Heart of America Group CEO Mike Whalen announced expansion plans for the company into East Peoria, IL and Olathe, KS. Both projects will be built and operated by Heart of America Group. East Peoria will be a six-story, 137 room Holiday Inn and Suites with a Thunder Bay restaurant and a meeting space large enough to accommodate 300 people. "After our success with the Holiday Inn and Suites in West Des Moines, we wanted to team up with them again" said Whalen.
In Olathe, KS they will build a six-story, 107 room Hilton Garden Inn with a Johnny's Italian Steakhouse and large meeting space.
Starting with a 100-seat restaurant back in 1978, The Iowa Machine Shed, Heart of America Group has evolved into one of the Midwest's premier design, construction, and management company with a 32 year history of developing award-winning properties. Currently Heart of America Group is located in ten metropolitan areas across six Midwestern states.
The projects will be a catalyst for the City of East Peoria's EP 2010 project, which will revitalize a vast brownfield former manufacturing area into a mixed use "new" downtown.
Olathe, KS was looking for a business class hotel to accommodate the growth of their area as well. The Olathe project will be the second project in Olathe for the HOA Group; the first hotel is a Comfort Suites and Inns built in 1997 and continues to be operated by HOA Group.Both hotels will be LEED certified and create 125 jobs in each market. "The hotels will have a unique look. We do all of our own design work so we can create hotels that aren't like anyone else's" continues Whalen, "Next year will be the biggest expansion year in the history of the company".
Construction on both of the $20 million projects will begin this spring with a target completion date in the spring of 2012.
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