TownePlace Suites Ames

We always stay at this hotel when traveling through Iowa to visit family (4x+ per year). The 2 br/2ba suites are perfect for traveling with older kids or young adults. Rooms are spacious and well equipped with dishes, a “real” coffee pot, plenty of towels, tvs in each room, etc. Rooms have always been top notch clean. The recent updates (paint, carpet, furniture) have made rooms even nicer! Location is safe and quiet, close to restaurants and shopping. Easy on/off highway access. Marriott members can even check in and out on the app. So, if you’re fried like I sometimes am after a long drive, you can go straight past human interaction and roll directly into your room, using your smartphone, highly recommend!

There are many Ames lodging options, and we have explored most of them over the years, but Marriott's TownePlace Suites of Ames is right at the top of the choices. It offers a solid combination of pricing, location, staff, customer service, amenities, and overall experience.

It was a one-nighter which is always perfect with this brand of hotel. We don't expect a lot of amenities so it was enjoyable to have a manager on duty shows us lots of attention. The hotel was not busy so we checked in early. We had laundry to do which made this stay that much more valuable. The locations is a little off the beaten path, surrounded by other chain hotels. But getting in and out was easy. A very pleasant stay.

One of the better hotels in Ames. I had a very pleasant stay here. It was quiet and very clean. The kitchen was well equipped and very usable. The beds were comfortable and slept well. Bathroom was large and spacious. Shower tub I dislike. I would have preferred a desk to work at, but the kitchen table was fine.

We could not check in to Country Inn and Suites down the road even though we had reservations . Front desk clerk at the TownePlace said they can squeeze both our families in and check us in early. The clerk took care of us. Got us into our rooms and made us feel right at home. Got the kids a snack. Gave us a run down of the hotel, breakfast, pool....etc. She follow up with phone call and made sure all was okay. The rooms all had kitchenettes, were clean and the stay all friendly the whole stay. Now the only place we will ever stay in Ames.

My family stayed two nights at TownePlace Suites over the 4th of July holiday. Upon checking in, we were informed that the WiFi was out and that the front desk clerk would need to let us into our room. We waited several minutes as she took a guest call and awkwardly rode up to the 4th floor to be let into our room, and no WiFi to be used as guests of the hotel. Our second night, around 7:00pm, the power went out at the hotel. It looked like a storm was going to roll through, but no severe weather occurred. Our infant had just gone down to sleep and we were left without the ability to use her white noise machine, which any parent can relate to how frustrating that alone is! On top of that, we have no lights, no A/C (it’s July in Iowa), no TV, no WiFi, no way to charge our phones, no access to our fridge, no access to the pool, and no access to the elevator— should we have wanted to wake our daughter, pack our numerous bags and get out of that eerie hot box of a room. This outage lasted THREE hours— apparently this hotel chose not to have a back up generator to ensure their guests were taken care of under such circumstances. Upon returning home from our visit to Iowa, I reached out to the GM regarding our experience and asked for a refund due to not being able to use the amenities/services we had paid for. Instead of responding with sympathy, or offering any amount of a refund, the GM sent me an email stating the outage wasn’t their fault and claimed the entire city lost power (not true- but beside the point). The GM did not acknowledge my question of why a back up generator was not in place and simply ignored my request for a refund of the services we paid for but were not provided. We had multiple emails back and forth and she has decided instead of making this right for her customer, to simply ignore them. Visitors, beware! Don’t expect WiFi or electricity if you stay here, and definitely don’t expect any money back should you have the same experience we had. Ps- her signature line states she’s the GM for Fairfield Inn & Suites, so I’d caution against booking there, too.