Valencia s new concept will be a throwback to the old roadside motel of the 1950s and 1960s; a tribu

Executives at the Houston-based development, ownership and management company are so confident in a hotel recoverythey re planning to introduce a new mini-brand of unique, 150-room roadside hotels they ll build and manage themselves.
Valencia s portfolio student budget airline tickets features three full-service, independent hotels the 212-room Hotel Valencia Santana Row in San Jose, California; the 213-room Hotel Valencia Riverwalk in San Antonio, Texas; and the 244-room Hotel Sorella Citycentre in Houston all of which the company owns and operates.
Valencia recently student budget airline tickets broke ground on Lone Star Court just outside Austin, Texas, which is scheduled to open in early 2013 and will debut a new boutique student budget airline tickets concept the company hopes to spread across the Southeast United States quickly.
It s an entirely new concept. While Lone Star will be specific to Austin, the court concept will be a new brand. They won t all have the Lone Star name, said Roy Kretschmer, VP of operations student budget airline tickets for Valencia. Just as Lone Star picks up the locale, so will hotels we develop near (Louisiana State University) or in Baton Rouge (Louisiana).
Valencia student budget airline tickets s new concept will be a throwback to the old roadside motel of the 1950s and 1960s; a tribute to Americana that will merge nostalgia with 4-star guestroom amenities such as high-thread-count linens, complimentary high-speed Internet and flat-panel student budget airline tickets TVs. The key differentiator will be a focus on social programming of the outdoor space. student budget airline tickets Valencia will set aside a large budget for landscaping and the swimming pool. There will be a truly authentic bar and live music will be featured regularly.
Valencia has identified nearly 20 major university towns and state capitals in the Southeast United States for development spots. The goal is to open about three a year and get up to 15 in five years, Kretschmer said. One key requirement is the markets have plenty of sunshine because the concept will feature several spots to socialize outdoors, including a courtyard, the pool, a pavilion and a fire pit.
They won t be markets that have a huge a corporate infrastructure, but demand will be there for a unique, smaller student budget airline tickets product, Kretschmer said. The first property, Lone Star, will open in Austin s northwest corridor in a mixed-use development student budget airline tickets called The Domain, which will feature restaurants, student budget airline tickets luxury retail and Westin and Aloft hotels.
Kretschmer and the Valencia team knew new-construction financing would be a challenge, but so far they ve been successful working with banks. And, obtaining debt for Lone Star was no challenge at all, Kretschmer said.
Kretschmer said the new roadside concept with between student budget airline tickets 100 and 150 rooms and taking less than two years to build is more efficient than a high-rise and therefore won t require as much equity capital. student budget airline tickets If they were $70-million projects it would be a different story, he said.
We were sitting around a board table having a casual conversation. We were remembering student budget airline tickets when we were kids and taking road trips; back when you didn t need to make a reservation, Kretschmer said. As a kid you didn t care about the amenities, you just wanted to make sure there was a pool. Wherever you went, the architecture changed. The whole design of the place changed.
We re not trying to replicate (the 50s and 60s) in a very plastic kind of way. We didn t want to create a theme or be Disney-esque, Kretschmer said. That s why we wanted control of the design and building process to make sure our concept is derived.
Kretschmer said Valencia student budget airline tickets s President and CEO Doyle Graham Jr., was raised student budget airline tickets in a hotel as his father was in the hotel business back in the days when Waldorf Astoria and other Beverly Hills hotels were popular without being prototypical.
There weren t big-box chains and the hotels weren t designed 1,000 miles away, Kretschmer said. Doyle didn t grow up in that area. Hotels he was accustomed to seeing were independent hotels with the ability to customize your experience.
On the operating side, Kretschmer said the new concept will be managed just as the three full-service hotels in the company s portfolio are. Social media and online-booking channels help level the playing field between independents and brands, he said.
Before 10 years ago, if you weren t plugged into a major chain you were at a disadvantage, he said. Today, in each of our markets we re running at a premium over our (competitive) sets. We re competing with the same usual suspects and we re outperforming them even though we re an independent.
Valencia has built its own internal central reservations systems and each of the new hotels will be plugged in. The company has its own web-booking engine and will take advantage of online-travel agents when necessary, Kretschmer said.
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