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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowBeing affiliated with Ball State University’s new performing arts center makes sense for Indianapolis-based Schahet Hotels, a company that presented a 2020 exhibition of Edward Hopper paintings at Newfields and traditionally serves as primary sponsor of the Indy Arts Council’s “Start with Art” fundraiser.
Schahet (pronounced “shock-it”) is building The Cantio, a 97-room hotel in Muncie that’s physically connected to the university’s performing arts center scheduled to open before this fall’s semester begins. Translated from Latin, “cantio” means song.
Schahet Hotels CEO Jeffrey Brown said Bob Ross, who recorded his TV show “The Joy of Painting” in Muncie from 1983 to 1988, inspired the name of Believe You Me’s — a restaurant on the ground floor of The Cantio.
Ross frequently told viewers, ““Believing in yourself may be the most important thing in life.”
Brown’s life is defined by his dedication to Schahet Hotels, a company founded by his great-uncle, Sam Schahet, in 1962. Brown, 72, celebrated his 50th anniversary with the company in January. He’s served as CEO since 2001.
Greg Schahet, Sam’s grandson, serves as the company’s president and chief financial officer.
Schahet’s portfolio of hotels includes six central Indiana locations plus one in Schenectady, New York, and one planned for Muskegon, Michigan.
The Cantio, which will operate as a Tapestry by Hilton Hotel, has allowed Schahet to assert more creativity than any other property in the company’s history.
Brown, who says he would like to work two more years before retirement, spoke with IBJ about adding signature touches to The Cantio and how Schahet adheres to its core values. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
What can you share about The Cantio, which is described as a boutique hotel in the heart of Ball State University’s campus?
We’re looking forward to getting this hotel open toward the end of this year. Normally, when we deal with a brand, we’re given a box we have to work within. Even though The Cantio is tied to the Hilton brand, we get to decide the theme and design. You’re not going to see another Cantio anywhere in the United States.
What’s rewarding about that?
You’re creating everything. We get to pick out what the room looks like. We get to pick out what the furniture looks like. The design is totally different. We don’t have to pick choices from the brand. We get to design it, and they have to approve it.
It’s just exciting to do a project like this. It’s exciting for us. I know it’s exciting for Ball State. It reminds me of years ago when we developed the Hampton Inn downtown. That was an old building [originally headquarters for the Big Four Railroad in 1930]. It was just a shell, and we partnered with some people who had bought that building. … We totally developed it from scratch.
In addition to the Believe You Me’s restaurant, what dining options will be available at The Cantio?
We have a bakery called Beeman’s Corner, and that’s named after Mary Beeman. She was a world-renowned home economics professor at Ball State from 1929 to 1951. We’re even going to use her recipes for some of the desserts.
And then the fifth floor is a rooftop bar and restaurant called the Broken Record. … When David Letterman was a Ball State student, he had a radio show, and we heard that he played records and asked people to call in to say whether they liked a song or not. If they didn’t like it, he just broke the record right there on air. I checked with Ball State, and they’re not so sure that actually happened. But we like the Broken Record name, whether that story is true or not.
The performing arts center is expected to host about 160 events each year. Is that enough activity to sustain your restaurants?
We don’t want the food and beverage outlets to be places you go to only for events. We want them to be a neighborhood connection, where people go for comfort and to see friends. Whether it’s university students, professors or the community, we’re building this hotel and the food and beverage outlets for them.
We expect the food and beverage outlets will do almost as much as the hotel does in revenue.
We’re working with consultant company Ring On Hook, which has done a lot of restaurants across the United States. They’re helping us to develop the menus, the staffing and the recipes. They will help us hire staff and do the training.
We have to market our restaurants. This isn’t a hotel where restaurants are an amenity. These are stand-alone, survive-alone restaurants.
What role does company culture play in Schahet’s success?
We continually work with our associates on our values as well as what our culture really means to everyone. It’s not just words on a poster for us. We continually reinforce the values. We hire and fire by them. We talk about them. We talk about how to implement them. We hold what we call RISE celebrations — RISE stands for our four values: respect, integrity, service and excitement. Every 75 to 90 days, a third party surveys our associates so we can ensure that we are reflecting what we say about who we are in our culture.
I did some research on RISE. Real estate company CBRE has a RISE philosophy in which their “E” stands for excellence. Is your “E” excitement because you’re in the hospitality industry?
A lot of people think excitement is that you have to have a big circus, a big party and a big show. That’s not what we consider to be excitement. To us, excitement is what we call gossiping about our successes, and that comes from the fabric of what our culture is all about.
I read a book titled “Riding the Blue Train: A Leadership Plan for Explosive Growth” that really spoke to who we are. It’s all about the people. You have to grow the people in order to transform, build and grow your business. We’re going to be all about the people, and we’re going to make sure that they come first.
I like to tell our people that Disney and Schahet Hotels actually sell the same thing: an experience. We just have a different product we sell it with, which is our hotels or our food and beverage outlets. They have all the rides, but our service industry is actually selling experiences.
Do you have any hobbies of note?
I really have a passion for what I do. That’s probably why I’m still working. I thought I was going to leave around 65 years old, but I just love what I’m doing. You can ask my wife. We take two weeks every year to go to Grand Cayman. She knows I’m going to have to put some time into work. Usually, we go up to lunch about noon, and she gives me two hours to do my work. Then I need to get back down on the beach to take another walk.•
Correction: The number of guest rooms in The Cantio hotel — 97 — has been corrected in this story. See more corrections here.
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A local company continues to make good. Most sell out after a few years. The Schahet name shows dedication to Indy and its core business. Great effort by both Jeff Brown and Greg Schahet.