Marriott Corporation

Edit links
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Marriott Corporation
Total assets$9.1 billion (1992)
OwnerMarriott family (25%)
Footnotes / references
[1]

Marriott Corporation was a

Twin Bridges Motor Hotel (demolished 1990).[2]

Marriott Corporation's first international property was opened in

Host Marriott Corporation
in 1993.

History

J. Willard Marriott, who had moved away with his business partner Hugh Colton and his wife Alice from Utah to

Columbia Heights neighborhood of Washington at 14th Street
and Park Road NW.

He would later rename the food stand The Hot Shoppe, adding Mexican food items to the menu.

Baltimore, Maryland, in 1934, shortly after which the company started its food services division. During Second World War, the business expanded to include the management of food services in defense plants and government buildings, such as the U.S. Treasury
.

They introduced popular items such as the

"Mighty Mo"
, a double hamburger served in a bun, topped with sesame seeds and divided into three slices. It was stacked with a dill pickle strip in the top layer and tomato, lettuce, and a distinctive dressing on the bottom layer. Very thick milk shakes were served with a long-handled spoon and an unusually wide straw, both of which would stand upright by themselves in the thick drinks. Similarly thick orange sherbet drinks were served in the same tall glass with a spoon and a straw, often called a "freeze". These would become mainstays of the luncheon menu and be imitated forever thereafter.

Then in the 1950s, Hot Shoppes, Inc. started providing food services to

public schools
and to Children's National Medical Center in 1955, a contract which they held for 35 years.

The company went public in 1953.[4][5][6] In 1957, the firm expanded into the hotel industry by opening the first Marriott hotel (actually a motel), the Twin Bridges Motor Hotel, in Arlington County, Virginia.

In 1964, Hot Shoppes, Inc. was renamed Marriott-Hot Shoppes, Inc.[7] The company became Marriott Corporation in 1967.

In 1967, Marriott acquired the

Big Boy family restaurants chain from Bob Wian.[8][9]

The following year, Marriott acquired the Fort Wayne-based RoBee's, a roast beef sandwich fast-food chain,

Roy Rogers Family Restaurants was formed a few months later by converting RoBee's and a few Hot Shoppe locations.[12][13]

Over the years, Marriott's company interests expanded. Continuing with food services, Marriott eventually became involved with

airline in-flight food service
. This segment of their enterprise continues to be a large part of their business, providing food services to many major airlines.

In 1976, Marriott opened two theme parks called Marriott's Great America in California[14] and Illinois.[15] Another was planned for in Maryland but local opposition prevented construction from ever beginning at any of the three proposed sites. The parks had replicas of the first Hot Shoppes. Both parks were sold in the mid-1980s, the one in California was sold to the city of Santa Clara, California and the one in Illinois was sold to Six Flags in 1984. They are both renamed California's Great America and Six Flags Great America, respectively.[16][17]

In 1982, the company acquired

Sizzler Restaurants International purchased the remaining 17.[21]

By 1984, Marriott had formed a vacation

Marriott Vacation Club International, through the purchase of American Resorts Group for an undisclosed amount[22] and also a senior-living division.[citation needed
]

In 1985, the company purchased the

Imperial Group P.L.C. of London for $314 million[23][24] with plans of converting the acquired restaurants to the Bob's Big Boy brand and to make Bob's the largest coffee-shop business in the country.[25]

In 1987, Marriott sold the Big Boy restaurants franchise rights to

Elias Brothers for an undisclosed amount while keeping 208 company-owned Bob's Big Boy restaurants in California and selected locations on the East Coast.[26]

In 1988, Marriott purchased all 91 Wag's restaurants from Walgreens Corporation,[27] but dissolved the chain in 1991.

The Roy Rogers chain was sold to Hardee's in 1990 for $365 million in cash.[13]

The Marriott Corporation ended its existence as a single company in 1993, when it was split into two separate entities:[28] 1) Marriott International Corporation, which operated the hotel and lodging aspect of the business and Marriott Vacation Club International, and 2) Host Marriott Corporation, the new name for the original Marriott Corporation and operating the Marriott Food Services Management. The last Hot Shoppes restaurant, located in the Marlow Heights Shopping Center, closed on December 2, 1999.[29]

See also

References

  1. New York Times
    .
  2. ^ a b c "The Marriott Timeline". Marriott International.
  3. ^ Feldmeier, Julia (October 8, 2006). "Capital Knowledge: Trivia to Challenge Longtime Locals and Newbies Alike". The Washington Post.
  4. ProQuest 132074273
    . Hot Shoppes, Inc., Washington, D. C., plans to offer its stock to the public for the first time since the curb-service restaurant chain was founded in 1927.
  5. ProQuest 152563052. Archived from the original
    on October 29, 2017. Retrieved October 29, 2017. Hot Shoppes, Inc., family-owned for a quarter of a century, is expected to file a registration statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission this week for the first public offering of shares.
  6. ProQuest 152580613
    . First public offering of Hot Shoppes Inc. common stock was snapped up within two hours yesterday. Some local brokers reported oversubscription by two or three times the amount allotted to them.
  7. ProQuest 142117126
    . Marriott Hot Shoppes, Inc., will be the new corporate name of Hot Shoppes, if shareholders vote approval at the annual meeting on Nov. 10.
  8. ProQuest 133077023
    .
  9. ProQuest 155571592
    . Marriott-Hot Shoppes Inc., is negotiating to acquire Robert C. Wian Enterprises Inc., and its affiliated Big Boy Properties Inc., officials of the two firms announced Wednesday.
  10. ProQuest 143546118
    . The Marriott Corp. has completed the acquisition of the RoBee's fast-food franchise organization based in Fort Wayne...
  11. Washington Post
    .
  12. ^ Marriott, Bill (December 30, 2013). "Tasting Success With Roy Rogers". Marriott on the Move. Marriott International.
  13. ^
    New York Times
    . January 31, 1990.
  14. ProQuest 158085073
    .
  15. ProQuest 171342023
    .
  16. ProQuest 153735173
    . The city of Santa Clara has decided to buy Marriott's Great America amusement park in a $101-million deal to save 138 acres of prime Silicon Valley land from developers...
  17. ProQuest 170742626
    . Bally Manufacturing Corp. completed Friday its previously announced $114.5 million acquisition of Marriott's Great America theme park in Gurnee from Marriott Corp.
  18. New York Times
    . December 4, 1981.
  19. New York Times
    . January 5, 1982.
  20. Washington Post
    .
  21. New York Times
    . May 3, 1983.
  22. ProQuest 138325625
    . Marriott Corp. has acquired the American Resorts Group, a Florida-based developer and operator of vacation time-sharing condominiums, it was announced yesterday. Terms were not disclosed.
  23. ^ Horovitz, Bruce (September 25, 1985). "Marriott and Partner Buy Howard Johnson". Los Angeles Times.
  24. New York Times
    .
  25. Washington Post
    .
  26. Washington Post
    .
  27. New York Times
    . June 30, 1988.
  28. ^ "Marriott to Split Into 2 Firms, Shift Debt Load : Strategy: The hotel management and franchise business will be separated from hotel and retirement properties". Los Angeles Times. October 6, 1992. The two companies, known as Marriott International Inc. and Host Marriott Corp., will be listed separately on the New York Stock Exchange and have their own management teams.
  29. ProQuest 408564853
    . But the last of the Hot Shoppes closed its doors at exactly 1 p.m. yesterday, bringing an end to a chain of restaurants that epitomized the '50s and '60s... Most of the Hot Shoppes closed in the '80s. A few weeks ago, the second to the last closed in Crystal City.

External links
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marriott_Corporation&oldid=1225582690"