Country Inn & Suites by Radisson in Gurnee, IL

If you know anything about cockroaches, you know it’s not likely to see one running about in the middle of the day. So while they’re infested, most people might not notice. When we first arrived, despite the place being run down, my biggest complaint was the strong chemical cleaning smells. We only got the hotel so we had a place to lay our heads after the concert we were attending. Anyways, so we check in, all is well. When we get back to the hotel at around 1am after our concert, I go to use the bathroom and spot 10 or more German cockroach nymphs. As someone who’s never dealt with roaches before I was absolutely HORRIFIED. The front desk clerk was clearly aware of the issue and just offered us another room. We get to the new room and while I don’t find any roaches in the bathroom, we find one in the light fixture. At this point there’s no way we’re staying. We left despite being refused a refund. I’d rather waste $118 than bring home bed bugs. Do not stay here unless you want to bring cockroaches home. Picture attached is the picture I took and the google ID results that followed.

I'll start with positive - friendly staff, cleanliness, new fixtures in the bathroom, and breakfast. The room was clean and new fixtures are always nice. The breakfast was a standard Continental with waffles but decent nonetheless. Now, the negative: old hotel being remodeled without warning on the website when booking. Many damaged furniture pieces and low quality repairs or upgrades. Paper thin walls. Many other items which have not been updated including old stained window treatments. Stains on ceiling from leaking roof. Hard surfaces everywhere in the room (no carpet) so everything echoes. Tiny pool with shorter hours than listed by the door. Uninviting lobby. Not enough staff, as when we checked in, the one person who could check us in was on the phone quoting room rates to someone. Not her fault, just kind of felt like poor customer service since they weren't very busy Wednesday night. Lack of house keeping to clean enough rooms to separate guests well. Large hotel, not very busy, but they placed a large family immediately next to our room (maybe because that room was also clean?) and at 11:30pm they tried to get into our room, waking us up and then proceeded to talk loudly and walk back and forth to and from their other room down the hall for the next 2 hours. Had to go to the desk twice. Why not put them in another wing, right next to each other, adjoining? Maybe it will improve over time, but I wouldn't stay here again and don't recommend.

Hotel This hotel started out very well other than the room smelled like stale smoke. We were going to Six Flags and got into town much earlier than expected and they allow us to check in early which I thought was great because we were going to have a long day at the park and then we could go straight to the room and go to bed. Nice thought but not quite how it went. We got back to the hotel about 10 PM and our key was not working. We went to the front desk she gave us a new key, which also did not work. The front desk worker went up to our room with another key, and she tried to open it with no luck; she then went down and called her boss while we sat in the waiting area with our two kids (teenage boys 12/13). After about 20 minutes I checked in and were told she was calling maintenance; I asked if they could give us another room so the boys could at least lay down and maybe watch some TV which she was able to do and gave us a room super close to our original room. I waited about 30 minutes and went down to see the status. I was told she called maintenance and was waiting to hear back, but her boss said worst case scenario maintenance would be in early the next morning. I told her we had medication that was needed in that room. She called her boss back who said they needed to wait an hour from that point to hear from maintenance and if they didn’t respond, they would call the fire department to get the door open. At this point we have been dealing with this for close to an hour already and I mentioned that so she said she would wait 15 minutes. Another employee showed up about 20 minutes later (thinking possibly the manager) and he told me the fire department was on the way and they arrived about 10 minutes later. The fire department did an amazing job and got into the room in about 20 minutes. I know this was a very unfortunate event that probably rarely happens; my issue was the initial response of telling me we would need to wait until morning when all our belongings were in the room then telling me we had to wait another hour before they called the fire department. A bad situation that was handled badly. I do feel bad for the young girl that was working the front desk as I think she was working alone and could only do so much. Overall the staff was friendly but management response was lacking to say the least. Both rooms also smelled of stale smoke but to be honest that was less of an issue after dealing with the issue of getting into our room. All this and we still paid full price for our room.

We were there with a group of friends for a weekend gathering and the hotel management and staff were so helpful, attentive and friendly! We were so grateful for their service and letting our relax and enjoy our time.

The stay was very clean and was a great hospitality! High quality, everything was well taken care of! Beds were comfy, breakfast was a nice option too! Definitely will stay here again when I am back in town! Worth it!