JQH vets join O'Reilly Hospitality

In the last four months, Springfield-based O’Reilly Hospitality Management LLC has assembled a team of key associates with one thing in common: extensive working histories with John Q. Hammons Hotels & Resorts.

Led in the move by architects Steve Minton and David Horst, six executives hired by O’Reilly Hospitality Management have a combined 100 years of experience at Springfield-based JQH Hotels, the national hotel development and management company founded by industry icon John Q. Hammons.

Former JQH Hotels employees joining Minton and Horst at OHM are Brian Inman, Joe Wadkins, Paul Devlin and Dee Palmer – each with management roles at OHM’s flagship property, the Doubletree Hotel at Glenstone Avenue and Kearney Street.

“Being in the hotel business in Springfield, Missouri, you naturally touch on people who have a history with John Q. Hammons every day,” OHM founder Tim O’Reilly said of the new additions. “I think everybody in the business in Springfield, and a lot of places nationally, have experience, got their start or have a substantial part of their careers spent with Hammons.”

Opening the door
The transitions started with former JQH Hotels executive vice president Scott Tarwater in June.

Tarwater abruptly vacated his post, essentially as Hammons right-hand man, in October 2010 as Hammons became hospitalized and Jacquie Dowdy was named the company’s CEO. Calling the move a retirement, Tarwater declined a severance package with a noncompete clause attached before signing with O’Reilly eight months later.

Since joining the O’Reilly team, Tarwater has been tasked with managing the strategic direction of O’Reilly’s hotel, resort and convention center development, which includes plans for a 250-room Embassy Suites in Denton, Texas. Tarwater pitched JQH Hotels’ plans for a hotel and conference center in Denton in early 2009, before the company pulled out months later due to a lack of financing.

Tarwater also has played an active role in bringing on new members from his former employer, according to those who have joined him.

Key O’Reilly hires Horst and Minton said they left JQH Hotels at the same time as Tarwater, because the seven-member design team was let go as Dowdy took the reins. Similarly, the two said they did not sign noncompete agreements.

Horst, O’Reilly’s director of project development, spent 12 years working with JQH Hotels, and he said the trio worked together on 40 hotel, resort and convention developments.

Minton is now chief architecture and construction officer in charge of OHM design and development. In his 25 years working at JQH Hotels, he was responsible for the coordination and execution of $2.5 billion in hotel, restaurant and convention center development.

“We were responsible for all the new projects with Hammons, and we couldn’t be more excited about bringing that experience here,” Minton said.

As for the other new hires, Inman was named general manager of the Doubletree after 27 years with JQH. He said he received a call from Tarwater about a possible move as he was tailgating prior to a Missouri State University football game.

Wadkins, who worked previously at University Plaza Hotel and Convention Center for 27 years, was named Doubletree’s director of catering. He started on the same day in December as Inman.

Devlin joined Doubletree as a sales manager, bringing more than 20 years of travel and hospitality experience with companies such as JQH Hotels, Great Southern Travel and Devlin Travel Inc. He worked most recently for three years at A Plus Payroll.

OHM also added Palmer as a Doubletree sales manager, after she worked four years managing sales at University Plaza.

JQH Hotels Vice President of Sales and Revenue Management Phill Burgess said the 9,000-employee company can absorb the losses. JQH Hotels posted 2011 revenues of more than $800 million operating 78 hotels.

“Anytime someone is starting up a new company, they want to go to the best folks for talent, and this is our national headquarters,” said Burgess, who is in his third stint at JQH after being recruited by Dowdy in late 2010 after Tarwater, Minton and Horst left the fold. “We’ve got about 500 managers and leaders nationally. So, we have a pretty well-stocked team, if you will.”

Fresh starts
O’Reilly, an attorney who represented clients in the hospitality industry, embarked on an additional career path when purchased the Hawthorn Park Hotel in 2006. He reopened it as Doubletree Hotel in 2008 after a multimillion-dollar renovation.

O’Reilly, the grandson of O’Reilly Automotive (Nasdaq: ORLY) founder Chub O’Reilly, said several of the people he hired early on also worked for Hammons. The first key hire, O’Reilly said, was Brian Sims, the general manager for the Doubletree Hotel when it opened. He previously spent a stint as GM of Hammons’ Courtyard Inn by Marriott and now serves as OHM’s chief operations officer.

OHM now also comprises the Hilton Garden Inn in Springfield, Houlihan’s restaurants in Springfield and Columbia, Baymont Inns and Suites in Branson, the Holiday Inn Tulsa City Center in Tulsa, Okla., and the Yellowstone Valley Lodge in Livingston, Mont. As the company has grown, so has its connections to JQH Hotels.

Michael Sorrell, the current general manager at the Hilton Garden Inn, got his start at the Chateau on the Lake in Branson, a JQH property. Doug Foreman, the Baymont Inns & Suites’ general manager, also worked at the Chateau.

“Mr. Hammons is one of the greatest men in the hospitality industry,” O’Reilly said. “The system he created was one of a kind in terms of the personality of the company and the dedication to guest service and hard work and putting the company before oneself. Obviously, that is appealing to me because the people who have been trained in that system have been trained with the values that would make them successful in our company as well.”

O’Reilly said he is not currently pursuing acquisitions of any Hammons’ owned properties.

Minton and Horst said they are currently working on up to six OHM projects, though no plans are firm.

“You work on a lot and some bubble to the surface and become real and some don’t. That’s how it was at Hammons,” Horst said.

Inman, who has succeeded Sims at Doubletree, said it was no easy decision to leave JQH Hotels.

“Sometimes, you have to look outside the box,” he said. “I was very happy with Hammons. I wouldn’t have stayed that long if I wasn’t.”

When he learned from O’Reilly that the Doubletree would need a new catering director as well, he quickly thought of Wadkins. Later, as sales staff was needed, he reached out to Devlin and Palmer.

O’Reilly said with project developments on the horizon, he’s building a larger, flexible work force.

“This feels like it did when I started working for Hammons in 1991,” said Devlin, the sales manager. “There’s an excitement and an energy here that I think we all feel.”[[In-content Ad]]