It was standing room only for the announcement that Mike Couch would be the new general manager of Wild Rose Jefferson.
The 43 year-old was born and raised in Pennsylvania and began his career in the gaming industry after an honorable discharge from the United States Air Force. He worked for Boyd Gaming in Peoria, Illinois-where his wife is from-in 1993 as a slot machine technician and worked his way up the career ladder to several technical and supervisory positions. Couch points out that he worked on the technical side while serving in the Air Force and received a degree in business and electronics technology at Illinois Central College.
Then in 2006, he was part of the initial management team for Wild Rose Emmetsburg as casino manager with his most recent job as director of gaming at Gulfstream Park in Hallandale Beach, Florida.
Couch told Raccoon Valley Radio how excited he is to re-join a company he once worked for.
“Well, I’ve worked for Wild Rose Entertainment before and it’s just a really good company and it’s a company that’s on the grow and so I’m taking advantage of this opportunity to be the general manager of their new property in Jefferson and join the team once again.”
He will oversee the construction of the new facility at the northwest corner of the intersection of US Highway 30 and Iowa Highway 4 in Jefferson, putting together the rest of the management team and have all the training done before their anticipated opening date of August 1, 2015.
Couch adds that he also wants to get involved in the community and has plans to eventually move to Iowa and specifically Jefferson in the near future.
He is married with two teenage daughters.