Looking for hotel furniture? Sale of Five Seasons Hotel's contents coming up

You're going to get a shot at buying nearly anything and everything - including kitchen sinks - from the city's 276-room Five Seasons Hotel.

A City Hall evaluation team on Friday picked an Ohio firm over another bidder to liquidate the contents of the now-city-owned hotel in preparation for the hotel's renovation.

The chosen firm, National Content Liquidators Inc., Springboro, Ohio, intends to conduct a "controlled public sale" of the hotel's contents over the course of 35 days in June into July, according to its proposal to the city.

The other bidder, Hotel Furniture Liquidators of Galesburg, Ill., proposed to remove the hotel's contents for sale to other hotels and motels without a public sale.

The city's evaluation team - which consisted of Drew Westberg, special assistant to the city manager, John Frew, consulting project manager for the hotel renovation and the city's Convention Complex project, and Roger Cousins of Frew's firm, Frew Nations Group - scored the two liquidation companies' proposals, giving the Ohio firm 61 points, the Illinois firm 44.

The team noted that the Ohio firm had 47 years of experience and had worked on multiple projects of similar size and scope while the Illinois firm had only six years of experience and had worked on a few projects of similar size and scope.

Another big difference: price. The Ohio firm guaranteed the city $249,500 for the removal of the hotel's contents while the Illinois firm proposed to pay $125,000.

The evaluation team's recommendation will go to the City Council for approval.

National Content Liquidators Inc.'s proposal states that the firm will arrive at the hotel June 6, will resurvey the hotel's contents for a day and then take eight to nine days to prepare for the public sale. The public sale them will run over 35 days, according to the proposal.

The firm will price items by the piece based on the firm's experience and current prices in the retail market, its proposal states.

The city's project manager, John Frew, said this week that the hotel renovation, which is occurring at the same time that the city is renovating the U.S. Cellular Center arena attached to the hotel and building a new convention center next door, will result in a 258-room hotel.

Frew said each of the rooms will be stripped of nearly everything, and he estimated that it could cost $15,000 to refurbish a room to the "upscale" standards of the three brands the city is courting for the hotel. Those are Sheraton, Doubletree by Hilton and Radisson.

The cost of the hotel renovation was put at $28 million in a report this week on the city's finances from Moody's Investors Service.

The hotel is slated to reopen in the fall of 2012.