OCEAN CASINO IN ATLANTIC CITY STAYS INSIDE FOR NEW GM: BILL CALLAHAN
By Pete Carry
Atlantic City’s Ocean Casino Resort got a new general manager yesterday:
Bill Callahan, its interim CEO became permanent.
He was promoted to the newly created position of general manager, the top executive spot at the casino, which is the successor to one of Atlantic City’s most spectacular failures, the former Revel.
But Ocean, which opened in 2018, is one of only two casinos in the nine-casino Atlantic City market to have increased its in-person gambling revenue since 2019, before the coronavirus pandemic hit.
While pleased with that success, Callahan has his sights set higher.
“Our ultimate goal in the next few years is to become the No. 1 casino in the market,” he told The Associated Press on Monday. “This property is still in its infancy; there’s so much more that it can grow.”
That would entail leapfrogging competitors including Hard Rock, Tropicana and the perennial market leader, Borgata, where Callahan formerly worked before joining Ocean in July 2020 as senior vice president of hospitality. He was promoted to executive vice president of hospitality and gaming in July 2021.
In November 2021 he was named interim CEO after New Jersey regulators approved a deal to sell half of the Ocean casino to the Ilitch family, which owns professional sports teams, a nationwide pizza chain and a casino in Detroit.
