Holiday Inn Downtown plans major renovations
digg it!
Facebook
del.icio.us
Seed Newsvine
Fark It
Reddit
By RICHARD PIERSOL / Lincoln Journal Star
It takes a lot of attention to detail and money to keep up in the commercial competition for backs on beds.
Joining the two other downtown Lincoln hotels that have just finished multimillion dollar facelifts, the Holiday Inn Downtown is starting a substantial remodeling.
Holiday Inn Downtown’s general manager, Joel Schossow, has a ream of paper on his lap, half his life in the lodging industry and a head full of of details about things like wall vinyl, plasma TVs and bathroom fixtures.
The hotel’s owner, one of New Orleans real estate and banking investor Joseph Canizaro’s suite of companies, is getting the money from Tierone Bank to fix up the only hotel, the last of six, Canizaro hasn’t sold.
Starting with replacement of the exterior windows now, by the end of 2008, they expect to have spent about $4.5 million fixing up the 230-room hotel, which employs about 100 people. It took about $6 million to build the place, which at 32 is the oldest among the three high-rise hotels downtown.
Schossow ran through lists of things to be done.
“It’s all necessary to stay competitive,” said Schossow, a Grand Island native who’s been in Lincoln for 18 months working for a management company, Northwest Hositality Group, separate from the ownership.
Embassy Suites spent about $2.7 million in 2005 and 2006 on its new beds and remodeled atrium at 10th and P Streets. The Cornhusker Marriott’s owners said they were spending about $7 million in 2005 to replace almost everything in the guest rooms but the phones, and to remodel the convention area.
Schossow is highly complimentary toward his competition and the looks of their places.
“We kind of put ourselves in the realm of being the affordable alternative to the Embassy Suites and the Cornhusker, but still a full-service downtown hotel,” Schossow said.
There are a lot of new lodging rooms in town in the past few years and the hospitality industry is in its third year of recovery from the hard times that followed the terror attacks of 2001.
The industry started to turn around in 2004, then 2005, and now it’s at the top of a cycle in a very cyclical business.
On the coasts, or at any large destination city, hoteliers took “an absolute beating” after 9/11, Schossow said, and as in most things, the smaller Midwestern markets weren’t so vulnerable.
Schossow described the local lodging market now as “maybe a little bit saturated.”
Revenue at the Holiday Inn Downtown was up last year, he said. The owners described its occupancy rate last year at 62 percent in documents filed with its recent property tax protest, and said competition was difficult because of the hotel’s age.
Occupancy this summer was about 74 percent, according to Schossow.
“That’s pretty good,” he said.
Mark Jeansonne, senior vice president and general counsel for Canizaro’s company, said they’ve decided Lincoln is a good place to put their money.
“It nets a good return for us,” Jeansonne said. “Frankly, we’re business guys. “
Lincoln has been pretty good to this business, in some ways, and not so much in others.
The Holiday Inn Downtown gets a lot of government and university-related business, Schossow said, and competes for business travelers.
Cornhusker football weekends are sellouts. Schossow is particularly happy about how youth sports tournaments are adding guests to his property, He credits the Lincoln Convention and Visitors Bureau for doing “a tremendous job” cultivating that business.
A few years back, the downtown hotels stood as one in criticism of the bureau’s performance. That’s improved, he said.
But Schossow was clearly unhappy about the the three-week USA Roller Sports summer events moving to Omaha next year. They’ve been in Lincoln about 20 times in the past 40 years, more than any other city, according to city officials.
Schossow saw the events’ going to Omaha as a loss of more than 1,500 room-nights at his hotel, $100,000 in revenue.
“The loss of that event has strained relations between the downtown hotels and the CVB,” Schossow said. “As a community, we are all responsible for that loss, not just the CVB, but they’re the ones that have to carry the torch. With that group, they did not.
“I hate to judge the CVB on one event, but it is the largest event. It’s a $7 million impact on the city and we lost them.
“It’s not so bad if it goes to Pensacola or Fresno, but when it goes 50 miles up the road, it hurts,” Schossow said
Tom Lorenz, general manager of the Pershing Center in Lincoln, denied that Lincoln “lost” the roller skating event for 2007.
“Omaha bought it out,” Lorenz said, by bidding more money to get it.
The event’s site for 2008 has not been selected. The bureau has bid on getting the event back for that year and 2010.
Roller skating aside, Holiday Inn Downtown has refocused strategically.
“This hotel hasn’t had a ton of stability,” Schossow said. Now, it does, he said.
“I’d say we’ll be concentrating in the corporate market,” Schossow said. “That’s where we see our biggest opportunity.”
Reach Richard Piersol at 473-7241 or dpiersol@journalstar.com.
What’s to be done
Remodeling the Holiday Inn Downtown, between now and the end of 2008, includes this work:
Replacing exterior windows, 3rd to 16th floor.
Remodel lobby, three sets of public restrooms.
Grand ballroom, ceiling to floor and lights.
All corridors, new carpet, lighting, wall vinyl, new window treatments.
Restaurant, new carpet, reupholster chairs, barstools, booths, new art.
Banquet rooms, new lighting.
New air handler.
Guest room corridors, furniture.
Elevators: mechanical systems, recovered walls and ceilings.
Guest rooms: all bathrooms gutted, replaced with marble tub “surrounds” and new granite vanities, chrome fixtures, new floor tile and art.
Guest rooms: all new bed sets, 60 percent of rooms will have new stands, headboards and armoire, 40 percent were done in 2004.
Guest rooms: all new refrigerator and microwave, (only 50 rooms are equipped now.)
Guest rooms, new lighting and 32-inch flat-screen plasma TVs.
Pool: All new furniture, painting, wall and ceiling work, deck.
Fitness center: all new equipment.
New carpet and paint in all public spaces.
Rooms under Americans for Disability Act: 10 total, three with roll-in shows. Four ADA rooms now.
Kitchen: upgraded.
2008: Carpet, bedspreads and drapes in all guest rooms.
Post Your Comment
Standards and RulesYour posted comment will appear after it has been approved.
Frequently asked questions about story commenting.