Everyone’s Crying About Primm. You Weren’t Going There.
(RIP Primm, according to people who haven’t stopped there since 2009)
Last week, social media suddenly became deeply emotional about Primm.
“End of an era!”
“Vegas is losing its soul!”
“The Bonnie & Clyde car… the roller coaster… my childhood!”
Cool story Bro!
Where the hell were you people when it was actually open?
Primm NV… That dusty little gambling pit stop 35 miles south of Vegas on the California border, with empty parking lots, flickering signs, and more employees than players most nights, is basically done. Primm Valley Resort, the last operating property, shuts down for good on July 4, 2026. Whiskey Pete’s closed in December 2024. Buffalo Bill’s and the rest have been dying a slow death for years. The Desperado roller coaster that once screamed through the building has been sitting silent for years. The famous Bonnie & Clyde bullet-riddled death car is being pulled out with the rest of it. (no one knows what the car’s fate will be)
And suddenly everyone’s acting like they lost their favorite uncle… one they hadn’t visited in 15 years.
Give me a fucking break.
Primm was built out from the late ’70s through the ’90s as a last-chance (or first-chance) gambling stop for people driving between LA and Vegas. It had cheap rooms, gas, slots, a monorail between properties, and that infamous bullet-riddled Bonnie & Clyde car on display. For a while, it was a legitimate roadside attraction.
Then California tribal casinos got bigger, closer, and better: Yaamava’, Morongo, Pechanga, Fantasy Springs, Soboba. In some ways, they are even hurting travel to Las Vegas, but they certainly sucked up the traffic that used to drive to Primm. The 35-mile pit stop lost its purpose. COVID accelerated the decline. And now it’s over. Californians coming to NV are going to Vegas to be in Vegas; they no longer need to look for a place to gamble. Even for the last 20 years, while I was intermittently working in California for Apple, my crew and I would only stop in Primm to use the restroom and get somewhat cheaper gas.
And let’s be even more honest, for people in Nevada, the lotto store on the California side (also closing in July) was the only reason they were driving there at all. I gotta believe that someone may revive this, but who is going to skip a Stations Casino property like Red Rock, Durango, etc…. To go to Primm?
Not so fun fact.. The 344 employees of Primm are not only losing their jobs, but many are also losing their homes of 20+ years because they lived in workforce housing. The Clark County Commission and the Nevada State Rapid Response team are deploying social services directly to the Desert Oasis apartment complex to help displaced workers find new housing and transition to the Las Vegas valley.
You didn’t lose Primm.
You lost a pit stop you already stopped making.
Primm didn’t die overnight.
It sat there, slowly emptying out… while everyone drove right past it.
Here’s my honest take: Primm doesn’t need to be mourned. It needs to be reinvented to what it actually is.
A pit stop.
I half-ass jokingly, and half-ass serious said, that they should turn the whole damn thing into the most aggressive Buc-ee’s on earth. 100 gas pumps. A liquor store the size of a casino floor. Cold beer, way cheaper than on the Strip, stacked to the ceiling. Clean restrooms. Every snack and drink you could possibly need to stock your Vegas room for the weekend.
Make it a legitimate “last stop before Vegas” again…
Honestly though… I don’t see this happening with Nevada being so dependent on California gas; I just don’t think they want to mess with it. There are some future plans, like pipelines from Utah and Texas to help with this problem. That doesn’t mean someone else couldn’t build a knock-off, though, because I don’t honestly see anything else that would work. So, yes, I’m team bulldoze!
Because right now? It’s just another example of people crying about history disappearing while they did absolutely nothing to support it when it was still breathing.
Same thing happened when The Mirage announced its closing. Same fake outrage. The same people who hadn’t been there in years are suddenly acting devastated.
Stop mourning shit you never supported in the first place, and let’s start replacing what doesn’t work with what does.
The Verdict
Primm isn’t closing because Vegas is dying.
It’s closing because the version of roadside Vegas people claim to miss stopped being profitable, and most of you stopped showing up long before that.
Everyone mourns it now that it’s gone.
Almost nobody actually supported it recently when it was open.
That’s the real story.
-Jason
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