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The Ramada Plaza hotel in Minneapolis is being turned into a Marriott Delta location. It will be Minnesota’s first Delta hotel, a high-end brand that was exclusive to Canada until it was acquired by Marriott in 2015.
This will be the fifth time that the eight-story, 248-room hotel at 1330 Industrial Blvd. NE has changed banners since it opened in 1979 as a Hilton.
As part of the latest rebranding, the 161,810-square-foot structure is in the midst of a sweeping, $12 million facelift designed by well-known Minneapolis architect David Shea, said Patrick Durand, a partner in the hotel’s ownership group and the chief financial officer of the operating company, Scalzo Hospitality.
Durand runs both with his brother, Paul, who is the company’s CEO. The two purchased the hotel at the height of the recession.
At the time, it was a tough sell to loan officers and hotel licensors alike. Durand called five different bankers looking for a mortgage, but got a response from only one: Brian Carnes at Maplewood, MN-based Premier Bank, which has done all financing for the hotel since then.
“It was a very rundown property. Over the last nine years we’ve run it as a Ramada [a brand owned by the Parsippany, NJ-based Wyndham Hotel Group] because that was the only one we could get on board at the time,” Durand said on Thursday. “But our ambition was always to renovate it and operate it as upscale hotel.”
This time around, Scalzo got plenty of interest from national hotel brands when it began efforts to reposition the hotel. It is in an enviable location, in the middle of an industrial and office hub just off Interstate 35 and a stone’s throw of one of Minneapolis’ hippest neighborhoods, Northeast.
“All the major brands toured it and all of them had brands that would fit our hotel. They were excited about the direction we’re going with it,” Durand said. “The Delta brand is exactly the right one for properties like ours – a little older, full service.”
In 2016, the company renovated the lobby. It followed up in October 2017 with a new restaurant, the Twin Cites 400 Tavern, tapping Edina-based Parasole Restaurant Holdings to come up with a new menu and train staff.
Now, Scalzo has turned its attentions to the rest of the property and is renovating the rooms, corridors and remaining spaces. It will officially become a Delta hotel in June, Durand said, though work on its meeting spaces will continue into October.
