PROGRESS: Dakota Dunes gets a Holiday Inn Express and Convention Center

Tim Rutjes, managing member of both SRK Development, LLC and Slowey Management, LLC, said in an email that business has exceeded expectations at the 92-room hotel, and that the 11,000-square-foot convention center has been especially popular.

SRK is the developer, construction company and owner of the hotel, while its sister company, Slowey Management, operates the hotels.

"Word on how nice the space is has spread quickly around the area, it’s been wonderful!" Rutjes said in an email. 

SRK, based in Yankton, South Dakota, along with Slowey Management, has built three hotels in the past few years, and is currently beginning work on a new hotel outside the Arizona Cardinals football stadium in Glendale, Arizona. Slowey Management has a total of eight hotels in its portfolio. 

Around 25 to 30 people are currently employed at the Dakota Dunes hotel and convention center. 

The hotel boasts a "beautiful outdoor patio environment with an abundance of seating and large fireplace," Rutjes said, while the convention center has state-of-the-art audio-visual equipment, including three 12.5-foot screens, "to accommodate the most technologically demanding events." 

Rutjes also said the firm is seeking "an interested restaurant partner" who would help in further developing the land adjacent to the hotel and conference center, which currently has few neighboring businesses that guests would visit. The developer is currently in the design phase of further development around the hotel. 

SRK put considerable research into the Dakota Dunes area prior to constructing the hotel, and came to the conclusion that the planned community was ideal for a hotel, particularly because of its upscale demographic and because of the site's proximity to Interstate 29. 

“The challenge with South Dakota is there isn’t a big enough population base, but the nice thing with the Dunes is we have access to the entire Siouxland area population base; yet, we are still in that business-friendly environment of South Dakota,” he said last year, while the hotel was under construction. 

The Dunes hotel is the third Holiday Inn Express in the metro area, joining a Sioux City location along Southern Hills Drive and a location in Le Mars, Iowa. A Holiday Inn is also located along Gordon Drive in downtown Sioux City.