Living the B & B Dream

 

 

 

 

I hear it all the time: “Someday, we thought it would be nice to open a bed and breakfast.” This is usually one part confession and one part inquiry.

As I am nearing my 25^th anniversary of actually owning and operating a B & B, there is no quick & easy response to this. Truthfully, I would like to say: “Why someday? Life is short. Why not do it now?”

But I am not so direct. I do realize it’s a dream for many people - a rosy image of heritage home, delicious smells of eggs & bacon and interesting travel conversations over coffee. If I were to ask Why Not; the dream might just fracture into serious self-doubts and lack of planning.

So I smile and say: “Ask me anything.”

I mean it. Do you think you would like to do bed & breakfast? My name is David - ask me anything!

What does "people-friendly" mean?

 

Back in 2010, I commented on the meaning of the term "gay-friendly" in the hospitality industry. Although the majority of folks will never encounter it in their own lives and therefore not give it much thought, discrimination against the GLBT community is still with us!

I recounted the news story of a B.C. bed and breakfast that refused to accommodate a gay couple and were taken to the BC Human Rights Tribunal on grounds of discrimination under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms(a crucial part of Canada's Constititution). It promised to be an interesting case as the B & B owners defended their action on the basis of their Christian beliefs.

At last, the decision came down today and as reported on CBC and Huffington Post, the B & B owners were found to have illegally discriminated against the gay couple. They were fined $4400 for the "indignity and humiliation" suffered by their prospective customers. In the judgement, it is clear that even though the B & B owners were free to hold certain religious-based beliefs in their own home, the fact that they opened their home as a public business required them to comply with laws that prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation. I have read elsewhere that they decided to close their business soon after the discrimination suit was filed.

I say hooray! Yes, this case was a sad, drawn-out legal mess that neither party probably wanted in their lives. However, if hospitality businesses want to live up to the very definition of "hospitality", they cannot discriminate against anyone just for who they are!

We have always described Nelson House B & B as "people-friendly". We think it meets the dictionary definition and underlines the kind of religious beliefs that we share: practice "kindness in welcoming strangers or guests".

A bed and breakfast garden continued...

The blue ceanosis or wild lilac beside our front steps is buzzing with happy bees. No wonder, the perfume emanating from this hardy shrub is both head-spinning and delightful!

The pink rose is a bonica. I have three and each stands eight to nine feet tall - covered with blooms all summer long. Many, many more blossoms to come!

Innkeeping - you just gotta Love People

I once read that innkeeping is "the hardest job you will ever love".

I think the author was talking about the long hours and physical labour involved in maintaining a large house. However, the important message is that all of that hard work takes place in a happy and relaxed atmosphere. And all of that work is by your own choice, for your own profit and enjoyment.

If you ever thought you might someday like to operate a B & B, ask yourself if you really do like people, engage with them, manage them and want to know more about them - starting with yourself.

Do these characteristics sound like you?

At the very least - you must be cheerful and optimistic. Well - are you?

To run a bed and breakfast, you can't be afraid of hard work, but it sure is easier if you are self-motivated.

Every day in this job, you are going to meet a wide variety of people. Do you communicate well?

Can you handle more than one thing at a time?

Stay cool when the unexpected happens?

If you truly are a "people person", you will learn from your mistakes and forgive those of others.

It helps if you have an innate desire to keep your home clean and tidy.

It will help more if you don't make your guests uptight over tracking in mud or a spilled coffee.
A bed and breakfast is a home, meant for the living.

Are you flexible?

Practical?

Non-judgemental?

If you can answer Yes to most of these questions, then innkeeping may be your thing. Most of your guests just want to enjoy themselves, unwind and learn a little about the place they are visiting. Generally, their demands will extend no further than asking for an extra towel, explaining their dietary restrictions or picking your brain for local restaurant recommendations.

As it turned out for me, an innkeeper sets the tone and the guests intuitively pickup on it. Be yourself. Be a gracious host and you will have very grateful guests.

Ozzie & Team Nelson House

It is a bright, hot & sunny day in Vancouver but I still feel grey today. The cutest member of Team Nelson House, Ozzie, our Cairn Terrier, is in the hospital, under general anesthesia. Since visiting a Sunshine Coast cottage, frequented by many other dogs, he has developed a stubborn infection in his left ear, that has not been responding to the usual frontline medication. Therefore, it's time for a deep ear flush, some lab work and new meds specific to his problem.

The smile on Ozzie's face has never wavered. Even with one ear limping, he greets our bed and breakfast guests, in fact every human being, with equal love and grace. People always ask if he is a puppy. He is going on nine. If anything, his affection and trust have grown with every passing year.

I have never known him to have a bad day. I have done my best to preserve his canine belief in the kindness of strangers. Everywhere he goes, he catches the eye of young and old, rich and poor. Inevitably, he interrupts their busy lives just long enough to meet his soulful, intelligent gaze and return that happy grin.











How have dogs affected your life?

Shangri-La - rooftop renovations.

A photo collage of the Shangri-La Suite

This week, we started to renovate our top-floor Shangri-La Suite. This is not the first time. Shangri-La occupies the entire third-floor of the house. The centre of the suite is under the peak of the roof. Originally(c. 1907), this was likely to have been the children's bed &/or playroom. The central area is now used as a sitting area gathered around a TV and gas fireplace. From it, three flat-roofed dormers jut east, west and north out of the sloping roofline. Charming, multipaned casement windows front each dormer.

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There is no south dormer - probably because of the neighbouring house. In the early 1990's, we added an ensuite bath with jacuzzi tub and skylight on the southside. When building the bath, of course we insulated the bath's walls and constructed a hatch inside the closet for future access to the southside attic crawlspace.

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To complete the picture - under the east dormer, overlooking the front door and garden is a desk, armchair & single bed. Under the west dormer is the main sleeping nook with queen-sized bed and glass doors leading to a balcony. Under the north dormer is the focus of our current project.

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When we bought the house in 1989, this small space, just beside and behind the fireplace, was a tenant's kitchenette and somehow managed to contain a gas stove, a full-sized clunker of a fridge, sink and simple custom-built cabinetry. For B & B purposes, our first renovations reduced this to a "galley kitchen" with only a bar fridge, microwave, coffeemaker, kettle and a general freshening up with paint and vinyl. Now, our goals are to turn this area into a sexier "wetbar", obtain access to the remaining attic spaces to prepare for blown-in insulation, make necessary electrical improvements and, once again(fun!), update the decorating scheme.

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Please don't forget to vote! See our poll questions just back a few days. We really want to hear from you.

Heritage Restoration and B & B Renovation

When I purchased 977 Broughton St., it had already been five decades since the old house had been used as a single-family home. The history of Vancouver's West End is that many of the prominent upper and comfortably middle-class families began to move out of the downtown neighbourhood between the two great wars. Gradually, large homes, such as this one, were converted to revenue properties. In our case, I figure this conversion to rentals may have occurred in the early forties.

Fifty years of rentals meant that many hundreds of individuals have lived in the house. Fortunately, the series of owner/landlords never subdivided the original rooms nor seriously damaged the character of the home. Bedrooms were simply converted to monthly rental spaces, locally called "housekeeping suites". Most rooms had a fridge, a gas stove or hotplate and a sink. A number of these suites shared a bathroom down the hall.

When I came along, thinking bed and breakfast, my first choice was whether or not to restore the house to it's early 1900s, Edwardian layout or gut and renovate to entirely modern standards. In the end, I opted for restoration of the public areas and renovation of the guest areas. I had the great advantage of purchasing a house that really needed no major reconfiguration or structural repairs. Because the bedrooms already had plumbing in them from the old rental days, I set out to quickly add ensuite baths for the use of B & B guests. Of course, the old kitchenettes were quickly removed. The entire house, inside and out, was scrubbed and painted. Where possible, original hardwood floors, banister rails and some built-in chests of drawers were sanded and refinished. Carpeting was added. The roof was re-shingled, stopping leaks and adding some small insulation improvement. The existing gas furnace was at least cheaper than oil, so I left it alone.

But the focus was on baths. A pair of shared hallway baths were gutted and rebuilt. One remained a shared bath for more budget-minded B & B guests. The other became an ensuite. In fact, over the course of some years, a total of four new ensuite baths were created for guest use. Two more were rebuilt and enhanced for my own and staff's use. In building six baths, I took the opportunities presented to insulate inside and outside walls for each project. However, I made the mistake of neglecting to insulate the remaining exterior walls. I worried more about delaying and disrupting B & B operations than long-term energy conservation. I rushed to redecorate with interior panelling, wallpapers and paints. That was way fun! I wanted to get and keep the bed and breakfast up and running for both the guests' enjoyment and to recoup some of my investment. In the process, I put off the big, messy task of drilling holes in the walls and blowing in insulation.

If I have learned one thing in the physical creation of Nelson House B & B, I would tell all aspiring innkeepers that "going green" is no longer an option, as it seemed to me back in 1989-90. Energy conservation is now a fundamental necessity to build your business bottomline. I know. You should see my gas bills!

Nelson House Bed and Breakfast- 2010 Olympics

Image courtesy of VANOC & CBC

Yes! Nelson House B & B has ONE LAST ROOM still available for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics. Our "Vienna" room is only CAD.$148 (+ 15 % tax)/nt. However, it MUST be rented for the MINIMUM 17 NIGHTS of the games from Feb.12 to Feb.28th (inclusive). Please see our website for details on the room and the rental procedure.

The Vancouver Olympic Committee (VANOC) today revealed their month-long transportation plan affecting downtown Vancouver and the highway corridor to Whistler. The map above indicates red security zones, yellow parking restrictions, blue 24 hour Olympics lanes for approved transit only, the closure of major roads such as Expo & Pacific Boulevards and the Georgia Viaduct. As well, most of Robson St., Granville & Beatty will also be closed to all vehicles to create pedestrian-only throughfares. The goal is to remove 30 to 50% of the normal downtown traffic. Needless to say, they are laying on lots of extra public transit options... a brand new Skytrain line from downtown to Richmond & the Airport, extra Skytrain cars on all other lines, a third Seabus, 180 new city buses....

See the mauve star on the map? If you were staying at Nelson House B & B, you could walk anywhere, enjoy the people-watching and forget the traffic hassles!

Vancouver - signs of spring.

While the whole East Coast is getting Snow Days off work and off school, the sun is shining in Vancouver and the garden is in bloom. Here at the B & B, the clematis is just teasing us with a few blossoms before it goes nuts. The hellebores are up and with their gorgeous, orchid-like faces, they promise that Spring is here to stay.

Keep the B & B dream alive - 5 tips for dodging Burnout!

If I've learned anything in 19 years of innkeeping, it's to be hospitable to the innkeeper. Here in the downtown, West End neighbourhood of Vancouver, there have never been more than half a dozen bed and breakfasts. Amongst my innkeeper colleagues, it was only a matter of a few years before my status changed from new kid on the block to the ancient innkeeper of the West End. I have since learned that this phenomenon is widely true across bed and breakfasting. There is rather horrendous burnout in what should be a very happy profession. Why? And how to avoid it?

1. Self-employment is a risk. Not everyone is cut out to handle that kind of uncertainty. It's easy, even a comfort, to gripe with your co-workers about the boss from hell and the inane company strictures, when you know that your salary will be deposited in your bank account every two weeks. Being an employee may be as boring as a clock but not knowing if you can pay the bills in two weeks can be an alarming wake up! Never open a bed and breakfast if you are fleeing the stress and headaches of a 9 to 5 routine. You could be trading that for a 24/7 nightmare. I would suggest that you are ONLY in a position to consider innkeeping if you have already succeeded as a dependable employee, a trusted co-worker, someone the company would be glad to rehire.

2.Plan. Plan. Plan. There are great books, online advice, consultants to hire and local college courses to help you decide if innkeeping is really for you. For me, the definitive guide that asked me all the thought-provoking questions was a book called "So - You Want to be an Innkeeper" by Mary Davies. It is still out there, now in it's third revised edition. The point of planning is to look at finances, locale, zoning etc, but ONLY AFTER you have looked in the mirror. Do you have the disposition to be hospitable? Ask yourself: Am I a warm person? Am I neighbourly? Am I concerned for the well-being of others? Be honest. Much can be learned but some things have to come from the heart.

3. So if you have decided you like people, are you still going to like them inside your home? The greatest downfall that I have observed in innkeeping is an underestimation of one's own primal need for privacy. Even saints need some private time for solitude and reflection. How much do you need? Is the B & B schedule that you have planned conducive to meeting your own needs for rest and recuperation? Is the physical layout of the B & B able to provide you and your loved ones their own "space"? Privacy is often about the psychological separation of the different components of your life. Work and home are symbolic of many things to each person and juggling them both under the same roof can be more than some can manage.

4.Okay, so you are ready to invite the world. It's because your heritage home has now been beautifully restored to museum condition. The design work and decorating details have absorbed and delighted you for months. That is well and good but most guests don't want to vacation in a museum. After the renos are cleaned up and the fun of shopping for the perfect antique armoire fades, you will then have to face the prospect of visiting with your guests, meeting their needs as paying customers, cleaning, cooking, marketing and the thrill of grocery shopping. And did I say cleaning? Only so much can be delegated before you are running a hotel. A major reason for burnout is the dawning realization, that maybe you should have focused more narrowly to become a self-employed contractor or designer or decorator or florist or even that museum curator. Personally, I believe that there is enough variety and multitasking to innkeeping to keep the mind active and the body engaged. Beware if the homebody housekeeping has become a bore. Ultimately, the best antidote to the isolation of working from home is the guest who accepted your invitation, chose your establishment in a crowded marketplace, took a chance on your hospitality and decided to share his/her own time and conversation, wisdom and insight. Just be yourself. Meet your guest as an equal. Communication is two way and over a shared cup of coffee can be surprisingly rewarding.

5. These days, it takes only a mouse-click to find so many beautiful bed and breakfasts on the market that have a proven track record of producing a fat income. Ever wonder why they are for sale? If it wasn't for lack of security or planning or disposition or the love of the actual day to day work, it is probably because a couple decided to do it all together! In other words, the business succeeded just as the relationship failed. Constant togetherness, night and day proximity can bring a relationship into very sharp focus indeed. All too often, it is only one partner who is romanced by the dream of bed and breakfasting and the other goes along - but only to a point. My suggestion is that life partners would do better if they kept some separation in their careers. It gives them something to tell each other at the end of the day. But if you both really want to be full-time innkeepers, try to work out clearly defined areas of expertise and management where you don't trip over each other each and every minute. And remember, be hospitable to the innkeepers! Give yourselves a vacation too!

Top 5 Reasons to Open a Bed and Breakfast

At the the turn of the year, I like(besides Sydney's fireworks) all of the Top Ten Lists, the retrospective Best Of ... Lists, and the look ahead to What We Might See in the New Year.

If you have ever thought that it would be nice to open a bed and breakfast someday, these are five good reasons to pursue your dream:

1. Self-employment is a challenge to yourself with the potential for great personal satisfaction.


2. Innkeeping is a particularly flexible form of self-employment that allows you to define the day to day details of earning your livelihood.


3. You can bring a wide variety of life experience and skills to the bed and breakfast table. A love of cooking might be equally as valuable as a love of home renovation.


4. Owning and operating a B & B is a multitasking delight. Each day is not necessarily like the last. Done right, it should not quickly grow stale.


5. In hospitality, your customers bring the world to your door. B & B guests are not only in vacation mode but they are often very seasoned travellers, who have purposefully chosen the personal touch of a guesthouse over the anonymity of a hotel. They are smart, considerate, genuinely interested in the the place they are visiting and as such, more likely to leave a positive impression of themselves behind them.
   

Fresh snow for the holidays.

Fresh snow for the holidays is a rare Vancouver treat! We have been decorating and baking. Our Christmas scones have green cherries and peppermint oil in them. Yummmm. The sweet smells from the kitchen combine with the evergreen odours of wreath, garland and tree.


Inside, everything is cosy by the fire. The old house creaks in the frosty weather. I am sure she feels her age on winter nights but her spirit is ready for another hundred years.


Even though we close the B & B for Christmas Eve and Day, New Year's Eve and Day, we receive lots of holiday guests, who need a little getaway to shop or ski or just to get away. Sometimes, it's an especially good time to rekindle a romance and look forward to the new year together. Sometimes, it's solo downtime, to write, to think or just to rest. We understand. We set the stage, spread a big home-cooked breakfast but otherwise leave them to their privacy and own thing.