Closing hotel earns award

By Frank Ruggiero

Appalachian State University literally bought quality.

The Quality Inn Appalachian Conference Center, sold to ASU for $9.8 million and now leased to continue operating, will close in March 2006, when it will then be refitted and renovated into a student dormitory – but it’s going out with a bang.

The hotel, a brand of Choice Hotels International, was presented the Choice Hotels Gold Award, one of the most prestigious awards the company offers.

“We’re obviously very proud of winning the Gold Award, as we want to go out with a bang appropriately,” Quality Inn general manager Susan Curtis said. To win the gold, a hotel must have passing quality assurance scores, and a surprise inspection is conducted on the hotel and a percentage of its rooms. The inspector, Curtis said, looks for cleanliness and maintenance quality among other criteria, and the Quality Inn scored 995 out of 1,000.

“It’s the level of customer service and satisfaction we try to achieve all the time,” she said. “We’re not doing this for ourselves, but to take care of our customers.”

Guests of Choice Hotels receive surveys to rate their stay, “and we far exceed the brand average of a guest enjoying their stay and willing to recommend this hotel to another guest,” Curtis said.

The award was presented in Norfolk, Va., but nobody on behalf of the local Quality Inn could attend – they were busy attending to guests. The “royal treatment” given to guests by dedicated staff, Curtis said, is the reason behind steady repeat business.

“I’m very proud of that award and very proud of our staff for us to win that award, but (maintenance director) Terry Day will tell you that’s an award that’s been in the making for 20 years,” she added.

Day is not only the maintenance director, but the hotel’s resident historian, having worked there since the building was completed on Dec. 2, 1985 as the Sheraton Appalachian.

“We’ve tried for years to get that Gold Award, and it’s very unusual for an old building to get it,” he said. The Sheraton Appalachian opened on Jan. 14, 1986 with only two floors open to guests. The hotel’s restaurant and lounge, Rob’s Restaurant and Chip’s Lounge, boomed with business, Day, recalled, adding both places were named after then-owner Seby Jones’s sons. The Sheraton Appalachian was converted to a Quality Inn in 1989, as Day said Jones thought the Sheraton brand had a reputation for being too expensive. Funnily enough, Day said, the hotel’s rates increased as a Quality Inn and business became busier.

Not able to praise Jones’s character enough, Day told how one year Jones approached him to offer a Christmas bonus. When Day said he’d already received a bonus in his paycheck, Jones handed him a folded wad of cash and said, “This is from me.”

“Seby Jones was probably one of the top 10 richest men in the state, but I could sit down and talk with him just as easily as with everyone,” Day said.

For a 20-year-old building to garner an award, it would have to be well-maintained, and former owner Ashok Patel attests that Day and staff did a superb job in accomplishing this.

“The real key is the dedication from the staff,” Curtis said. “Everybody on staff here will do anything that needs to be done to take care of the customer.”

For instance, Curtis has cleaned rooms when needed, and Day has worked banquets. To Day and Curtis, staff is family.

“We’ve lost people, but we’ve always been able to maintain the core,” Day said. “We’ve not lost the people that really make the difference. We’re just as much family as we are employees.”

“And we’re very happy with how this family’s been getting on,” said Patel, who bought the hotel in 2001 and financed a thorough overhaul, remodeling and renovating both the interior and exterior of the building.

He told how the staff is not only respectful of guests, but each other, following the adage, “You don’t ask anyone to do something you don’t want to do yourself.”

Curtis said guests often return to see certain staff members, such as Peggy Dillard, the breakfast hostess who welcomes guests with a hug and hot cup of coffee.

“We have many customers who just come back here to see Peggy,” Curtis said.

Day told how Mollie Profitt, executive housekeeper “is very instrumental in not only getting the gold, but in our day-to-day operations,” as is Sonya Church, front desk manager.

Curtis said customer service starts at the front desk when the phone rings “because the guest experience starts the minute they phone the hotel. We get lots of repeat business because of the front desk.”

Fortunately, the chance of Day’s “core group” remaining together is likely, as Patel sold the Quality Inn with the intention of opening three other hotels in its stead. The Country Inn & Suites, located on U.S. 421 across from New Market Center, should open in the middle of March 2006, and Patel said all the Quality Inn staff wishing to remain aboard will be transferred temporarily to the new hotel.

After the two others, Sleep Inn and La Quinta, are completed, staff will be transferred to those accordingly. Curtis will manage both, and Day will serve as maintenance director for both, “and we’ll operate the same way,” Curtis said. “We’re going to do our best to keep the team together.”

“The Gold Award will probably be much easier to get in the [Sleep Inn],” Day said. Had the Quality Inn remained open 18 months longer, though, Curtis is confident it could have won the Platinum Award, the highest award from Choice Hotels.

The last night the Quality Inn will host guests will be Feb. 28, 2006. Curtis said the date was chosen in part because the Northwest Area Health Education Center has been holding its conference at the location for 20 years, and its final conference there will be held in February.

“The future is sort of unknown right now, and I think I’ll miss the teamwork and camaraderie, but we’ll get all that back,” Day said, adding he’ll probably drive to the Quality Inn instead of the Country Inn & Suites a few times, just out of habit.

The full-service hotel is a dying breed, Patel said, adding he’s saddened to see Boone lose this quality. Quality will ensue, though, through service, and Curtis hopes to see many familiar faces expecting – and delivering – just that.

As part of her farewell to the Quality Inn, Curtis has posted a Web blog for staff and guests to share their thoughts and memories, which can be reached on the Web at www.spaces.msn.com/members/hotelhappenings00.

• Frank Ruggiero may be contacted at ruggiero@wataugademocrat.com.