For 50-years the New Orleans Marriott has stood proudly against the elements. The big white 42-storey tower will be lit up tonight with a big ‘50’ projecting from its windows facing west celebrating a half-century of hospitality in New Orleans. Tonight the hotel will honor a handful of employees who’ve been with the property since it opened in 1972. Marketing Director Scott Jernstrom talked about them:
“It’s just amazing to see these people 50-years later. They all could’ve retired at this point. But, they reached a point in their lives where coming to work was such a big part of their lives they just wanted to continue working.”
Jernstrom credits the creed of Founder J. Willard Marriott as a factor as the reason these handful of employees have stayed on: “We take care of our associates so that our associates can take care of our customers, so that our customers can keep on coming back.”
Looking back across time, Historian and Publisher Errol LaBorde credits the 1964 Civil Rights Act with inspiring the hotel’s construction:
“Prior to the Civil Rights bill, you never had national chains in New Orleans. All of the hotels were locally owned. And all of a sudden you had the Marriott moving in.”
Even as it opened, the Marriott was controversial as LaBorde explains: “It was on the edge of the French Quarter and it was a high rise; there was nothing that high over the French Quarter.”
Still the Marriott was more than just another hotel. It was a chance taken by the Marriott Hotel Corporation to establish a hotel geared for conventions in New Orleans.
“This was one of their initial, what we call ‘big box hotels’—convention hotels—one of their early projects," Jernstrom says. “It really put them on the map as a hotel company and really got into the group business.”
“Once you got the national chain hotels, they had money and they were essentially to fund the tourist commission (known today as New Orleans and Company),” According to LaBorde. “And once you did that they were doing more promotion to getting tourists in here. Things like the Superdome were financed by hotel tax.”
Through the years, the Marriott’s unique location, on the north side of Canal Street, overlooking the French Quarter worked to the hotel’s advantage, according to LaBorde: “Bringing people into New Orleans, you know they could cross the street and go to the French Quarter restaurants, of all the new hotels, the Marriott was the one that was really closest to the Quarter. It’s right there on the edge, so it did a lot of good for tourism.”
So tonight, the Marriott will honor associates who’ve been with the hotel for 50 years, they’ll also make a significant gift to the Son of a Saint foundation. “It’s an $18,000 contribution that supplies 50-boys with back-to-school supplies, laptops and school uniforms,” Jernstrom says.
Be sure to get over to the Marriott’s 55 Fahrenheit Bar in the Great Room and enjoy signature 50th anniversary cocktails at 1972 prices.
Happy Anniversary New Orleans Marriott, here’s to 50-more-years!