The Millennium, the cylindrical hotel with the restaurant that spins, will end its run early next year when the owner closes the last of its 780 rooms.
Once the largest hotel in ºüÀêÊÓƵ, the 28-story Millennium Hotel is going out with a whimper. All but 164 of its rooms already are out of service and the workforce is down to about 80 people.
Rumors of the closure circulated Wednesday before the owner, Millennium Hotels and Resorts, confirmed Thursday that Jan. 22 would be the Millennium’s last day in business.
“The hotel has served the ºüÀêÊÓƵ community well for many years,†Robert Rivers, the owner’s regional general manager, said in a statement. “However, we have concluded that the hotel, in its current state, does not meet our standards and has not kept pace with guest demands.â€
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The Millennium’s owner will maintain the building’s water and electric utility connections and discuss with city officials what might be done with the structure, said Maggie Crane, spokeswoman for Mayor Francis Slay.
Rivers said in his statement that he and other Millennium officials “are evaluating our options.†He added that company officials “are committed to working with the hotel community in ºüÀêÊÓƵ to re-establish employment for our staff.â€
The Millennium, at 200 South Fourth Street, is part of Millennium Hotels and Resorts. Based in Greenwood Village, Colo., it is the 14-hotel North American arm of Millennium & Copthorne Hotels, of London.
Recent online reviews of the Millennium are mixed. Several reviewers on praised the hotel’s helpful staff and its location near downtown ºüÀêÊÓƵ attractions. Others complained that the hotel is outdated. A review posted in September called the Millennium “an absolute disaster.”
“First off this place has no wireless Internet in the rooms,†wrote the reviewer, adding that “the rooms are disgusting, the carpet was sticky.â€
Gary Andreas, a hotel industry consultant in ºüÀêÊÓƵ, said a sensible plan would be to convert the Millennium’s south tower to residences and provide the taller, main tower a much-needed renovation as a hotel.
Longtime ºüÀêÊÓƵans might remember the Millennium as Stouffer’s Riverfront, opened in 1969. Additions to the original tower produced the city’s largest hotel. The building later carried the Clarion and Regal Riverfront names before the hotel began flying the Millennium flag more than a decade ago. For a time, the hotel’s 10-story south tower operated as a Sheraton Four Points.
A $5 million remodeling in the early 1980s resulted in a larger lobby, a multilevel bar, skylights and renovation of the top-floor revolving restaurant.
Brian Hall, marketing director of the ºüÀêÊÓƵ Convention & Visitors Commission, said Thursday that the Millennium needed a “re-imagining†that would attract new investment.
“No doubt it’s a landmark building and has played a role in the past,†he said.
Overall, the downtown hotel market is improving, said Hall, providing figures showing rising room occupancy and average daily room rates. Through October, the overall occupancy rate this year was 68.1 percent — with an average rate of $122.29 — compared with 55.1 percent and $109.65 in 2009, according to Smith Travel Research. The CVC is working to help find new locations for conferences and business meetings that had booked space at the Millennium.
Among the relocated meetings is the conference of the Missouri Association of School Librarians, which has moved its 2014 meeting in April to Union Station.
Jill Hancock, an association staffer, said Thursday that the group needed as many as 400 rooms and decided in June to move its meeting after learning of delays in what Millennium officials had said were plans to renovate the hotel’s south tower.