Back to basics at Lands’ End? Tosa Residence Inn opening
Emphasis on classic business is planned Innovation Campus hotel ready Tuesday
It could be back to basics at Lands’ End.
Little more than two months after the departure of controversial CEO Federica Marchionni, it appears that the company’s leadership is retreating from her efforts to put a glossy sheen on what has long been a traditional-clothing retailer.
The signals came Thursday as the Dodgeville firm reported downbeat financial results — a $7.2 million loss and declining revenue.
That’s nothing new. Lands’ End now has posted nine straight quarters of lower year-over-year sales.
And during a conference call with stock analysts, interim co-CEO James Gooch said the company is “not planning any major shifts in strategic direction.”
At the same time, Gooch and fellow interim CEO Joseph Boitano stressed the importance of Lands’ End’s classic lines — the traditionally styled chino slacks, cotton sweaters and such that have long been the essence of the Dodgeville firm’s identity.
A long-delayed hotel at the Innovation Campus development in Wauwatosa will open on Tuesday.
The 127-room Residence Inn Milwaukee West is at 1300 Discovery Parkway, north of W. Watertown Plank Road and east of U.S. Highway 45.
The all-suite hotel will operate as a Marriott franchise, owned and managed by Hospitality Specialists Inc., of Grand Rapids, Mich., the firm announced Thursday.
Construction started May 2015. in
The $8 million project’s construction start was delayed for more than a year to allow excess soil from grading work done at Innovation Campus to properly settle.
Innovation Campus, developed by a University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Foundation affiliate, includes Echelon Apartments, ABB Inc.’s area headquarters and a business accelerator operated by UWM.
The extended-stay hotel is the first of three new Residence Inns that are being developed in the Milwaukee area.
An 83-room Residence Inn is under construction in Glendale at 7003 N. Port Washing-