“You could build five 200-room hotels with this money,” Milani said."
Wow, talk about a shot across the bow! Mo Milani was referencing the $30 Million Dollar renovations currently going on at the Koury Corporation's Sheraton Greensboro Hotel at Four Seasons:
"He walked me and photographer Julie Knight through the ongoing $30 million renovation project at the Sheraton, the largest renovation in the hotel’s history. Milani took us from the 28th-floor suites where dignitaries including George W. Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev stayed — Pilot Mountain is visible in the distance from the 28th floor — down to the updated lobby area and everywhere in between.
With 990 rooms and 250,000 square feet of meeting space, the Sheraton is by far the Triad’s largest hotel; it triples the size of the second-largest 330-room Marriott Hotel, Winston-Salem. So a top-to-bottom renovation isn’t something that Koury Corp. undertakes lightly."
$30 Million Dollars is more than either Kaplan or Carroll were planning to spend to build their entire hotels. Well, more of their own money, that is. They'll spend all the incentive money they can get their hands on.
And you do realize Koury built his dream without incentives, fighting the City of Greensboro and the downtown elites the entire way.
Greensboro hotels average 54% occupancy. Koury's Sheraton with 990 rooms has its own convention center and it's own nightclubs, restaurant and shopping mall to help keep it filled-- do you think Kaplan and Kern's Empire Room can keep the downtown Wyndham filled?
Yeah, me neither. And having made deliveries to both places in preperation for events I can tell you Kaplan and Kern are clueless when it comes to running events. Koury has it together.
