Former Delavan House re-opens as Baymont Inn two year later than planned
By Michael S. Hoey
Correspondent
The former Delavan House Hotel in downtown Delavan, last open in 2004, re-opened for business as a Baymont Inn and Suites on March 21.
“It has been a long time waiting,” Mayor Mel Nieuwenhuis said. “I am thrilled they are finally open.”
Sean Patel, owner of the Delavan Super 8, purchased the hotel from Stonecrest Hospitality in November 2013 and originally announced he would open a new hotel at the site in May 2014. Patel said the rehabilitation of an older building turned out to be a bigger project than he anticipated.
Patel said an older building being re-opened as a new business must meet modern standards and the building presented several unforeseen challenges in bringing it up to state code. For example, Patel said, he discovered after much of the drywall was completed that the building’s electrical system needed to be replaced. He said the new sheetrock had to be ripped out and replaced after the electrical system was brought up to code, and that resulted in an eight-month delay.
Patel said part of the problem with the electrical system was that the previous owners began remodeling the building before deciding to pull out of the project and they did not do it correctly. He also said some of the vendors he hired to do the work did not finish on time.
“Although it took longer than originally thought to open, I believe it was a bigger project than anyone really thought until work actually began to remodel it,” said Alderman Ryan Schroeder, chairman of the Downtown Delavan Project Management Team.
“I’d rather the project take a little longer and get done right than the alternative, which was no one perhaps stepping up to take on this challenge,” he said. “The hotel would have remained unoccupied and perhaps condemned down the road.”
“It was a lot of work to refurbish that building,” Nieuwenhuis said. “They encountered more things than they envisioned.”
Patel said he took on the project as a business opportunity and he said the city and the state helped make the project possible. He said the city worked with him on parking space behind the building, and the state provided a $200,000 grant through the Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. Patel will continue to own and operate the Delavan Super 8. Patel also owns the Microtel Inn in Janesville and a Days Inn in Madison, all under the name Best Hospitality LLC.
“The business owners downtown are very happy we are open,” Patel said. “People will come to the hotel and visit other businesses and shops.”
“It will bring in a lot of people to stay there and to visit other local businesses,” Nieuwenhuis said.
Patel said Baymont, which signed on as the franchise for the new hotel early in the process, has been very nice to work with.
“They patiently waited for us, and they are very happy we are open,” he said.
Front office manager Daiana Niemier said business has been good since the opening.
Patel said all 60 guest rooms are open including king suites with wet bars and standard rooms with two double beds. A continental breakfast is complementary with a night’s stay and the 100 percent smoke-free hotel offers free Wi-Fi. The hotel boasts that it is surrounded by entertainment and is well located for business trips to the Delavan area. The hotel will offer two meetings rooms that are not open yet.
The hotel will also offer a fitness room and its own restaurant and bar called Arcadia Bar and Grill that will serve traditional American food. Patel said he hopes the restaurant and bar are open by mid-April. If that were the case, then they might need an experienced hospitality headhunter or their likes to find the right candidates for working at the restaurant and bar. Two retail spaces are available for other local businesses on the first floor. Patel said he is working on filling those spaces.
“In the last 2 1/2 years we have seen a lot of progress to our historic downtown area with several new businesses opening up and filling what were once open spaces, as well as historic buildings being remodeled to ensure their existence for many more years to come,” Schroeder said.
“The hotel, in my opinion, will only work to build upon and add to that progress,” he said. “We want people to not only visit the downtown, but actually stay for awhile and truly experience what makes Delavan so unique.”
Schroeder said if people stay overnight, they can take the time to visit the downtown stores, see the Walldog murals and learn about Delavan’s history much more than if they just drove through the city and spent an afternoon there.
“Now that the hotel is officially open, I wish the owners a lot of luck and look forward to them being a community partner in continuing the progress we have made,” he said.
