Melchiorri's first job in the hospitality industry was at the Embassy Suites as a Night Auditor in Overland Park, KS. Ten months later, he became a night manager at the city's Plaza Hotel. Over the next four years, he worked his way up to the position of Director of Front Office Operations. After an 11-year-old girl came into the Plaza and asked him, "Mister, where's Eloise?," he and Randee Glick created the hotel's Eloise tour. He was then appointed general manager of the Lucerne Hotel on the Upper West Side of New York City. Under his direction, the Lucerne was selected as the New York Times Travel Guide's Best Service Hotel. In 2005 he left the Lucerne to assume the position of general manager of New York's historic Algonquin Hotel. After convincing the owners to close the Algonquin for 29 days, he oversaw a $15 million roof-to-basement renovation of the building and its image, restoring it to the glory days of the famous Algonquin Round Table. He updated the rooms, repositioned the restaurants, and earned the hotel a high rating as a Michelin Guide Hotel. He orchestrated publicity campaigns such as the Algonquin's "$10,000 Martini", won a Hospitality Sales & Marketing Association International "Best of Show Award", and generally promoted the renovated hotel. Melchiorri also helped manage the Nickelodeon Hotel and Resort. He then became first vice president of Tishman Hotels, and later senior vice president of New York Hotel Management Company. In that capacity, Melchiorri helped to develop a 310 all-suite hotel in Times Square. Melchiorri then founded his own hotel management and consultancy, Argeo Hospitality.
''Hotel Impossible''
After serving as an executive producer of the 2008 Lifetime cable-movie Wisegal, starring Alyssa Milano, Melchiorri and fellow executive producer Leo Rossi, whom he knew from the hospitality industry, developed Melchiorri's idea for a hotel-improvement show, resulting in the Travel Channel series Hotel Impossible. Each episode features a hotel with issues that Melchiorri and his team must deal with in less than a week. The pilot debuted in April 2012. On March 2, 2016, the show was renewed for its seventh season.
