Grant House Hotel — Hotel in Rush City

Sadly, this Used To Be one of our most favorite places to dine and entertain guests. We lived in nearby Stanchfield and took visiting family and friends here often. We loved the setting, hospitality, food, service and price.

So it was a no brainer, or so I thought, throwing my wife a Surprise, 25th Wedding Anniversary Champagne Brunch at the Grant House. We would check in the night before, then have brunch, with our family and friends, at 10:00 a.m. Sunday morning. The hotel was centrally located as our guests would be coming from areas around Duluth, Menomonee, Farmington and the Twin Cities.

I made reservations for this event two months in advance. I called, again, Monday, September 10th, just to confirm and tie up any loose ends, before the event that weekend. Each time I called I left my phone number. Each time, I explained that this would be a celebration of our 25th wedding anniversary. All plans, I thought, were set and agreed upon.

Our check-in Saturday evening was a bit brusk, but I shrugged it off, as they were busy. Sunday morning, The "Surprise" worked great... at least initially. Then additional surprises unfolded. Our daughters, who arrived early to help set up, were initially told the restaurant wouldn't be able to accommodate our group. Our guests were at multiple tables around the dining room, not at one table in the party room, as originally planned. The server and hotel owner both confronted me and asked me what I wanted to serve my guests? I was originally told guests would order from the menu. We ended up with the "Special," which wasn't, for a number of our guests. And was not worth the price.

I later found out that the hotel staff had set up their dining room, for our party, but did so on Saturday. Also, the staff I spoke with, to make these arrangements, never wrote down my phone number - or at least not where anyone could see. And they are no longer there.

So, apparently punishing the victim is the norm. I spent months planning a surprise for my wife, for a milestone event, to be held at one of her favorite venues. I did my due diligence. While I appreciate that the hotel staff took the time to set up for our party, its not our fault they got the wrong day. So why the animosity toward us, your paying guests, for Your mistakes? Can't say we'll be back,...

My mother and I had a reservation to stay here through Airbnb this past weekend (10/5/2024). My mom had driven over three hours and was excited to spend an evening in this "quaint" hotel. Upon arrival, there was a group of about 5-6 men just milling about outside. Fine, whatever. There is a bar located on the first floor so we figured they were patrons there, but we felt a little uncomfortable. We get into the hotel just fine, code from the outside door works and we have no issues with that. However, we get upstairs to our room after the check in time of 4pm. We punch the code in, open the door, and the first thing we see is that the bed is a mess! It isn't made and someone has clearly been or has been sleeping in it. We open the door a little more and see that there is luggage still in the room! The window is wide open, there is no screen on it(major safety issue) and the bathroom light is on and it sounds like someone was possibly showering. We quickly shut the door and we're in disbelief at the state of this room. It was clearly still being occupied, and another MAJOR safety concern with the door code! So the code we had was the same code the tenant still in the room must've had, otherwise how are they still able to occupy it. Superior Stays (the host/owners of the hotel) don't change their codes. We were shaken up and tried contacting the host, and the emergency number, to no avail. We called, left a message, called again, ZERO response. Five days later and they still haven't responded. I don't believe they ever will. Who runs a business this way? We made our reservation a couple of weeks in advance and they knew we were coming. I don't know who was still in "our" room and I'm glad we didn't have to find out. Many things went wrong here and nobody ever reached out to explain what happened. It's extremely upsetting and we will never be back. I don't recommend this place to anyone, nor would I ever want to stay at a "Superior Stays" property (they have them all over) ever again. Do better! North Branch is a short 15 minute drive away; I'd recommend you stay somewhere there instead. On a side note, the room is about the size of the bed. The bed appeared to have taken up the whole room. Just wanted to add that in case anyone...

It is painful for me to write this review. First of all, any staff at this hotel were impossible to get in touch with. I called about a week before my stay, and the woman who answered said she was at dinner and would call me back to help with my reservation. She did not call me back. The next day I called again, and this time, no answer. I continued to call over and over again, and no answer. I finally decided to overlook my questions, and I just booked on the website. I put when I would be arriving (9:00 p.m.), as I was traveling from out of state. After a long day of traveling, I showed up to a locked hotel. There were two women cleaning up the restaurant, and they let me into the lobby. No one was in the hotel. I called the hotel number over and over. I called the emergency number posted inside over and over again. I was supposed to have received a code via email to get into the hotel and into my room, and I never received it. I'm not sure if you've ever traveled an entire day only to arrive at your hotel to find no one around except two restaurant workers who try to spread ghost stories. This was the poorest example of customer service that I have...