)
Option 3. Go direct to the software provider.

Each have their pros and cons, mainly down to control versus cost. We are favouring Option 3, which is more expensive but gives you much more control. Option 3 requires set-up costs and additional support costs, but at least you have more of your destiny in your own hands. If everything goes to plan, we hope to launch the online side in July/August 2006 and Chubbs will be in charge of generating revenue for this area of DTD.

It is key that we make the online side work, as we be less reliant on external sponsership from other poker sites to subsidise the live club. Our strategy is to do everything "in house" at DTD, so noone controls us and we can do the right things by the members and remain independent.

I transferred the first amount of money into the new DTD bank account today. My bank manager seems a but nervous about the whole DTD thing and has been asking me for a full 3 year business plan for the last 3 months. When I told him that "I havn't got one but I can make one up if he wants" he got even more nervous. When I told him that I needed a £20,000 company credit card for miscelaneaus expenses he nearly fell of his chair. However, when I reminded him that I might move sf groups bank account somewhere else, he sorted it all out.

The shocking thing is that I am a qualified accountant and I have not even done an accurate financial plan for DTD, whats the point, who the hell knows what is going to happen? When I first took on the project 9 months ago, I did one (which I posted the summary on Blonde), but costs have escalated so much, I'd rather not do one at the moment! With a project like this, I think you have just got to go with your gut feel, and not get too hung up on making up figures such as number of customers per day, average spend per customer etc. The number of assumptions will make the profit/loss so wildly inaccurate anyway - you could be worrying about nothing. My thought process is much more basic:

1. Is poker growing?           YES
2. Will it continue to grow?  YES
3. Why?                             BECAUSE ITS ADDICTIVE WITH NO AGE RESTICTIONS
4. Is the project interesting? YES
5. Should we do it?              OF COURSE

Good luck to everyone in Monte Carlo. My tip to do well is DC, as he is due a result in a major comp and I just have a "gut feel" about this one.

Cheers Rob

I bloody love this thread. Thanks for the updates.

Another great update Rob, truly fascinating and thrilling too.

Rob, If you happen to over order a few XXL items, I will gladly take them off your hands ;)

I had to laugh when I read this bit.  I know what you're trying to say on number 3 (young and old can play) but you might want to re-think your exact wording if you have an interview regarding the licence.  You'll give the poor bloke visions of delinquent 13 year olds running amok around your club!

Fascinating stuff as always Rob.

Sheriff

bloody brilliant Rob

At your time of life its great to see you can still  put the effort in and see the funny side when things go tits up.

Take my hat off to you sir !!

Just had an idea Rob

Know you dont want roulette or blackjack in the establishment but what about F.O.B. s

Like fruit machines but you can play roulette etc., linked to RNG.

Would be a good income stream for very little hassle.

Jim - you need a bookmakers licence for these. Cant have them in a casino under current legislation. Rob

Hey Rob, just out of curiosity, what did you think of the "22" game in the Concord?

Didn't play it Red, but I'm a 21 is best player, would take some adjusting to for me!

I met with my Finance Director today to run through how we are going to intergrate and control the finances of DTD. I had done some quick calculations on the number of accounting transactions that I expect to go through the business and we both came to the conclusion that it would be necessary to have a dedicated accountant who just looked after the DTD business.

At sf group the finance department supply detailed financial analysis as well as the normal "run of the mill" accounts which help the Directors control all areas of their business, and although DTD will be a much smaller business that sf group, the same principles will apply. Unfortunatley, yet another unbudgeted cost................

My lawyers are really starting to annoy me now, asking for information that has either previously been supplied or that they could get from other sources. We have scheduled a preliminery meeting with the Gaming Commission to run through the prcedures and policies of DTD, in particular, how we handle cash, as they are red hot on money laundering. I am really hoping that they give me a bit of latitude on this, as the less hard cash we have on the premises, the better. The "cashless" membership system Darren has been looking at, similar to the one that is used on cruise ships, has really got me buzzing.

We have the final presentation from the designer and contractor that did The Boardway Casino, tomorrow. They are coming to my house for the meeting, I like to see people in more relaxed surroundings, I find you can pick up a lot more about them.

Time is closing in on Nick to make a decision on the people he wants to work with to help him on the refurbishment, as I have to submit final floor plans to the Gaming Board and the owners of the building next week. We've really tried to hold off as long as possible to make the right decision as you only get once chance at a refurb of this size and its got to be top notch (at the right price). Now that Nick is on the "homestraight" with his apartments project he is starting to get his teeth into DTD and come up with new ideas and concepts.

I have signed and faxed a "subject to contract" agreement for the poker software for our online side today. We got a reasonable deal but they were not as negotiable as I had hoped. In all, we considered 7 companies, it was a real minefield, with plenty of "smallprint" to catch you out, which I guess you should expect of an unregulated highly profitable industry.

Development of our poker client will begin in April and Pete will be heading this up. I see this as way we may be able to subsidise some of the overspends on the club, but the % of gross rake you actually receive after banking charges, royalties and various charges is not substancial unless tou can afford to set yourself as a cage, such as VC or Bluesquare. In effect, being a skin, you are an "affiliate" with a slightly higher commission scheme and more hassle, but we need the software to run our satelittes for the club which I consider a key factor in generating large fields of players to increase prize pool sizes.

The enthusiam from my project team is growing, and we are already recieving applications for jobs at the club 6/7 months before it opens. I've just spent the last 7 hours updating the project plan and sorting out all my admin and feel a lot more organised. Been following Jen in Monte Carlo on BP, what a good performance in a top class field.

Cheers Rob

I looks to be going great Rob, all the best mate.

Great updates as usual Rob.....keep up all the hard work,we all know it will be worth it in the end :)up

if anyone sees or speaks to rob today or over the weekend can you ask him to call me please

I've been away all week on my annual trip to Chelternam. Ideally my horse, Hi Humphrey would have been running but its injured and running crap anyway, I broke even after a weeks betting so not a terrible result. The hospitality there was excellent but it was a draining week due to the amount of guiness drank every day.

I would have really liked to go the the Blondebash this weekend but had to go to the quarterly conference at sf group this weekend. Blondepoker is going from strength to strength with the addition of there poker software. I downloaded it and it looks excellent. Hopefully people will play through their skin on tribecca and the BP crew will start to get there rewards for the investment they have put into the site over the last couple of years. Hoefully, BP will be able to hold some live tournamants at DTD when we get the club open.

I'm still struggling with our logo, and at £100 per hour for a designer, I've been racking up the costs. Logos are such a personal thing, but I'm trying to get something that works well on the web site, poker clothig, chips, cards, tables, uniforms and signage, and just can't seem to get it 100%. I'm missing deadlines by delaying this, but logos have always been a problem for me.

I am submitting the floor plans to the lessor, liqor licencing and the gaming board next week. I lot of chopping and changing has gone on here and we have gone for the most elaborate and therefore most expensive design. this gives us 25,000 sq ft of space and allows us for 66 tables in total, each with plently of room. Some of the key points of the final design are listed below:

Ground Floor
Reception
Bar / Restaurant with 50 internet terminals built into the furniture (vegas style)
Tournament area - 41 tables + raised final table and 3 valet stations
Cash Room - 12 tables
High Limit Room - 3 tables


1st Floor
Corporate Area with TV studio, bar and 10 tables
VIP Nightclub
Viewing Gallery over downstairs tournamant area

Its hard to visualise, but it looks amazing. If we can produce a place like this that my friends, collegues and customers can use, I'd be so proud. We have a few hurdles to get over, planning consent and the work needed to 1st floor, as the site is built on a methane plant! This means that we must drill down 10m throught the existing floor and put in extra steel supports and concrete filling. Its an awful lot of hassle and we could go for a simpler design, but we gonna be stuck with it for at least 15 years, so might as well do it right. Again, this causes the costs to spiral further oustide of the original budget, but it will be worth it from my point of view, even if its not really good commerical business sense.

Pete begins work on our online site in April. Rather than go through a cage, we have done a deal direct with the software and banking facility. The contract is with my solicitors but I've signed a "letter of intent" so hits 99% gonna go through.

I am conscious that BP have set up their own site and wish them every success in this, so I will not be marketing our online site through the BP forum, this would not be right. Also, marketing our live club through BP would be indirectly marketing our online site, so I need to be careful here aswell. Last thing I want to do is upset anyone at BP. Consequently, I think the generous "free marketing" that BP have given me should probably come to an end as well. DC and TK have always refused to take anything from me which is much appreciated. I probably should speak to them to see what they want me to do about this diary etc

Cheers Rob







 
 

Very surprised no-one has commented on this yet, maybe it was missed due to everyone being at the blonde bash.

I hope this thread can continue.

 ;iagree;

I am enjoying hearing updates about the club. I actively look for this thread when I logon.

 ;iagree;

I hav followed this tread since it began,it would be a shame if commercial pressures force its demise.

What he said

;iagree;

Agreed

I certainly would want to see this thread continue. Let's face it - the Tank's 4000 STTs thread could be considerred advertising for Pokerstars, but it's a great thread & a must read for many Blondeites (as is this thread).

DTD will be GREAT for Poker, as is BP - so for the good of the game I'd think that the various commercial sensitivities could be put aside & the association remain.

I understand where you guys are coming from, but....

DC and TK are absolutely fine with me posting re: DTD etc but I sort of feel I've been on a bit of a "BP freeroll" marketing DTD over last 9 months on the BP site. They are cool with me using the BP forum to discuss DTD, cause BP is run buy a real great bunch of people, but since the launch of the BP online poker room, I just don't feel its "right" doing it anymore, as DTD will be having its own online room later on in 2006.

I think I'd rather revert back to being a BP forum reader that "poster" and do my marketing of DTD off my own back from now on. By me posting about DTD I am effectively marketing our online site aswell and that doesn't really wash with me. If I saw someone marketing another online poker room on BP for free, even in a subtle way, I'd be a bit narked as a Blondite myself, so I gotta look at things from that point of view.

When I originally started this thread my intention was not to market DTD, but to do something similar to my WSOP diary, DTD is not and will never be a major source of income for me so I have the luxury of being able to do as I choose and what I feel is right. As a BP supporter I don't like 3rd parties piggy backing on BP's success which hopefully will be accelerated by the success of their online poker room.

I appreciate that people want to know what is going on with DTD etc but I've made my decision. Most of the interesting set-up has been done now anyway so youre not missing much. This poker business is full of free loaders and parasites at all levels, so we are going to do things entirely of our own back, as we enter the most critical period, the 6 months before opening, whether we are successful or not!

I have not discussed this with anyone at BP, so please don't cause a big issue over this, as we're all good mates and I'll find it embarrassing, however, obviously I needed to explain myself to people who have followed this thread, so they know why its come to an end.

Cheers Rob

Have you spoken to DC about this, rob?

I'm sure you guys could come to some sort of arrangement that benefited both sides.

I didn't follow this thread at all when it started, to be honest it was so long by the time I noticed it it seemed like hard work to get into.  After the first bash i found some time and read the whole lot and awlays look out for it.  I've always been impressed by the honesty and Rob's attitued to the whole thing. 

I would be really dissapointed if it stopped as would the vast majority of Blondeites (I think).  But I can see your reasons and respect that.  I like the way you want to stick by your principles even though it would probably be more beneficial to go against them this one time.  Have to respect that.

I have read each page of the story as it has unfolded, it has been a great journey so far.

2 questions

If you feel you cannot update on blonde, will you have a similar diary of progress on the DTD site that everyone could read?

Are you giving yourself 2 weeks off the project to go to the WSOP this year?

Good Luck however it goes and I am another that is looking forward to visiting it when it is open.

Fair enough Rob & I applaud your integrity. Sticking what you think is right rather than what you can 'get away with' shows that integrity.

I'm saddened as, like many blondeites, I find myself with an avid interest & even an emotional investment in the development of DTD.

Please think about continuing the diary on the DTD website as this isn't a new business to a lot of us, it's the work of some friends & we want to know how it's going.


PS I know I come across as a soppy big shite with that emotional guff, but to hell with it - I want to know what's going on  ;goodluck;

Having read the thread from the beginning and got more and more excited about the prospect of your poker paradise i will be a bit gutted not to know whats going on. But as said before you do what is right and it's fair enough.

Good luck with the rest and i can't wait till dtd opens.

 :goodpost: ;iagree;

Rob,
If your are going to stop posting about DTD, please start a blog, its a must read ive followed this thread from day 1.
We are going to be left in the dark if not.

Cheers


Jason

I personally hope DC or Tikay intervenes and insists you keep going with this. this forum is a place to exchange important iformation. DTD in no way effects my decision weither or not to use Blondepokerleague. we all hold accounts with lots of companys anyway. DTD nor Blondepokerleague are likely to become my exclusive place to play.

don't stop this thread mate

I agree M and Adam, but from what I know about Rob he goes with his instincts (only got that idea about him from his posts on here) so if he says hes going to do something he probably will.
Im sure Tikay and El would not want this thread to end as im sure it benefits both parties too.

1. Not sure if going to WSOP this year, the fields were so huge, after 8 hours you look round and still have 800 runners to get through! Plus I'm not sure whether I can spare the time. I would say its 50:50 at moment.

2. I dont think I'll do a blog, but we will launch the DTD web site (when it eventually gets done!) we'll put on some pictures of the progress of the refit.

3. At the moment we have no plans to do a forum style site, just information based, so maybe a detailed interactive type diary like on BP is not really possible, and I'd rather stay away from forums as BP fullfills this purpose more than effectively. We will have a standard news section on the site where people can keep up to date on how things are going.

4. If anyone has any questions about DTD feel free to PM me through BP, I reply to every message as people know.

I'm sorry that some of you feel this way about me stopping the diary on BP, but I hope you appreciate my reasons. TK and DC are good friends of mine and I know they would not mind me continuing, but I'm not comfortable marketing DTD on the back of another site's success as I already mentioned.

Please don't feel like I don't want everyone on BP informed or can't be bothered to keep doing the diary, I just think DTD should promote itself and not free roll on BP. The exposure that DTD has had is amazing, and I know that a large % of this is due to BP. However, the next 6 months of marketing are even more key, and I feel we should do it entirely off our own back.

We had a number of approaches frrom 3rd party organisations in Poker to get involved with DTD and turned them all down, we want to remain totally independant and do everything in house. One online site even offered to buy all our poker tables, chips etc if they could have there logo on them but we said no. It's a somewhat strange mentality to do business but it does sort of work for me in the long run. If DTD is to be a success then we make that happen ourselves, whilst getting on really well with as many other people/organisation involved in poker.

See some of you at Vic at weekend.

Rob

perhaps if Blonde are too generous to take money from DTD and Rob is too consciensious to write on here for free another solution can be found.
How about DTD throws the occassional $500 freeroll via blondepokerleague.com that way Blonde gets the players onto the site, Rob gets to pay a fair price to advertise to Blonde members and we get a free tourney and and we get to keep the DTD diary thread going.

I completely understand what you are saying Rob and of course it is your decision.

As an alternative, how about a DTD blog on the DTD website when you get it up and running. That would keep those of us that are interested in developments informed on progress and would be entirely independant of BP.

Carl

ooops Posted this without reading to bottom of thread. Good luck with the venture Rob.  I'll be logging in as soon as the DTD website is up and running.

Just wondering if you had second thoughts Rob regarding reporting  the live aspect of DTD.

Fixture and fittings etc


Regards

M

 

Quality. I've kept up reading this thread since it's beginning. Shame the updates will come to an end but can totally understand the reasoning behind it.

As for doing everything in-house, that's even better. Don't sell your soul to these monsters!!! DTD will be 10 times the poker club for it and you know it!

Good luck with the venture, I'll try and stay up to date with everything from Canada. No doubt I'll swing by in 2007 to see this place with my own eyes.

Scott

SKA, T do hope you swing by as Nightfly thinks you are working there!

Hells bells, I had not seen the last few pages of this thread until just now.

The position is....

Rob, Dave & myself are good friends, & it will stay that way, come what may.

Rob's Posting on blonde is a 2 way street, bringing benefit, information & entertainment to many peeps.

blonde would very much hope it continues.

Rob & myself discussed the issue of him Posting on blonde a while back, & I insisted that we wished the status quo to remain.

Rob is a man of deeply-held principles, & he may not wish to change his mind once he has made his position clear. For the sake of record, I hope he does.

There have been no discussions between Rob & I about this matter in the last few weeks, though I did spend some time with Rob in London last week.

Personally, I don't see that our two Cardrooms will necessarily be in competition or conflict with each other. We in blonde are aiming at a specific, niche, market, (see seperate thread & Posts tonight) you may well be aiming at an entirely different target market. It cannot be taken for granted that there will be conflicts of interest.

You owe blonde nothing, we owe DTD nothing, but we do owe thanks & gratitude to you personally Rob.I hope you will re-consider your decision, which I know was made with honourable intentions. Why not call me tomorrow, & let's have a chat, maybe over a drink - mine's a pot of tea.

You are a good pal, & a true pal. All sorts of freeloaders, self-promotionists, peeps with vested interest, folks keen to use blonde simply for their own financial gain, are crawling out of the woodwork & sending me sucky-wucky PM's & e-Mails,  angle-shooters supreme. You are not one of them.

Keep it coming Rob. You know it makes sense.

xx

Oh, TK, I thought you had read the thread when we spoke in London or I would have explained my position in a bit more detail over a drink at the bar. I've had loads of PM's and email from Blondites asking me what is going on with DTD, and this thread has 11,355 hits so its been pretty popular.

You guys have done me loads of favours and you know I'd do and will do the the same for BP when DTD becomes operational. However, unless we can sort out a commercial arrangement between DTD and BP I will feel like one of those poker parasites that we both talk about and loathe.

Poker is now big big business, Mansion (a new online poker business) are looking like replacing Vodaphone in a £60m shirt sponsership deal with Man U, people who don't give a XXX about the players are getting richer, and the good guys and players are getting skinter. I can't see the halm in having a commercial deal between BP and DTD, but you need to know more about DTD plans and strategy to appericate where I'm coming from.

You're welcome to drop by anytime for a pot of tea! I know you're the worlds busiest man sand havn't had time to get involved the way I had originally hoped.

Cheers Rob

No, I had not seen the last few pages of the thread until tonight Rob, so I could not have discussed it with you last week "forewarned". I'm afraid I m struggling to keep up with the Forum Posts, I used to read every Post, but I am way behind now, & getting into trub with all manner of people for not doing things I should have done. I have yet to read the Monte Carlo Live Update, or the Vic Final Day Update.......

And The Vic was the perfect example as to why my head is spinning right now. I had 3 business meets, tried to play the Main Event, write a bunch of stuff for the site re-launch, sort out some "payment" queries with the Cardroom, wear a TV Producers AND Interviewers hat for 425, and gawd knows what else. Me the world's busiest man? Hardly, but "most disorganized" I have a shot at......

I am not opposed in principle to some sort of "commercial arrangement" between DTD & blonde - though I'd insist that any deal we cut was announced publicly - but if I'm honest, I am happy with the way things are, & putting money on it may disturb that delicate "balance" we have.

But let's chat.

Finally, please drop the notion that you feel like "one of those poker parasites we both loathe". I may be getting on a bit, but my antannae for such folk are (is?) keen as mustard, I can spot them a mile off. You have not, are not, & will not, ever be one of those.

TK and me had a good chat in Luton about DTD and BP. Clearly, there is an overlap if both orgainisations have their own online card room, and there was always going to be, but we need to find a way around that whilst still benefiting both parties. However, as TK says, BP deals with other 3rd partycard rooms and will continue to do so, so why not DTD?

I believe the way forward is that DTD should be a paying customer of BP for the following services:

1. Banner Link to the DTD site from BP homepage so Blondites can join the club online and read information on DTD

2. Dedicated section on the forum for DTD so DTD members and Blondites can debate issues on DTD, the DTD web site can have a direct link to the BP forum (and therefore DTD members join BP to post therefore BP members increase)

3. Blondebashes can be held at DTD and DTD will add money to prize pools for the Blonde Live Tournaments

4. Blondepoker has exclusive rights for live tournament updates in DTD

5. Blondepoker can take advantage of the DTD Poker Tour (12 major tournamants around the world)

There is lots more we can do together, and TK is going to get back to me. If its a "no", then I guess I can still post stuff about the Live Club but ideally, I'd rather get tied in with BP in a more formal way, cause I can trust TK and DC.

PS. Everything is going fine with the club, were really getting a firmer and clear strategy now.

Cheers Rob


 

It's just sorting the nut & bolts now. I am confident we can work it out to the benefit of both paries, we just have to sort the details. Give us time, there are other, external issues, which complicate things, but I'm sure we will resolve them.

Our discussion was long & complex, so I will Post the story as soon as time permits.

But the will is there, & it's a pleasure to engage in a business dialogue with someone like Rob, who is brutally & 100% honest. Almost everyone on the buusiness side of poker has an "angle", & are trying it on in some shape or form, it disgusts me & insults my intelligence that they do it & think I can't spot it. But not Rob - he's as straight as a die.

It will be a while before everything is formalised, but in the meantime, it's "as was".

Hope you guys do come up with an agreement. Everything you say about so many people having an angle in poker is true. In my dealings with you two guys you are 100% straight and poker needs more like you.

 ;iagree;

Sounds exciting and I'm looking forward to it already.

ps. Can't believe that guy called with those pocket nines, Rob. I don't care what any1 at the table says, it was a bad call for his whole stack.

Give us a bit of time to work out the details, there's much to sort, but I'm sure it's gonna be wicked, bro.

This is exciting news!

 I'm sure that there are a lot of things that need sorting first, but I for one am excited at the thought that this thread may continue.

I scan for this thread, whenever I log in and have found it to be fun, provocotive and highly educational. Reading about the conception, gestation and future birth of DTD has me feeling like an expectant father. This can only be attributed to RY's personal style of writing.Thank you Rob.

It obvious that Rob, TK and DC are men of considerable integrity, and I'm sure they can sort something out.

Thanks to all three of you.



Del 

Okay, TK has assured me that he doesn't mind me continuing this thread. I've signed up with the Blondepoker card room and will only be playing on this for the time being, I am one of the biggest rakers on cryptologic so this should generate a few quid for BP in the short term.

We are off to Dublin this weekend. A few people have asked me what the score is with who buys-in/gets what etc. Basically, I have allocated a pool of money for Chubbs, Aces, Nick and me to promote DTD around the poker circuit before DTD opens. The total cost of our tour is about £160,000 inc buy-ins and expenses. If we make a loss between the 4 of us, I stand it. If we make a profit, it gets split on the basis of who has won most prize money. So far, we have won £27,000, and spent £26,000, so no great bonuses here! This will be the first time we wear the DTD merchandise, Adam from www.shuffleupshirts.com has done these for us, and he's bring the stuff round today.

Here's a few things that have happened with DTD since I last posted:

1.  We have offered Ben Mayhew (sundaypm on BP) a job to work for Chubbs on the DTD Poker Tour. This is 12 main events from around Sept 2007 - August 2007 and we will be taking a group of DTD players with us (hopefully 15+ players each trip). These will be all 7 EPTS, WPT Paris, WPT 5 Diamonds, WPT Final Bellagio, The WSOP, Amsterdamn Masterclassics. His job will be to look after the players, a bit like Jonathan Rabb does for Blue Square, and Rory for Betfair.

2. We expect our Gaming Licence hearing to be in July, and the club to open December 1st 2006. Our lawyers are 90% confident we will get through.

3. DTD will initially open Thursdays, Fridays, Saturday and Sundays, until we can recruit enough high quality staff and train them. We will hold 8 tournements per week (each night will have a small (£25-50 freezouts) and a larger (£100-£250) freezout. We will do no re-buy events. We will have 42 tournaments tables, 15 cash & STT tables, and 10 tables in a separate area for Day 2 of main events.

4. DTD will hold 4 festivals in 2007. Every single event will be sponsered by DTD's online card room and will have ADDED PRIZE MONEY. We will have no third party sponsership and keep everything "in house".

5. DTD will only host third party tournaments if their sponsor agrees to add a % of money (not decided yet) to the prize pool. This elimates the possibility of hosting some of the moest presigious tournamants, but we have to remember why we set DTD up and stick to our values.

6. DTD's online poker room has been delayed for the time being. There is no rush in getting tied into someone, we don't open till December 1st, so better to take our time. We have a very strong bargaining position and should make sure we get the best deal for the players in terms of £ and quality of software, there is a balance, or course.

7. DTD will try and tie up a some sort of deal before we open with Blondepoker to use their forum, a bit like 425 do, and look at ways we can work together for the benefit of both sets of members. We need a place where we can debate DTD and get contructive comments (dont bother positing IFM....lol).

8. The DTD web site will be ready by the end of May 2006. You will be able to join the club online from this site. Hopefully we will have a link from Blondepoker to our site.

9. The refurbishment of the DTD Club has been delayed due to the fact we need further approval to build additional floor on top of the methane site which the building is based on. This additional floor would huse the VIP Suite, TV Studio, Corporate Lounge and Day 2 Tournamant area. there is not a problem, it can be done, we just need to go through a bit of red tape. From a design point of view, this Club will be amazing, and hopefully not empty when it opens!

10. The club will operate a cashless system. Each members cash balance will be registered on their card, so they can buy into comps, play cash games, eat and drink by just usung this card. You will of couse be able to reserve your seat for a comp online, but not part with the cash until you arrive.


This is a few snippets of what is happening. I'm gonna post about the live club rather than details about the DTD online card room until TK gives me a green light to talk about both.

Hopefully see some of you in Dublin, I made 2 finals in Luton and made a loss, had to give 50% of one to Nick, and did a deal with Bad Girl for 50% of another when I busted her and felt bad. Nevermind, maybe I'll make a few quid on the Blondepoker card room, anyone fancies a game of heads-up PM me.

Cheers Rob

wow!
its all sounding very impressive. - I dont think you'll have problems getting the people in when it opens Rob.

i hope blonde members r getting vip passes :)up

You say no re buy tourneys at all, will that include sattelites?
I assume you will do sats for the dtd tour?
I have to admit to prefering re buy sats to freezeouts because of the number of seats generated.

Laying everything out like this, with actual dates for things, has given DTD an aura of tangibility which will really get people drooling. I've been reading the diary of a card club, the opening of which has always seemed to me to be 'in the future'. Everything was 'early days', 'hope to be', 'if all goes well' etc.

Now, suddenly, it's the diary of a card club which I can almost sense is round the corner - everything just got a bit nearer in time. The hazy mist is clearing and, by jiminy, there's an actual card club there.

This feature is the most interesting for me.


With this scheme, DTD immediately positions itself as a whole different experience - it truly is the future of live poker in this country. One question I do have though - how will tipping of staff be handled if players don't have cash on them? Slipping a waitress a quid for a cup of coffee seems more elegant than a cashless card in this instance.

Answers

1. Super satelittes may be re-buys, but they will not be part of the standand 8 tournaments a week. The DTD Tour will be managed by Chubbs, with Ben as his assistant. All player will wear DTD merchandise and travel with us, their buy-ins, flights and hotels will all by arranged by DTD. The system for getting on the tour will be made public soon but it will be linked to the online site.

2. I wish I could afford to give VIP passes to everyone, but alas................

3. We will be having a global system for tipping, yet to be finalised. I want card room staff to receive a % of this and we have to get it authorised by the gaming board. However, we will be enough paying wages to all staff so they do not depend on tips for a living.


Cheers Rob

You are not ready.... ;goodvevil;

The cashless system intrigues me as well.

I have serious reservations about how good it will, these come from my use of the mondex (which is essentially cash stored on a card) system they had at nottingham uni. Everyone found it far more convienient to use cash even though the mondex machines (to reload the card) were on site and the cash machines were 5 minutes walk away - and these are notoriously lazy students we're talking about! The whole thing was eventually scrapped...

Maybe the systems have improved now, I wouldn't know I haven't looked.

The other thing would be the prizemoney. I think it feels far more satisfying to be paid in cash then to have the amount added to your balance. Part of the buzz that makes live play better than online. Maybe that's just me though?

Whatever happens though it's great that this thread has restarted and we can see updates. The tournament schedule sounds great to me and I can't wait to play!

I've used a cashless system on a cruise ship before and I thought it was tremendous - you don't feel like you're spending real money so you're a bit quicker to spend it, which can only be good for DTD.

As for the prize money, a big concern of internet players who have not played live is 'will I be mugged the second I walk out the door if I win' - having any winnings squirted back onto a Switch card will solve that.

 ;iagree; rotflmfao rotflmfao

sounds safer than cash to me. - like the sound of it.

1. You will be able to get your winnings paid in cash OR put in on your card

2. Main reason for cashless is security and ease of use. Whatever teething problems we have will get sorted as club develops, but we won't be scrapping the concept, just improving it if things go wrong.

3. It will be a new way to operate, the Gaming Board really like the idea (ease of audit), and when people get used to it, they will as well, I believe.

PS. Flushy, you even lost in front of your girlfriend, Ginger, and I had to buy her into the comp that night cause you were skint. If I were you I would keep stum after that night. How could you gamble her tournamant buy-in V me at heads-up?

I much prefer cash.........I hate the idea of all my money being traceable........ ;D

Me too... I don't want the wife to know where it's all gone!!   ::)

i dont mind how i get my money i just want some

I wont sent your wife or anyone a statement, I promise, and you can take cash out at cashiers anytime, just use card for spending in club, thats all. Promise no audit trails will be made public if you are/are not doing your brains!

you got a stutter rob?

Thats an odd statement from someone called Trace...

I couldn't think of another one....... :blonde:

HEY!!!, i haven't posted a negative comment since lent started!
Good luck, looking good (just hope i'm allowed in)

PMSL

The Irish Open was the best event in Europe that I have been to and we have learnt a lot from it for DTD. I loved the way that Paddy Power added money to all of the festival events and to play in an arena with 35 full tables was fantastic. The atmosphere was great and I made sure I told the organisers what a good tournamenet they had put on.

We also managed to make some really good contacts for DTD and I was stunned that everyone in Dublin seemed to know about DTD. On the very first hand of the main event, the dealer turned to me and said "can I have your email, I'd like to come and work at your club"...........I had never even seen him before.

After seeing what Paddy Power have done here I know we can do the same in the UK and get the largest fields in Europe BUT we must be able to add to prize pools for EVERY event in on our 4 festivals (I missed this cost out in the original budget aswell!).

So many people have offered to help and support me with DTD on this trip. Poker can be quite a selfish world, at the end of the day we are all trying to win each others money, but overall we have a great community spirit and we once we are knocked out we all support whose left, whether it be Jonny Texas, Mick Jones, Mickey Wernick, Jo Greche, Rumit, Stuart Nash, Ian Woodley, Paul King, Kev O'Conner.......or even Stephen Pearce(???????!!!!!!!!).

Nick and Chubbs didn't speak to me for 4 hours after my exit from the comp and everyone was "breaking my balls" in the bar on how badly I played after I was the chip leader with 24 people left. One guy I had never even met before had bet 300 euros on me at 125-1, I offered to give him the money back but he refused.

I found it a bit strange (but nice) that a lot of people (many who I have never spoken to or met) were rooting for me over here in Dublin. That was the worst thing for me about me being knocked out, I had at least 50 people come to me afterwards and say they had wanted me to win...........weird. The only explaination for this can be the DTD project..........not my poker skills!

I need to fly to Las Vegas now from Manchester, I have a DTD related meeting scheduled on Thursday in Vegas which is very important for our club. There is no way I'm playing the Bellagio $25,000 WPT after the disaster in Dublin, I can't face seeing a pack of cards at the moment, I'll railbird and support DC when I'm out there. I'm also going to drive to LA and visit The Bike, LA Commerce and Hollywods Park, 3 of the most famous poker rooms in the world. Trumper, Nick and Chubbs are going to fly out Thursday and come with me so we can get some ideas for DTD. Actually, one of them will have to drive, as I got banned for 6 months last week for speeding.

Anyway, on a positive note, a well worthwhile trip. What Paddy Power and the Merrion have done here is the benchmark for DTD Festivals. Aces Trumper has responsibility to ensure we deliver this in the DTD club, it's a great challenge for him, we were speaking with the Operations Director of Paddy Poker last night, and I was amazed how much work goes into staging a festival.

Cheers Rob


 

when will you have a website up and running  rob? looking forward to coming down from glasgow when the club opens

rob will your staff be able to play in tournaments?
also when will you be recruting?

yeah, Id be interested to know that too. part time dealing, part time playing sounds good.

i was thinking along those lines Adam.maybe not dealing though for me.bar superviser or customer relations maybe

Rob you need anyone to clean the toilets? I have my own brush and Marigolds.

Answers:

1. The Gaming Board have told me that any person who holds a licence cannot play poker in the club. The "licenced" people in the club will be the Complaince Officer (white licence), Card Room Managers (Grey Licence), Final table Dealers (Red Licence). Technically this means that dealers who do not deal the final table in comps will be allowed to play, but this does not mean we will alllow it, as clearly may not look good, we'll have to see.

2. In terms of starting recruiting, I am doing that now. However, we are looking for top notch experienced dealers in the first instance that can deal all types of games, full or part time. We need to have a strong foundation before we take on less experienced "non professional" dealers.

3. In terms of numbers - 35 dealers, 25 hospitaility staff (bar, restaurant etc).


4. Of course we will need someone to help Chubbs clean out the toilets.

Our web site will be up in 4-6 weeks and people will be able to apply for jobs through that by sending a short CV.


PS. I know I said that I was not going to play the $25k WPT at the Bellagio after my Dublin self-destruction, I changed my mind, I've bought in and play on Wednesday. Biggest buy-in I have ever played in and 50,000 starting chips, should be an experience. The reason I have totally changed my mind is that I can now play Wednesday, which means I won't be mega jetlagged as I arrive in Vegas 11.55am Tuesday...................no that's a big lie...........I just can't resist such a fantastic tournament and I promissed myself I would play this year after I read all the updates on last years event.....sick person PLUS surely the law of averages says I'm due a WIN.

Good luck in Biggy Rob - a win in this one would put a smile on the bank managers face.

Good luck Rob!

I have to say i would rather the dealers didnt play.....

Yes, so would I. It's not just enough for the club to be fair, but it must be seen to be fair. I've seen at places before that, if there is any sort of dispute when a dealer is playing, some players can quickly fall into 'they're all cheating' mode and accusations fly.

:goodpost: ;iagree;

IMO the main problem about dealers playing in normal tournaments is that they will have been in a privileged position to have gleaned a wealth of knowledge about the other players without ever buying in a tournament and not giving other players the opportunity to experience their style of play.

I seem to remember Rob mentioning earlier on in this thread about holding a tournament specifically for dealers, not just from DTD but dealers from any casino. Whether other casinos would have to agree to this I am not sure but I think this would be a great idea..... :)up

I think holding "dealer only" comps is my preferred option aswell, we'll have to see what Gaming Board say about it.

Arrived in Vegas 11.50am today, got the VIP treatment from the Bellagio, Limosine at the aiport, my Host waiting for me at hotel entrance, fantastic suite overlooking strip...................but it's all false - they only want to get even for the battering I gave them on Blackjack a few months ago.

Getting the red carpet treatment in Vegas is great, you get everything compted, ring side tickets for the best shows, VIP passes to all the restaurants and big smiles from everyone...........but I always feel like a little fluffy sheep, lost in a dark forest full of packs of wolves (the wolves being my "personal host", "the pit bosses watching me play blackjack" and the "waitresses giving me unlimited free booze and fags at the tables"). We all exist together for the duration of the Vegas stay, but we never actually be totally honest about eachothers motives, which are basically:

- I am trying to get through the trip on a total freeroll, staying in the best room, eating their food, using their facilities WHILE not losing at their blackjack tables

- They want me to lose more than it costs them to keep me in this luxury (and make sure I am not counting cards at Blackjack, which is all but impossible on a 6 deck and 10 sets of eyes on you).

It's a little game that I have playing for the last 10 years when visiting Las Vegas, and I've managed to keep my head above water. I can't remember the last trip I went home losing to "them".....................but no need to temp fate.

Anyway, I managed to get hold of the Poker TD, Jack Mclellen, and part with my $25,500 for the buy-in to the big one. I don't really know him but without prompting he said "Okay Rob, you're in on Wednesday.you got yer buy-in?". These guys are so good, they never forget a name or a face, its their job, and they always make you feel so welcome.

I was wandering aimlesly and jetlagged around the Bellagio poker room trying to find Lawrence Gosney, when someone tugged my arm, it was El Blondie. His table looked a tough one, but he had 80k. He pointed towards a cash game 25-50 NL which he had been battering over last couple of days..........I appreciated the tip at the time, as NL cash is my stongest game (yes - a lot better than my tournament play before anyone sniggers). I sat down with 20k and the following 4 hands sent me to the felt in 45 minutes:

Hand 1: 4 way pot, I call a raise on button with 6h 6c. Flop Ks 6s 2d, every checks, I bet $1000, UTG guy moves all-in for $5000, I call hoping (he has 22) and he hits his spade flush on river with 8s 9s in his hand ($6k down).

Hand 2: I limp UTG with  Ad  Ahrt. 2 callers and button raises to $300. I RR to $1200 but noone ever belives me - he smooth calls - heads-up pot. Flop Jc 5d 2s - lovely (if he has JJ - good luck to him). I put a $1400 weak bet representing a missed AK and he moves all-in for $4000. I call, and he has Ks Js, river  Jh ..........damn ($11k down).

Hand 3: I raise on button with Qh Th, BB calls. Flop 3h 5h Td (what a flop!), he checks, I bet $400, he RR to $1200, I move him all-in for his last $3k. He dwells and then calls with Kh 9h, flush comes but he wins with K flush (15k down).

Hand 4: I raise Ad Qh in cut-off, BB calls, Flop Ac Qd 2s, I bet 500, he smooth calls, turn 7s, he bets 800, I move all-in, he has 2c 2h ...........- could have avoided that one really, its an obvious set and a stupid all-in by me.

So, an excellent start in Vegas.......................... but I don't mind (much) really losing at NL cash, as I know that in the long term things even themselves out in cash games and I played these hands a big too aggressively cause I was tired from the plane journey.

I'd really love to do well tomorrow in the big one, especially as I let myself down so badly in Dublin. I haven't played at the Bellagio since my nightmare at the 2004 WPT 5 Diamonds when I had over triple average chips on the bubble and decided to move in against the chip leader on a  Ac Aspades 5h board (I had with no A...............but he had). For the 2005 5 Diamonds I came over to Vegas, but could not bring myself to play again as memories were still too clear. Anyway, I have written a list of things to do tomorrow to make sure I get through Day 1, and I'll read them at each break. I've been a real waste of space at tournament poker so far in my poker career, and it bugs me a lot more than I let on, it must bug my girlfriend Louise even more, as she gets all the bad beat and poker stories at 5am in the morning.

I'll try and post some updates on the Bellagio BP thread at the breaks, and put on any interesting hands and famous players I see. Will be nice to write a bit about poker, although the $25k buy-in seems a bit steep..................well I guess its nearer $45k now for me, after my "friend", DC, forced me to play in that damn cash game....

Cheers Rob

Not much to say apart from "Ouch!"
Now go get em Rob, GL.

A good read yet again Rob, if all else fails you could always write abook.

Best of luck with the Blackjack and of course the Poker.  Do well
today ready for the DTD railbird team to cheer you on to the cash.

Regards

M  

Good Luck Too EM, dont let the cash game get you down as you know you'll get it back in the cash game. Just focus in the comp today
 No Pressure
Chubbs

Hi Rob .nice to see this is back on didnt bother looking when you said you were stopping.I hope its all going well with D t D.    N L holdem and bad form a terrible combination, but they say its always darkest before the dawn.A pun in there somwhere.  LOL 8)

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http://www.blondepoker.com/index.php?q=node/1009 (http://www.blondepoker.com/index.php?q=node/1009)

Still on American time after getting back from Vegas yesterday. Been away for 10 days and I'm shattered. It was worth it though, we managed to get a lot done:

1. We met in Vegas with 2 software providers to discuss the online room for DTD. It's a 3 year committment taking on an online partner, and as I've said before, very tricky and murky waters. What has been encouraging is the interest among the software providers, who normally try and force you to deal with one of their cages. We have managed to negotiate deals direct with the software and banking providers (ie. be a "cage" ourselves) rather than be forced down the "skin" route. This is the only way that we will be able to return enough value to our players, retain control and be competitive. It's a long and trying process, with much small print, and I see it running on into the summer and beyond. It would be nice to launch our online side before the club opens, as our rewards scheme is linked to live poker in the club, buts it equally important not to get "bent over" on the software deal.

2. Me, Aces, Chubbs and Nick did a tour of all the card rooms in Vegas after I was knocked out of the Bellagio main event. In my opinion, the Venetion have a fantastic card room, its classy, loads of space, friendly staff and they have gone that little bit further with the small touches to make playing poker there as comfortable as possible. Next time I go to Vegas, I think I'll stay there, I liked it the best.

3. On Saturday. we hired a car and did the 300 mile drive to Los Angeles. We got lost and it ended up a 6 hour journey, mainly due to Trumpers navigation skills. We eventually arrived at the LA Commerce and booked into the Crown Plaza hotel which is next door. What a place, 120 tables, nearly every one full. They have recently added 30 extra tables to cope with demand, and it is busy 24-7.

4. We also visited the Bycycle Casino in LA, just 10 minutes from the La Commerce. They use a computer system which I am very interested in, and the Card Room Manager gave us a in depth demostration in how it works. I actually preferred the layout of the Bycyvle Casino, and it felt slightly more relaxed than the Commerce. These places really treat the poker player WELL. We took plenty of photos to remind us so we don't forget anything obvious in the DTD club.

5. A very worthwhile, but very tiring trip. The highlight of the trip for me was when we stopped for directions in downtown LA, Aces shouted over for directions from a few "gangster types" standing on the street corner (we just slid down our seats), they ingored him, but their dog came over, sniffed him, and narrowly missed his crown jewels with its teeth.....pity

6. Back at the Bellagio, there was no real time to play any poker or blackjack (I did manage a $5k profit "hit and run" session), as we had organised to meet as many people as possible. One was Mike Sexton from the WPT, who was very enthusiatic about DTD and the possibility of a UK leg of the WPT. Having Aces with us is very handy because everyone knows him and he very well respected in the game.......people seem willing to talk openly with us about future possibilites, although a WPT event in Nottingham seems a long long way away!

7. I was surprised about how quick news travels accross the water when I was in Dublin, but many of the american players I spoke to in Vegas also knew about our club. Whether we can ever be high enough profile for them to visit without paying "appearance fes etc" is another story, but it is nice that people are interested in what we are doing. I gave my card out to a few of the big names, you never know.....................

So, overall, a very good trip for DTD, but with flights, hotels, a 45 minute cash game session and my entry fee for the Bellagio, I arrived back on UK soil about $65,000 worse off and only $12 left in my pocket. My cashflow had taken a serious hit in the last 18 months and the money under the sofa is running out......................

When I got finally got home at 12pm yesterday I was just ready to get a good days sleep when Pete called me and said he needed to see me at 1pm. Then I got a call from my gaming solicitor saying that I had to meet him at 3pm to sign some forms that needed to go out by registered post that day. Then Rebecca called, my Finance Director, and said she need to see me aswell that afternnoon..........................what a life.

PS. Snoopy , I noticed you have moved this thread to www.blondepoker.com/index page, should I be still putting it here?


Cheers Rob

JOBS AT DTD

I am getting quite a few enquires abut job opportunites at DTD through Blondepoker and direct emails. We will be recruiting about 80 staff in total before we open. In about 4-8 weeks we will be putting a full vacancy listing on our web site (when it finally gets done!) and you will be able to email your CV / details through the site. its not clear yet.........but the sort of jobs we will be looking for will be:

LIVE CLUB
Card Room Supervisors
Card Room Dealer
Card Room Cashiers
Card Room Valets
Receptionists
Security
Bar & Restuarant Manager
VIP Suite Manager
Bar Assistants
Chefs
Kitchen Assistants
Waitresses
Cleaners
Administrators
+ other jobs that come up!

ONLINE SITE
Affiliate Managers
Internet Administrator
+ other jobs that come up!

In the meantime, if you want to register your interest, email me at ryong@dtdpoker.com. I'm sot sure on pay rates yet, but they wil be good as we want to recruit and keep the best people.

Cheers Rob

what jobs on the list prevent people from playing in the club?

legally only people holding a uk gaming certificate, which would be final table dealers and card room managers. However, it is still under review whether DTD employees will be allowed to play in club, assume they will not to be on the side of caution.

 :( too big a price too pay

The whole scale of this thing is really impressive, when this thread first started i pictured in my mind a pub sized building with card tables.
It's almost like every step of the process has added a chunk onto the overall "object", like bacteria multiplying, the closer to opening the bigger and clearer it has become.
I really like the way you are trying to get everything in place at once rather than open the club, then a site, then some sponsored events, then look to attract bigger comps etc.
Your enthusiasm really shines through Rob, good stuff and good to see you logging the progress once more.

Rob,

I'd just like to say this has been a facinating read and I'm genuinely excited about the club coming to Nottingham (as are many others I know). Best of luck with your final preparations!

PS - You'll serve Vodka Redbull won't you?  ;D

Looks like the trip was worth if for the PR alone. Even if they can't spell your name Rob.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/poker/columns/story?columnist=rosenbloom_steve&id=2421035
(search for Trumper or just scroll about 3/4 of the way down)

Good work Aces!

And good work Ron :D :D :D

Nice publicity

There was another nice article that was printed about Rob, But he is to Modest to put it on blonde, I will try and get hold of it and post it for you guys.
Chubbs

yeah good luck RON ? i take it RON is rob's brother?

Rob also got a mention from JohnnyBax - "A few of the other players were strong as well. Phil Ivey’s showing up didn’t make the outlook any easier, but he was busted quickly by a tricky Robert Yong."  Must have been nice busting Phil Ivey!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

A possible UK leg of the WPT at DTD, interesting.

However, it is amusing to imagine how the WPT will handle the bringing out of the prize money when it gets to heads-up.

Courtney friel enters stage followed by some WPT dancers dressed as Robin hood's merry men, they then proceed to "steal" the prize money of some poor actor dressed as the sheriff of Nottingham and present it to the players.

God bless the colonials.

After rooming with Aces and listening to him 24/7 for a week its good to see all his hard work networkin the Us circuit and get some press on ESPN.

The man can Talk.

Well done mate.

Yep Nice Work "ACES" , I dont know who can talk more Aces or Ariston, believe me there is not much in it, plus these Too are very Good pals I think we should lock them in a room.  LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Chubbs

come on chunky what did the room ever do wrong too you?

If you locked us in a room you better make sure we got a deck and some chips. Simon for me deserves anything he gets for being the first European to put so much effort into publicing poker and I read everything he wrote over a number of years- he was one of the only players giving secrets of the game away and way before anybody had ever heard of Mr Negreanu. One of the highlights of last year was playing on the same table as him in a huge event and I played some of my best poker against him (unfortunately some of my worst against others on the table)- I think partly because I had read so much of his stuff I had an advantage. I think I definately have him on the talking stakes though (side bets accepted).

We had a meeting yesterday with our structural engineer regarding the proposed layout of the club. It looks like we are going to have some problems with some of the layout due to the methane site that the building is built on, apparently if we break the methane seal we will blow the East Midlands region up, so we will have to make some more adjustments to our plan. This is more frustration as we have already spent a lot of time working on this, but that's life, nothing easy is worth doing I guess. It shouldn't actually halt our progress in achieving a December opening date, but it means more costs and time on the layout plan, and yet again more generation of paperwork to the various governement bodies.

I am waiting for another written offer from an internet software provider today, we met them in Vegas and they have given us a verbal offer. Our internet room is definaley delayed and I still have not made a firm decision who to go with. Its a lot more hassle setting up a deal direct rather that just doing a skin with a cage, but I'm getting used to wading through thick mud on this project. everytime I can see some light at the end of the tunnel, the lights go out!

Me, Aces, Chubbs and Nick are planning on playing the Blackpool main even this weekend. Its one of my favourite tournamants of the Uk calender, although my results there leave much to be desired. I hope Grovesner will let me continue to play their festivals when DTD opens, I really enjoy them and theres plenty of bantor. The DTD Poker Tour is into a loss now, despite me cashing in Dublin, lets hope Aces can get his first cash for DTD in Blackpool...........

Nick is getting really stressed out about the refurbishment of DTD, as he's got a number of other property projects running over the next 12 months in Nottingham, Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham and London, so we'll be heavily reliant Redgates Contracting who are the same company that did the Broadway Casino in Birmingham. We have also retained the same designer as the Broadway usel, "Bob", whose a nice but slightly eccetric chap. These boys are not the cheapest, but we know what they are capable of. Although DTD will be going for a "vegas" theme, rather than the contemporary style of the Broadway, I think using these boys is a safer bet.

I never realised how much of my time this project would take up, maybe I am too hands-on and want everything perfect, but I really struggle to work any other way. I'm in Birmingham today to work through the DTD accounting procedures with Rebecca, my Finance Director. Although we've only spent £200k so far, my accounting records are pretty scrappy, and the Inland Revenue will be on DTD's case because its owned by me. In the last 4 years, I have had 2 personal tax investigations, 4 vat inspections, and 3 PAYE investigations. I have no doubt that DTD will be interrogated by the the tax office, so we need to get the financial records right from the start. Don't get me wrong, I believe in paying tax, not avoiding it, but I seem to get a disproportionate amount of attention  form the government, they never find anything irregular, but seem hell bent of making my life difficult, or maybe I'm just paranoid.

Expense, expense, expense, DTD is burning all of my cash resources. When I first had this "club concept" at the start of my diary, the costs were under control and within my c"omfort zone". Now, everything is going over budget and for a qualified accountant, I have shown zero financial dispipline. I'm still not sure what the final DTD project cost will be, but believe me, it is going to really really hurt my financial situation. I guess in some sick way I need it to be like this, to get that adreneline rush that taking risks give you.


Never mind, tomorrow is another day,

Cheers Rob

Look forward to the DTD tour rolling into Blackpool.

Can someone bring Mr ACES into the club in plenty of time for the start. It's 6pm by the way on Saturday, so if you can get him in by then it would be much appreciated, especially after last time. Darned Gaming Board Guidelines and all that.

 :D :D :D

Yogi

Remind us Yogi. (Like we don't already know.....). :D

Dusk Till Dawn Ltd and Matrix Properties are now fully set up on the sf group accounting system and all of the costs to date have been logged in the right catorgories. I feel a sense of relief handing over control of the finances to Rebecca, I know she will control the purse strings and question any expenditure. She has worked with me for 9 years and I have total confidence in her when it comes to managing the finances and dealing with the accountants and lawyers. I don't sign any cheques or invoices for any of my businesses, she has authority to do everything which frees me up. She manages an accounts department of 15 people and one of the accoutants, Pete Jenkins (an internet poker player actually), is going to be soley dedicated to DTD accounting, which will be quite complex due to the amount of transactions and the online rewards scheme.

I finally managed to finish the content for our web site yesterday and emailed it to Pete, its taken me 2 weeks. Its hard to write content for something that has not even opened yet, but we need our web site up and running as soon as possible so we can generate members for the July Magistrates hearing for the Gaming Licence. People will be able to join the club online through the site and this will allow up to prove demand to the magistrates court. I spoke to Andy, my lawyer, yesterday, he has really positive feedback from the Gaming Board but I do not want to leave anything to chance, I want to show them that there is SUBSTANCIAL demand for this club in the UK, so the sooner I can get the web site up, the better.

I was watching Poker 425 last night and I noticed that Aces  had the DTD clothing on in Oxford Cup, where he finished 2nd, it gave me a funny feeling to see the logo which I has been the bane of my life actually on TV. TK gave him some good pr and also mentioned DTD on the program which was nice. I couldn't help thinking how relaxed TK looks nowadays in front of the cameras, he must be the most famous guy in UK poker if you polled the average man in the street, Louise's (my suffering girlfriend) Dad is one of his fan club and watches every episode of 425 as do many other people I know. They say to me, "do you know Tikay, have you ever played poker with the great one, do you get nervous when you are on his table", my answer of course is, "yes, yes and yes". Maybe we should get TK to cut the ribbon on DTD's opening night, I think he may be slightly more cheaper that Helmuth, I'm serious.

Its funny how this DTD thing seems to have taken over much of my life, when I started the idea, I thought it would be a hobby, something to give my life some balance after 2 years of dossing roung the world playing poker. Being honest, I think I actually first made my mind up to do it when I arrived 1 minute late for a comp at Notts Gala and was turned away, in the car on the way home I was moaning to Nick and he jokingly said "why don't we open our own poker room". The irony of this is that I probabably won't be able to play poker in DTD due to Gaming Board restrictions........what a plonker. However, this doesn't really bother me now, I've found it interesting doing all the reading up on the law, recruiting people into the operation, negotiating with the online rooms and mapping out the strategy, its sort of given me some purpose again as well as caused me a lot of headaches. Before DTD started I had been seriously thinking about going to university to re-educate myself and study for a degree, but I guess that student life will have to go on the back burner for now.

Right, gotta get a shower and do a quick workout, Pete is coming round to review the web site and Adam is bringing more DTD clothing round later, I gotta speak to my accountants about the online business, watch some TV with my sister, watch Louise playing online poker, discuss the online contract at 3pm on conference call, visit Nick at Maho Road (his apartment project) and something else I can't quite put my finger on.....have something to eat.


Cheers Rob

Great post Rob!

The club really seems to be turning into something tangible now.

blwng u the east midlands is that suh a bad idea? ;D


keep up the good work rob theres thousands out there waiting for this club

Got back from Blackpool at about 8pm last night, me and Nick decided to try and win back the Blackpool £4k deficit and played the Stars and Party comps but had no success, I then logged into Louise's Littlewoods account and played 1 hand of cash (got KK v AA) and lost £1k. I also walked into AA 3 times in the main event at Blackpool, I had raised with live cards everytime though, but my 65, 62, 74 did not hold up. I had planned to give tournament poker a rest until the WSOP but Chubbs decided to buy me in to the Barcelona Heads-Up (well, not exactly buy me-in, sort of "enter me", and then I owe him the 2,500 euros).

Loads of people were buzzing about DTD in Blackpool. They speak about it like its already open, although when the same plonker asked me "when is the club open?" that asked me 4 weeks ago in Luton, I had to grit my teeth and say, "its a big job you know.............". It's nice that so many people are looking forward to it, I think some players feel like in some small way they are part of it, a bit like members of Blondepoker do with the BP forum. Imagine if Nottingham Magistrates turn us down for the licence on July 27th, how will I ever be able to show my face at any poker event ANYWHERE!

Anway, I'm on a new regime today, here's my list of jobs:

1. Finally sign a contract with an online poker room for DTD after soooooooo much faffing about its unreal
2. Arrange for Nick to be do on a course for Microsoft Project to help him manage the refit project of the DTD Club
3. Pay 1 years gym membership up front to comitt myself to getting mentally and physically fitter
4. Do a job spec for Sarah, my new PA, who I have not spoke to for 6 weeks since I initially offered her the job
5. Do a complete final list of fixtures and fittings for the Club at the DTD meeting (we have 1 every 3pm Monday)
6. Do all little crappy admin jobs outstanding (eg. fax over passport to lawyers)
7. Try and set up a meeting with TK to discuss DTD/BP
8. Sort out my Gambling  Log* TOP PRIORITY

*I used to be pretty meticulous about keeping gambling records. Since DTD started though, I have had to retire from Blackack and Sports Betting, you need time practice your card counting for Blackjack (I have a computer program called Wilson Software which trains any mug to win at Blackjack) and to bet on football, you really have to study 2-3 hours per day to have any edge. I enjoyed doing that stuff, but without the time, I would just be a guarenteed big loser, so I stopped.

However, now my poker has now gone completely to pot since I stopped recording wins/losses. I have always been a loser at live tournament poker (and not really taken it seriously to be honest) and also dealers choice cash games, but a winner a NL online and NL live games.............however  recently I know I have been doing my brains on all types of poker. At the end of February, I was over £100k up for 2006, mainly from online NL cash, but I stopped updating my gambling log when DTD got too busy and Blackjack and Sport betting came to an end. I estimate that I have lost since February:

1. £15k on the DTD Tour (thats buy-ins + expenses for 4 people though, so not too bad)
2. £40k online NL cash (including the "nowab" factor)
3. £15k live NL cash (after vegas disaster)
4. £25k on Bellagio main event + misc expenses

Thats about £100k in last 3 months, so I've done at least all my profit in since I stopped keeping records, and this doesn't include the £200 I lost to that fish, Ariston at heads-up in Walsall. If this losing streak continues, I'll be £500k in the hole by the end of 2006, so I got to get some discipline back, or the DTD Tour will be playing £30 freezouts (although this may suit Ace's current form, 1st at Blonde Bash 1, and 2nd in Oxford Cup!).

I've never really cared much for money, its always been a "currency of risk" for me...........its for investing, gambling, spending on friends and family, or giving to charitable causes. I never had any money when I was younger, so as long as my loved ones are okay, I'm happy to risk the whole lot, as long as I believe the upside is 0.1% more likely than a downside............but these recent losses at poker are really xxxxing me off, its just reckless and bad money management, I could have put that £100k in my charity and done some good with it (or bought all the poker tables for the club!).

When I sit down and write this diary I never know what I am going to type and god knows what impression it gives. When the club opens I'll probably read the whole thing and think what a dickhead, but writing it is sort of "theroputic", sure I've spelt that wrong.

Cheers Rob "turning over a new leaf today" Yong

Keep up the great work Rob !!....compelling reading.

Rob, great reading, totalliy compelling stuff!!

(Are you sure you were not an author in a recent life?)

Great read, you really do manage to convey atmosphere and feeling in your posts rob, great stuff.

Lot of big bills coming up i imagine and 100k is a big chunk, those poker pros should pull their fingers out and win a biggie.

Rob,

I am sure the DTD poker room will be a great success and all the hard graft will pay dividends.

All the best.

"The Nowab factor"- absolute class lol

No need to keep saying all the best and gl etc as you've heard it all a million times so I will try a different approach- pull your bloody finger out, its taking to long ;)

PMSL

Rob, surely you can forgive Tikay, he is getting on a bit you know.

 ;goodvevil;

:goodpost: rotflmfao rotflmfao

To save Tikay the bother..... :redcard:

Re Rob's item # 7 - "set up meet with tikay"......

Rob & I chatted briefly today, but I was doing 3 or 4 other thngs at the time, so we did not talk for long. But I shall be viewing the DtD premies in the next week, & discussing stuff with Rob.

Rob & I had a meet in Luton a month or more back, & thrashed out an an Interim Agreement between DtD & blonde - I will Post details of it later today.

carry on as normal, m8

The one on the main site is for those who wish to read all your entries uninterrupted. Also, it should allow for easier naviagtion of the thread. Just an alternative.

Just getting up-to-date now.

This diary has now been updated and can be found in uninterrupted form on the blondepoker site:

"Dusk Till Dawn" Poker Club In Nottingham (http://www.blondepoker.com/index.php?q=node/1009)

Hasnt Nowab been retired to Stud yet? :)

Dubai, you've put me on the spot there, but I have to be honest to keep my credibility within the poker community, so here it is, it hurts me to reveal this as I would never want anyone to take the mickey out of my good friend Chubbs (no 2 in the world at heads-up) .......but ..............we put £25K in each for a £50k bankroll to play the 10-20 NL on Cryptologic, he tilted off £12k, most of it to Roland De Wolfe, so I paid him his full £25k back to get out of the deal, a bit like a "golden handsake". He'll really get the ump for me posting this but if he does, rest assured, I will post a copy of the email I received at 6am that morning, IF HE MAKES ONE SINGLE COMMENT ON THE MATTER (it is currently framed in my office remind me never to do it again).

he cant even play NLHE yet how is is supposed to learn stud?

Chubbs v Roland in a whos got the biggest competition- was always gonna end in tears. Would love to see some of the hand histories rob pleeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaassssseeeeeeee

Well Chuibbs, you gpnna allow yourself to be bullied by the Yongsta?

Listen we all know who wears the trousers there Tikay. Chubbs dare not go against anything Rob says as he is robs bitch- you will be waiting a long time for chubbs to bite on this one ;)

(ps that comment is for the one you tried to set me up with last week matey)

He just isn't ready yet....

I had a legal meeting yesterday afternoon at Frankie and Benny's, oppoisite the Club. Present was Andy, my licencing lawyer, 2 policeman and Nick. Andy is highly experienced in casino licencing, thats why I went to him, and thats why he's so god damn expensive. I asked Andy the direct question;

Me: "what happens if I get turned down for my Gaming Licence on 27th July, you do realise that there is no going back    now, I just can't get out with all the money I have invested and the commitments I have made?".

Andy : "I just can't see you not getting it. The Gaming Board are 99.9%, and I can't think of any reason why the magistrates would turn you down. In the event of being turned down, we will appeal to Crown Court, but I just can't see this happening".

Normally Lawyers are sceptical, but Andy seems so certain about this on the basis that the government need a test case for Poker Clubs, a "precedent", jumping through all the right hoops to get this legal process through. The 2 policeman were there as part of the liquor and gaming auditing process. I felt the meeting went well, although the police will be imposing some security conditions on the Club such as cameras and doorman.

I have finally signed the online poker contract direct with the room, not through a cage. They have asked us to keep stum until they annouce it to the stock market as they are a public listed company. In my wisdom I have decided to go with the online company that has the most expensive deposit, set up fee, support fee and % commision on the rake. One of the elements to my decision is that they have agreed to sponsor a monthly freezout at the DTD Club, they will guarentee the prize pool at 200 x the buy-in. This means that if we do a £500 Freezout (the monthly comps will vary from £250-£750), they will guarentee the prize pool at 100k. There are a number of other initiatives with the live club, and overall, I just felt they really understood the importance of the link between live and online play for DTD. As soon as it gets announced, I'll paste a copy on this thread.

I have a huge amount of admin to do all of a sudden. My inbox has 23 emails requesting documentation so I need to complete all of these today to make sure processes are not slowed down. I know that I could have probably delegated a lot of this legal/admin work, but I can't afford any mistakes in the set-up stages, I don't even trust the accountants and lawyers to always get stuff right, based on previous experience,  so I double check everything.

I'm not control freak, once the foundations are in securely, I have no problem with leaving people alone to do their jobs as long as they are hitting he targets, but there are so many donkeys around advising you who have a long list of qualifications but are about as useful as Chubbs on the 10-20 NL. We are setting up the first licenced poker club in the UK, its never been done before, so we are all playing UTG without looking at our hole cards.

That thread on "Nottingham Gala" yesterday really xxxxed me off, especially the unnecessary vidictive comments about DC. I know the guy who posted it pretty well, I always found him to be a really decent chap and have played on the same 8table with him and had a few drinks and laughs at the bar, can't understand why he would post something like that, I was shocked, and he also have a dig at me and DTD. Saying that TK was posting negatively about Notts Gala to get people to go to DTD, what planet is he on, DTD is not even open and is a totally different concept to Gala, we will both exist side by side appealing to different sectors of the poker community.

I'm used to people having a pop at me in general life, but that was a pretty disgusting post and left a bad taste in my mouth. I've had so many good times at Notts Gala, the only reason why I don't go anymore is because Nightfly is now an employee of mine, and I feel that going there would be a bit disrespectful to Gala. I miss all the bantor there, my last longer bets with Ash, Ali "bad of bollxxxx" playing 83 like it is AA........

Anyway, on a more positive note, I whipped Nick at squash last night..he's not ready

Cheers Rob

good skills the yongsta,
keep it up

Good stuff, just noticed your signature, was that the hand you busted on?

I made 2 calls with KJ costing me 300k in chips with 17 people left at the Irish Open in Dublin, when I was chip leader. I was trying to justify it to Mickey Wernick when we were having a smoke ouside, and he just said "Rob, would there have been a better situation for you to put all of your chips in".....meaning......."Rob, you are a turkey but this is a nice way of putting it".

I think you should give chubbs the same advice after his paly at Blackpool, I promise not to get him a large JD again :D

its getting there! -
good luck with all thats left to do.

Me and Nick nipped over the Walsall £300 Freezout on Saturday night. On the downside it started late and did not reach 100 runners, I think this was due to the £300 freezeout that was being held at the Luton Grovesner the same day. The UK poker calender is getting so congested, there was also a £50 freezout at the Broadway that apparently only got 12 runners. On the upside I thought the structure at Walsall was excellent and staff were as usual, very efficient and frirendly. So much poker available in the UK now, even Grovesner are clashing events and fighting for players internally.

Quite a few players were laughing at the Broadway's 12 runners, I think there is some rivalry here. I found myself wondering if anyone will be laughing at me and the DTD Club one day, if we only get small fields, but then I remembered that I could just ban anyone who takes the XXXX and I felt better.

Off to Barcelona on Friday. It was not in my original plans for 2006, but I'm self justifying this trip on the basis that I need to go to  Gibralter and Tenerife anyway, which I intend to do when I finish playing the heads-up in Barcelona. The beauty of the internet is that wherever you are in the world, you can continue working and catching up on things, we coped without it before..and mobile phones........god knows how.

I've been getting plently of practice for the heads-up on the Blondepoker site, I like the NL heads-up formats there, although the turbo formats are a waste of time. Since I started playing on the BP I have not won a bean on the cash games, in fact, I'm 4k down, but I've won a bit on the heads-up and I think I'll stick to them from now on. Poker software is a really funny thing, I hated the tribecca software when I first switched to Blondepoker from Littlewoods, but I find it really easy to use now.

Pete has just arrived at my house with the latest version of our web site to show me. Its tedious work, trying to get even the most basic of things right, but I'm very finicky about stuff like that, and keep changing the goal posts. Our first version which will be launched in next 2 weeks is very basic (just so we can collate members for The Gaming Board) but we will continue to develop the site up until the club opens. I've spoken to Kevin O'Connell's son, Adam, about doing some work on the site content in the future and he's sent me a few ideas. He's studying journalism at Uni and seems a nice lad. As always, I like to try and use people that I know, or know people I know, even if they are not the most experienced (or have no experience!).

The DTD crew is ever growing, even with no club or online room open yet. If we don't get the gaming licence I'll be handing quite a few P45's out sharpish! We have Pete (IT), Darren (General Manager), Chubbs (Online), SundayPM(Chubbs assistant),  Aces (Poker Host), Nightfly (Card Room Manager 1), Mr X (Card Room Manager 2), Mr Y (White Licence Complaince Officer) plus me and Nick.

In the long term, me and Nick will have no operational hands-on responsibility for DTD, as we both have our "day jobs", but at the moment its all hands to the pump. I never realised in a million years the amount of crap there is to do setting up a venture like this and I take my hat off to The Gutshot and all of the other independant casino/card room operations in the UK. Would I have done it If I had known how much red tape was involved?

Okay, time to get some work done this week, I was well on top of things last week, an example of supreme organisation, now I'm back in chaos again, with 23 emails and 13 phone messages to respond to.

Cheers Rob

Gl in barcelona mate. If you need any practice with the heads up games I don't mind giving you a few games- I think you may be ready now  :D

Great stuff Rob,

 I dont know how you find all the time !!!!!.

 DTD sounds like Dog's , cant wait to visit , and i dont even where Nottingham is !!!!!!!.

 Best of luck with your licence.

 cupcake.

As always mate, a fascinating read. Good luck in barcelona and fill us in when you can! cheers, matt. 8)

Any odds up yet for the heads up?

I fancy sticking a few quid on Rob to take this one down.

Had 2 meetings yesterday with lawyers and accountants in Birmingham. Being banned from driving is becoming a real pain, I had to get taxis to and from Birmingham, the train service is really crap on this route, taking 1.75 hours.

While I was in Birmingham I popped over to the Jonny Texas 3k euro TV tournament, Aces was playinl. It was situated at the Mailbox complex in Birmingham City Centre. There were quite a few familiar faces there, players and spectators, including Michael Grecco, Malclom Harwood, Ash "Cushions" and of course John Hewston himself. I was really impressed at the set-up there, all the right equipment, plenty of support staff, and a lovely canal location in one of Birminghams most presigous locations.

Before the poker started I had a drink with Jon Hewston, that guy can really talk....he's one of those "larger than life" charactors. He gave me a guided tour of the studio and seemed very proud of what he is creating, his enthusiasm hits you straight in the face . His mobile was going off every 5 seconds, literally, that guy is really working his backside off and you can't underestimate the work that must have been put in by him and Craig Wildman to get this show on the road.

I've got heaps of crap to sort out before Barcelona, my office looks like a bomb has hit it. On a positive note my new apple 30" screen has arrived which allows you to play 9 online games side by side. I've seen a mate of mine, Dave Clayton, play 9 tables and its a challenge to learn how to do it. He's one of the top internet players in the UK and watching him play 9 NL 6 handed games at the same time is pure poetry. I can play 4 maximum........and still get timed out.

On an even more positive note, I couldn't sleep last night when I got home so logged onto crypto to test my new apple screen. I couldn't resist a quick bit of heads-up and took down a £10k pot on the 1st hand with K8 v 88, flop KK8.......say no more, all the money went it and I'M FREEROLLING IN BARCEONA!

Cheers Rob

read again, your eyes are playing tricks on you.......

I count four, Or is it a trick question?

Good post Rob, I thought info on the Jonny Texas 3k euro TV tournament was meant to be top secret ;)

Good luck in Barca.

Those apple 30" monitors are loveerly.....


Jason

Hope you win the heads up in Barcelona mate then you will be ready  :D

"info on the Event" is not secret, just the results.

And if you re-read Rob's Post, you will note he has not given any results......  ;)

PS - Thanks for the "nod" Tractor, phew!

Hi Rob,

If you ever need a promotional video, or any filmwork of any sort, I'd be glad to help for the variable cost of equipment/material expenses. I'm in my second year at Uni studying Film and TV Production.

Mark

I'm very well prepared for Barcelona - we leave tomorrow, have no transport to the airport, I'm yet to pack, have no euros and still have a shxx load of paperwork on my desk. However, my heads-up game is rocking after some practice on the Blondpoker site and I reeled off 6 heads-up wins on the trot tonight. I've also found out that Chubbs gave me some mis-information about the draw and schedule to get me to go. Nick's coming aswell with for a few days, he changed his mind at the last minute when he saw that there were other comps on as well as the heads-up, which I don't think he's playing.

The online card room that DTD has signed up with made the whole deal conditional on getting the Gaming Licence on the 27th July, which was a nice little bit of small print in the contract. I guess I don't blame them, without the licence DTD is a few t-shirts, a diary and a half finished web site, and they have really broken their mould by going with a start-up venture like us, rather that their normal traditional large sportsbook clients.

Aces is snowed under with requests for interviews about DTD from the online and live press, but I've asked him to hold fire until we get the thumbs up from the magistrated court in July. We gonna look a bit stupid broadcasting this venture as the "first licenced poker only club in the UK" if we don't get past the final hurdle. Its not that I am not confident, to put our situation in poker terms, I would say we are holding AA or a 236 flop, and my opponent has A4...........but we all know there are 4 5's still left in the deck, and even runner runner 4 is a possibility. Playing poker teaches you that the virtually impossible can happen, and normally happens at the most crucial moment.

Everyone seems to want to get into the poker business. Every day there is a new magazine, a new site and a new venue to play live. Most of the casinos have plans to re-open their card rooms and you can watch poker round the clock on TV. Will it last........I think it actually will, for a simple few reasons:

1. Poker is addictive
2. Some players will go broke and out of the game for a while, but they'll come back
3. As more and more people start playing and encourage their friends to play
4. It doesn't really matter how old you are to play
5. You can play no matter what the weather is
6. Poker can suit all bankrolls
7. Everyone has a lottery dream of "landing the big one" to change their lives

.............however the above logical and rational reasons for opening a great big poker club in the UK and spending loads of dosh on it are yet to convince my Finance Director and Bank Manager.........I say, "you know it makes sense" (Delboy)

Time 4 bed. Cheers Rob

Might see you out there Rob, i still cant decide if i should go or not.

Stay at home Flushy ... you aint ready :)

you aint wrong.

I love festivals there though!

I first met chubbs at the WHU last year, great fun.