Steve Marcus, standing, and Greg Marcus, sitting, pose next to the bust of Marcus Corp. founder Ben Marcus at The Pfister in Milwaukee.

Blu, the 23^rd-floor bar atop The Pfister, offers stunning panoramic views of downtown Milwaukee. The 107-year-old hotel that launched Marcus Corp.’s foray into the lodging industry is the crown jewel of the company’s portfolio and one of the grandest hotels in the country, a local legend and national landmark.

But it’s not the hotel or the swanky bar known as the gem in the sky that reveals what Marcus Corp. is all about. Earlier this summer, in a small banquet room next to Blu, you could see into the heart of the company that is celebrating its 75^th anniversary.

There stands Greg Marcus, in a dark blazer, amid a crowd of 40 people. The new 45-year-old president and CEO of Marcus Corp. is making a short speech and presenting a cake and gift to a longtime employee who is retiring after 47 years with the company. Also in the room are Bill Otto, the president of Marcus Hotels and Resorts, and a mix of executives and associates wearing everything from suits to uniforms to jeans. The employee being honored isn't another executive, but a dishwasher named Ron who has devoted his life to the hotel and company.

“An ordinary day for us is someone’s most extraordinary day,” Greg says to the dishwasher and everyone else in the room. “Our third wedding of the day is their only wedding of a lifetime. You all know that.”

It’s the same story Greg relates earlier in the day when asked about his management style and the company’s philosophy. “You’ve got to take care of people,” he says. “It could be somebody’s first date at a movie theater and to us we’re just serving the ninth guy popcorn. But they may get married. The people we have make those memories and experiences.

“I’m not making this up. I learned it from him,” Greg adds, pointing to his father, Steve, the chairman of the company who until last year was the CEO. Steve learned it from his father, Ben, the Polish immigrant who came to America in 1925 and started the company on Nov. 1, 1935, when he opened the Campus Theatre in Ripon, WI.

Seventy-five years later, and with just its third CEO, the Milwaukee-based Marcus Corp. is a publicly traded company with the long-term thinking of a family business. The company went public in 1972 and joined the New York Stock Exchange 17 years ago. On Nov. 1, Greg and Steve will ring the bell in honor of the 75th anniversary.

On the Silver Screen

Marcus Theatres, the sixth-largest circuit in the U.S., owns or manages 668 screens at 54 locations throughout the Midwest, and Marcus Hotels and Resorts owns or operates 19 properties in 10 states. The diversity of the two divisions, which combined for more than $379 million in revenue for the fiscal year ending May 27, and a commitment to keeping a strong balance sheet have allowed Marcus Corp. to weather the recent economic storm that has crippled many in the hotel industry.

While many hoteliers have struggled to stay afloat during the past two years, Marcus Hotels and Resorts has been buoyed by the strength of the theater division, which posted a record year in fiscal 2010 with revenues up 4.1 percent from the year before.

The theater business has improved during six of the last eight recessions, Greg adds, because it’s the cheapest form of out-of-home entertainment available. So when people aren’t traveling and staying at Marcus hotels, they instead are watching movies and buying popcorn.

Now that the economy and hotel industry have begun turning around, Marcus Hotels and Resorts is leading the way. In the first quarter of fiscal 2011, the hotel division posted a 15.7-percent year-over-year increase in revenue per available room, helping offset the inconsistent and down results from the movie business.

‘Welcome to the Hotel Business’

By 1960, with thriving movie and restaurant businesses well on their way, the entrepreneurial Ben Marcus dipped into the lodging pool by building a motel, the Guest House Inn. He added another three years later, but he dived headfirst into the industry with the purchase of The Pfister in 1962 when as trustee of the faded property’s foreclosure auction, he made the only bid.

Steve, who was working in real estate development in California after earning accounting and law degrees, returned to Milwaukee and the family business to head the restoration of The Pfister.

“I went in as a lawyer because that’s what it needed,” he says. “The first day I was in the office I had commandeered a desk, and there was a knock at the door … A girl said, ‘Can you tell me what rooms to make up today?’ I said, ‘Don’t you have a housekeeper to ask,’ and she said, ‘She quit yesterday.’”

“Welcome to the hotel business.”

Steve served as general manager for a year and a half and led the $7 million renovation and expansion project that added a 185-room tower to the now 307-room hotel.

In 1972, all of Ben’s growing businesses were brought together to form the Marcus Corp. Also that year, the company added a second downtown Milwaukee classic, the 850-room Sheraton Schroeder, which was rehabbed and repositioned into the Marc Plaza, with 550 deluxe rooms. It’s now the Hilton Milwaukee City Center, a property still owned by Marcus Corp. The company also added the management contract for a nearby Sheraton outside the city and the hotel division was booming.

Today the portfolio includes 19 mostly full-service upper-upscale properties, eight of which are owned, and the rest are third-party managed (Marcus has a stake in two). The latest asset, the Skirvin Hilton in Oklahoma City, is Pfister-like with its history and turnaround story.

Marcus Corp. got out of the restaurant business in 2001, after decades of success with franchises like Big Boy, KFC and Applebee’s.