Before I first met Reggie a couple of years ago, I had pictured him as a wild-bachelor, champagne-drinking, all-night-party-boy, kind of guy. Now I know this image couldn´t be further from the truth. Reggie Martin is extremely down to earth with a contagious positive energy that just exudes from him. After just a five minute chat with him, I was convinced he should be a motivational speaker! As a keen socialite, Reggie has a job that fits his talents perfectly, working as Senior Manager of Special Events and Sports at the Venetian Macao and liaising with VIPs for one of the biggest casinos in the world. He is also vice-chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce.
So he has come and long way from East Chicago where he grew up in a city next to Gary Indiana – a place that did not offer an easy childhood.
“Gary has been one of the roughest cities in the United States for many years, as far as violence and drugs and gangs,” says Reggie, “It´s hard growing up in a place like East Chicago, you´ve got to be aware of your surroundings and learn to be street smart very quickly. I believe that taught me a lot and made me who I am today. Everything from the streets you have to use in everyday life, like politics for example. You´ve got to know what part of town you´re in, what group of people is running this or that side of town, and what colours you can and can´t wear. There are a lot of gangs with a lot of rules. You´ve got to be aware of the politics from a young age”.
Martin explains that being exposed to violence and even death, made him appreciate life much more.
“I lost a lot of friends back home and that just made me realize how short life is and how important it is to make the most of everything, to make the most of right now and take chances.”
After graduating from East Chicago Central High and leaving Winona State University with a Bachelor in Resort Management, Martin left home and made his way to Turkey.
“I was 23 when I moved to Turkey. I wasn´t scared, I was happy to leave the country, happy to have been given the opportunity,” Martin explains, “It was my first time to leave home and it was also the longest flight I had ever taken, and that I was scared of!” From this first move, he never looked back. Work took Reggie all around the world, working for Club Med Resorts everywhere from the Dominican Republic to Indonesia, the Bahamas, and since 2002, Macau. “It has been exactly ten years since I left Club Med,” he reminisces.
But of all the places anywhere around the world he could have chosen, why chose this small town?
“I guess I was blessed and spoilt working for Club Med, but I was tired of moving every six months. I said ´the next place I go, I´m staying`, and it just happened to be Macau”, tells Martin.
After meeting and talking with John Mills, Vice President of Starwood Hotels and Resorts at the time, he learned about the Westin Resort in Macau and decided to leave Club Med for a new chapter in his life.
“I lost a lot of friends back home and that just made me realize how short life is and how important it is to make the most of everything, to make the most of right now and take chances”
Speaking about his move to China and the culture shock, Martin explains: “Macau was probably one of the easiest moves I´ve made. Compared to Turkey, with their very different language and customs… this was easy”.
Given that he moved here before the casino boom, Martin has witnessed the birth of a new city and the growth of what makes Macau what it is today.
“When I first came here there was nothing, not even the Sands (the first American casino in Macau). To see the evolution is just incredible,” enthuses Martin. “Going from a very slow, modern country to becoming one of the most entertaining cities in the world, right next to Las Vegas, Miami and Hong Kong. It has grown tremendously in the time I´ve been here”.
Macau is definitely expanding but is it an exaggeration to compare it to cities such as Vegas and Hong Kong?
“Macau has an advantage, it´s unique! There is nowhere in the world like Macau. It´s where east meets west, it´s a UNESCO World Heritage site,” Martin points out. How can you beat that?
“As far as entertainment, there is still a bit to go, but we have to start somewhere. To see personalities like Diana Ross and Beyoncé here…says a lot about where Macau is right now and where it´s heading,” comments Martin. “People are starting to know Macau, especially with attractions like Cirque du Soleil, the House of Dancing Water and the Grand Prix. When the NBA and Manchester United came here it was televised around the world, people are definitely starting to notice”. Some have questioned how much more “growing” Macau can really handle and if all this speculated growth will be sustainable in future, or if we are heading towards dangerous waters. Reggie Martin is of the opinion that there is still much more that can be done.
“Macau has another advantage, we have China just around the corner, billions of people with the possibility of just crossing over. There is an enormous Chinese tourism industry backing Macau,” he remarks. “As you can see, we don´t need a lot of space to grow, we just expand vertically. They utilize space well here and maximize it to the limit. In America we take our space for granted”.
In November last year, Reggie Martin´s work and success was recognized when he was awarded the key to the city of East Chicago by Mayor Anthony Copeland.
“It is such a great honour, not many people can say they received the key to their city,” gushes Martin.
The ceremony took place at his old High School and he brought along some of his good friends including CNN news anchor Wolf Blitzer, DJ Skee, a disc jockey and entrepreneur working in Los Angeles, actor Carlos Knight and WNBA basketball star Bridget Pettis.
“I wanted to show the kids what they can achieve too. I brought celebrities, so they could see that people just like them have made something out of themselves,” he explains.
The Reggie Martin Education and Empowerment Foundation is one of his latest projects and his first step towards “giving back to the community”. Martin takes great pride in his foundation.
“It was a dream of mine to brand my name in a positive way. I aimed high so I could do more and give back to my community”.
In part, the foundation focuses on the youth of East Chicago, teaching them the importance of staying in school, graduating, keeping out of trouble, and helping them grow as a whole. Martin´s project to help keep the young off the streets includes buying a few properties and providing them with incentives to “fix them up”.
“In the US you can buy a run-down building for as little as a dollar in auctions. One of my ideas was to purchase a couple of places and get a group of kids to do it up. By teaching them a trade, whether it be painting the walls, fixing a window, doing the plumbing, just by holding them accountable for something important, it will help give them some self pride and will help guide them in the right direction,” he proudly explains.
Martin really wants to teach and guide young people; “I always tell these kids, ´you are here for a short period of time, make the most of it. There are no refunds´”.
The foundation in East Chicago is just the beginning, “In the future I´d like to give back just as much to my community right here in Macau”. Throughout the years a lot of people have inspired Reggie to aim ever higher, but the people who most influenced him weren´t your common celebrities and personalities.
“I look up to people who came from nothing, who are self-made. People like Richard Branson, Steve Wynn, Donald Trump. These are men that made it through hard work,” explains Martin, “In my line of work I´ve been very blessed to have met a lot of influential people that inspired me to better myself. Meeting celebrities is cool, but they come and go. I get more of a high meeting people like the Sheik of Saudi Arabia and Sheldon Adelson, people I can learn from”, he adds. In the coming years Martin hopes to expand his foundation, to give back to the community and maybe even go into politics. “I never thought about politics, but being given the key to the city has put me in a position to do something really special in a few years,” says Martin, “although right now politics is not in my plans”.
Did he ever think he´d come this far?
“Never! From a young age I knew I wanted to do something big, but to be awarded the key to my city, to have had the chance to meet all these wonderful people along the way, to be living in China and working at the biggest casino in the world… if you´d have told me this back then, a kid from East Chicago, Indiana, I wouldn´t have believed it. But I planned and I stayed focused. I kept my belief in God. I made it!”
By the end of our talk I couldn´t help but take with me just that little bit of his feel-good attitude and some of his inspiring words with me, and one of Reggie’s observations particularly stuck in my mind: “If you don´t aim high you stay the same. If you don´t plan and if you don´t dream, if you don´t see it, how can you do it?”
