SIOUX CITY | In May, the building at 707 Fourth St., formerly known as the Sioux City Hotel, reopened under the Howard Johnson franchise.
Property managers Manoj Desai and Sameer Thakkar said they spent about $900,000 modernizing the property and expected total renovation costs to reach about $2 million. The Howard Johnson managers wanted to create an affordable, mid-level hotel.
The local owners signed a franchise agreement with Wyndham Worldwide, which holds the rights to Howard Johnson and several other hotel brands across the U.S. and in several other countries.
Work on the hotel included renovation of the front lobby, new beds, flat-screen TVs, mini-refrigerators and microwave ovens installed in the guest rooms. The indoor pool, which had been closed for some time, reopened after extensive repairs.
Originally opened in 1974 as a Hilton, the 12-story hotel currently connected to the city's Convention Center fell on hard times in recent years. After going through foreclosure, the property was sold late last year for $2 million to a local ownership group with 20 years of hotel and hospitality experience in metro Sioux City.
Howard Johnson's, often referred to as HoJo's, was the largest and one of the most successful hotel chains in the U.S. throughout the 1960s and 1970s, with more than 1,000 combined company-owned and franchised outlets.
The brand, now under the Wyndham umbrella, also includes such national chains as Ramada, Super 8 and Days Inn.
