The owners of Saks Fifth Avenue are abandoning their flashy proposal to build a casino atop their flagship Midtown department store, becoming the first serious contender to drop out of the competitive race for a downstate gambling destination.
People involved in the casino process said they have heard little in recent months from the Hudson’s Bay Company, which owns Saks Fifth Avenue. In response to an inquiry from Crain’s, a company spokeswoman confirmed Thursday that its bid was dead.
“At this time, the company is no longer pursuing a downstate New York gaming license and is focused on other strategic priorities,” spokeswoman Erin Celentano said. Their dropout leaves 10 known contenders for the maximum three licenses that the state will award at the end of this year.
The move is a likely acknowledgement of the steep odds Hudson’s Bay would have faced. The local community board has come out against all casinos in its Midtown district, elected officials are skeptical, and Saks’ 10-story building across from St. Patrick’s Cathedral is a city landmark, complicating any effort to renovate it.
The proposal had called for converting the building’s top three floors into an upscale casino spanning about 200,000 square feet. Renderings depicted a swanky, somewhat retro facility, complete with a rooftop terrace.
Hudson’s Bay executives claimed their casino could be up and running within a year, a shorter timeline than all other bids except for the two existing small-scale racetrack casinos — Resorts World in Queens and Empire City in Yonkers — that are considered front-runners for two of the three licenses. But its small size may also have worked against it, since the state will weigh each project’s economic development potential when deciding who gets a license.
Hudson’s Bay had hired lobbyists from the firm Cozen O’Connor to pitch the casino to city and state officials, but terminated that contract in July 2024, records show. Unlike most other applicants, Hudson’s Bay had never announced a partnership with a gambling company to operate the casino.
After a yearslong run-up, casino bidders will finally get to submit applications by June 27. Each project will face binding votes by six-person committees of neighborhood officials, followed by a final decision by a five-person state board before Dec. 1.
Hudson’s Bay is the first casino bidder to drop out of the process since Vornado Realty Trust abandoned its own proposal for the Hotel Pennsylvania site in 2023 — although that proposal showed few signs of ever getting off the ground.
The remaining contenders include four projects in Manhattan, two in Queens, and one each in Brooklyn, the Bronx, Westchester County and Nassau County.
Given the size of the New York City market and novelty of a full-fledged casino, each license is expected to be money-printing — generating as much as $2 billion in annual revenues, per some estimates. But each winning bidder will need to pay a $500 million license fee, spend at least $500 million more in capital investments, and pay annual taxes — which will steer at least $231 million toward the state’s coffers, according to budget projections.
