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ENTREPRENEURS
REINVENTING A
LONDON GIANT
By Simon Thomas
Simon Thomas is the Executive Chairman
and majority shareholder of Hippodrome
Casino Limited, the extensive leisure and
casino complex in Leicester Square. It is
London’s premier entertainment venue,
employing 850 people and attracting more
than 32,000 customers a week.
hen I 昀椀rst stepped inside the
Hippodrome in London’s
iconic Leicester Square,
I felt two things at once: awe at its
scale, and the cold recognition that if
we got this wrong, it would 昀椀nish me.
W
The building was a sleeping giant, one
of London’s great venues fallen into
neglect: part legend, part liability. I
wanted to wake it up, restore its place
in the capital’s story and prove that a
casino could be something more: both
a complete entertainment experience
and a civic asset.
“It was in a whole lot of a
state, but still magni昀椀cent
under the dust.”
Gambling and entertainment are my
blood. I’m the seventh generation of
a showman family. My forebears ran
fairs and amusement arcades across
the country. My father, Jimmy, was
one of the industry’s true pioneers and
built Beacon Bingo and Showboat,
taking the business from caravan parks
to landmark venues. When we sold
the group in 2006, it wasn’t a retreat:
it was merely a pause before the next
gamble.
We took on the Hippodrome lease in
2009. It wasn’t just in a bit of a state,
Jimmy Thomas (Simon’s father) and Charlie Chaplin
it was in a whole lot of a state, but still
magni昀椀cent under the dust. We poured
£50 million into restoring it. We linked
Cranbourn Mansions – an apartment
block attached to the theatre – to
create new spaces, rebuilt everything
from the plumbing to the plasterwork,
and worked through the bureaucracy
that comes with a Grade II listed
landmark.
I nearly lost the project when the
昀椀nancial crisis hit, and I had to write
directly to Bob Diamond, then head of
Barclays, to save the funding. To his
credit, he listened. That letter kept the
lights on, and I’ve got my wife Fiona
to thank for that: she was listening
to Diamond on the news saying
investment in new business was his
priority and suggested I contact him.
We opened on 13 July 2012. Boris
Johnson, then Mayor of London, cut
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the ribbon. Within a month we were
breaking projections. It felt like a
victory for persistence more than luck.
From day one, my vision was to
build more than a casino. I wanted
a place that represented London at
its best: safe, civilised, social, where
anyone could 昀椀nd their night. The
Hippodrome had always been about
spectacle, from its circus beginnings,
through Houdini to Swan Lake,
Ivor Novello premieres, Dame Julie
Andrews, the legendary Talk of
the Town and Garland’s will-shewon’t-she appearances, to Peter
Stringfellow’s “greatest disco in the
world”.
I wanted to restore that theatrical
heartbeat but also continue the
tradition of delivering something new
to the West End, something bold,
