Eagles Landing Hotel


Meeting High-Class Demands of Comfort, Style and Durability

For the Chehalis tribe of southwestern Washington, the 102 room expansion to its Eagles Landing Hotel would double the hotel's revenue and position the hotel, the neighboring Chehalis-run casino and the essential tribal programs they fund for continued growth. Here, guests are accustomed to luxury and comfort, and eye-pleasing aesthetics are key to customer satisfaction. Yet, when it came time for furnishing the new wing, tribal leaders chose Washington State Correctional Industries – an organization best known for furnishing institutional facilities and government offices.

 

CI's design and production flexibility enabled it to adapt to the hotel's needs, producing furniture that is comfortable and stylish while still meeting its hallmark standards of durable workmanship and timely, hassle-free installation.


CI's Local Operations, pricing and Quality Craftsmanship Prove Ideal for Tribal Project

By August of 2011, construction on the expansion was nearly complete and Eagles Landing Project Manager Jay May was ready to order furnishings for the new rooms. He had styles and fabrics all picked out and was ready to place the order when the Chehalis' tribal chairman asked him to take a look at Washington State Correctional Industries. CI's location and program to reduce state prison costs and recidivism rates by employing incarcerated individuals drew favor from the tribal council. "We are prone to look very seriously at (suppliers) from nearby," said May.

 

May was also impressed with CI's pricing and looked forward to saving the tribe thousands of dollars on the extensive order of headboards, dressers, desks, night stands, lounge chairs, sofas and settees. To seal the deal, CI reupholstered several pieces of the hotel's existing furniture to demonstrate their quality of workmanship and capacity. "We saw the quality of the work they could do. I said, 'If you'll do more like this, we'll take it," said May.


For Luxury & Style, CI Won't Be Outclassed

Accustomed to producing furniture for state institutions and government offices, furnishing a hotel presented a new set of challenges. In catering to clientele with an eye for luxury, Eagles Landing required a higher level of comfort and aesthetics than CI's traditional clients. May found that CI's stock cushioning, while plenty comfortable for an office environment, did not meet the needs of the high-class hotel environment.

 

Without hesitation, CI secured samples of additional options from its foam vendors and let May have his pick. Fabric styles were also a concern, but CI, looking beyond its normal sources, successfully secured fabric styles and patterns that suited the hotel's modern look and stylish sense of comfort. "CI was very easy to work with," said May, "very responsive."


When Time Is of The Essence, You Can Rely On Correctional Industries

Coming into the project just months before the first rooms were scheduled to open, CI crews had only a fraction of the time normally available for design and production. Additionally, May asked CI to match the selections he'd already made to avoid starting from scratch. CI representatives worked diligently to develop furniture lines that closely matched those selected from another vendor and poured through hundreds of fabric samples and wood stain colors to find those most suitable for Eagles Landing. May had only to approve selections or make a final choice between a couple of examples, so he could focus on other aspects of the expansion project.

Late in the game, CI was handed a curve ball. Architects for the Eagles Landing expansion discovered that ten more rooms could be added by utilizing the hotel's unique attic space. Tribal leaders decided to take advantage of the discovery and ordered ten more rooms of furniture. CI took the changes in stride and capable production workers adapted easily. With production and installation processes designed for large product runs , CI crews pulled through and delivered each floor's furniture ahead of schedule. "We pushed them right to the edge time wise," said May. "A large run of a single item or a large run of several items is clearly CI's strength."


Superior Craftsmanship & Professionalism

May said he and his crews were impressed by the professionalism of the CI teams at both the production facilities and on site at the hotel. Production and installation of CI furnishings are both handled by incarcerated individuals from Washington prisons. As part of the CI program, workers are trained with job skills that enable them to find good employment after prison and decrease their chances of recidivating.

 

It's not uncommon for CI's clients to feel a little wary at first about having incarcerated individuals on their premises during the installation phase or being around them when touring production facilities. But May found no need for wariness and occasionally forgot the workers that surrounded him were convicted felons. He shook their hands, gave friendly pats on the back to incarcerated workers, and found he was able to treat members of CI's installation crew just like his contractors from the private sector. "I expected there would be a couple of problems. There were none." May said.

 

May had similar things to say about the workmanship of these crews. Although the production lines had to work with different materials than they were accustomed to and all the work involved custom upholstery or stains, he and the tribe were extremely pleased with the finished products. "The workmanship was excellent" May said. "We've had no complaints, no issues with it at all."


Redefining "Flexibility"

The University of Washington project also provided a unique challenge for CI in that the primarily-steel designs were unlinke anything in CI's existing furniture lines. This required CI's research and development team to not only design the furniture, but also design the manufacturing process from beginning to end. Meanwhile, production crews re-configured their processes to meet the demands of the new designs, from laser cutting steel and furniture components to powder coating and finishing the final products.

 

There were also serious time constraints with which to contend. Receiving the final product order in February, CI had only six months to design, manufacture, finish and install the final products before students filled the residence halls in August. CI's diligence and focus got designs finished and approved in March and production launched in mid-April. "We really had to juice the front end of that project," Morse said. "We had no way to know what the process time was going to be."


CI Positions Clients For Growth

Six months after opening the new wing, Eagles Landing Hotel fills twice as many rooms as it did prior to the expansion and still has room to grow. The additional business required adding twenty new jobs, which nearly doubled the staff. Meanwhile, the quantity of extra rooms enables staff to stay on top of maintenance and take rooms out of service when needed without having to turn customers away.

 

The flexibility of furniture options and manufacturing processes at CI, along with an organization-wide drive for customer satisfaction, enabled the Chehalis tribe to achieve several important goals that might not have been possible otherwise. The tribe was able to work with a local supplier, so tribal funds continue to have local benefit, and achieved substantial savings compared to the out-of-state vendor they had planned to use. Both of these goals were achieved without sacrificing the quality and luxury the hotel's guests are accustomed to, ensuring retention of their customers. "I certainly would go back to CI," said May. "They did a great job. The hotel looks beautiful."

 

With product lines and styles selected in record time, CI's production crews quickly launched into operation. Deadlines loomed tightly with different floors of the hotel expansion scheduled to open on varying dates. Correctional Industries crews had to produce and install the furniture for each floor ahead of its opening date.

© 2025 Washington State Department of Corrections — Correctional Industries