the number of restaurants were in decline, with FAI's official directory listing just 84 restaurants remaining in the US and Canada. 2000s: Sharp decline By 2005, there were fewer than eight surviving restaurants. A combination of no vision, no reinvestment of capital, ageing restaurants, a stale menu, lack of marketing or new ideas, and competition from other chains had taken their toll; restaurants were closing their doors. FAI ceased operations in 2005, the same year that the Springfield, Vermont, location and the last New York City restaurant in the chain closed. Cendant acquired the rights to operate and maintain the remaining Howard Johnson's restaurants. In 2006, Cendant sold them to La Mancha Group LLC, which had proposed an aggressive expansion of the restaurant chain that never materialized. After the Waterbury, Connecticut restaurant became The Brass House Restaurant in April 2007, only three locations remained. Cendant split into four smaller companies in 2006; its hotel group became Wyndham Worldwide while other pieces were spun off separately to become Avis Budget Group, Realogy, Travelport and Affinion Group. A line of Howard Johnson-branded frozen foods disappeared from grocery stores after Fairfield Farms Kitchens shut down its Brockton, Massachusetts plant in 2006 and America's Kitchen of Atlanta, Georgia shut down in May 2008. 2010s: Fading out In spring 2012, one of the last three original Howard Johnson's restaurants closed, in Lake George, and was listed for sale. Television personality, chef and author Rachael Ray once worked at that site while living in Lake George as a teenager. By 2013 only two original restaurants remained open, but the Bangor (hotel and restaurant) no longer had the distinctive orange roof. While the highest tier in the hotel franchise (HoJo Hotel Plaza) did include a restaurant, there was no requirement that these replicate menus, format or branding of the former Howard Johnson restaurant chain. With La Mancha Group LLC no longer active, Wyndham Hotel Group now owned the rights to the HoJo's food business as well as the Howard Johnson hotel chain. In 2013, Wyndham proposed a Howard Johnson Brand Reinvigoration which would bring select flavors of ice cream back to the hotels, adopt a new logo, phase out the multiple branding tiers, give the properties a facelift and redesign as a lower-midscale chain starting in 2015. Despite Wyndham moving ahead with eliminating hotel tiers and implementing a (retro-inspired) guestroom renovation program, all other plans, including those