1st of the Month Bonus Episode: And the Major Award Goes to... Lance & Elaine Stitcher!

Speaker 1: 0:02

Welcome to Alex and Annie, the real women of vacation rentals. With more than 35 years combined industry experience, Alex Hussner and Annie Holcomb have teamed up to connect the dots between inspiration and opportunity, seeking to find the one story, idea, strategy or decision that led to their guest's big aha moment. Join them as they highlight the real stories behind the people and brands that have built vacation rentals into the $100 billion industry. It is today and now it's time to get real and have some fun with your hosts, Alex and Annie.

Speaker 2: 0:41

Welcome to Alex and Annie, the real women of vacation rentals. I'm Alex and I'm Annie. We are here today for the November 1st, first of the month, bonus episode and, oh boy, we've got celebrities in the house. We have the recipients of the VRMA major award property managers of the year, lance and Elaine Stitcher from Seaside Vacations. Welcome to the show.

Speaker 3: 1:05

Oh, thank you so much. I'm blushing now. Thanks for having me.

Speaker 4: 1:08

That's a heck of an intro.

Speaker 5: 1:10

Well, I mean, it's a major award and it was funny. Somebody said major award and I automatically thought of a Christmas story.

Speaker 2: 1:17

Of course, you see that with the dad.

Speaker 5: 1:18

The dad gets the major award. I was like, but and you carried it around. So I do have a question.

Speaker 4: 1:23

I'm not sure if it's the first time I've ever seen a Frigile. No, no, I don't believe so we never dropped it, it was I did.

Speaker 2: 1:32

You know, I don't want to know.

Speaker 3: 1:36

I do wish we had gotten a leg lamp as well, though that would have been really yeah.

Speaker 5: 1:40

Oh, that would have been great you can give a leg lamp to the recipient next year on your behalf, right.

Speaker 4: 1:45

Here. I thought we had not tested the Frigile part of that. It was quite heavy. That was the. It was quite heavy.

Speaker 5: 1:52

Yeah, well, I mean you carried it around like you were light of foot, so he did enjoy it.

Speaker 3: 1:57

Everywhere he went he put it on the table. I was starting to get a little embarrassed.

Speaker 2: 2:02

It's a big thing. Yeah, it's a huge deal.

Speaker 5: 2:06

I mean that's like winning like the Olympics for our business. I mean, it's amazing.

Speaker 3: 2:10

I remember sitting there last year when the awards were being given out and watching Ginger and Hunter get their award and, just you know, watching the different people going up, and Tim, my marketing person, and I looked at each other and we're like we're going to be up there one day.

Speaker 5: 2:25

We just didn't. Oh, I love that, so exciting yeah.

Speaker 2: 2:29

So for any of our listeners that aren't familiar, this is the VRMA. We just all got back from VRMA International in Orlando. It was the biggest vacation rental conference to date ever Over 2,500 people there. Great energy was a just probably one of the best shows I think that the organization has put on and there's several awards that are given out, that the process to submit into being eligible for the awards is is quite lengthy and there's a lot of competition obviously, and Lance and Elaine they, obviously they won. So would like to hear from you guys what that process was, was like, and tell us what was, in your eyes, unique as to why you, why you, won over such really strong competition.

Speaker 3: 3:15

That's a tough one because there are so many worthy companies out there. Um, you know, from the day we started our business, we've just we've just been ourselves in every possible way with, with owners, with guests, um, with our, with our team, and really I just laid it all out there what we've been doing. We've been working hard to grow a business that we could be proud of and, um, we involve our team in everything. We bring them to conferences, we're huge on education and we we built a laundry which almost killed us. It's still might kill us. It's been challenging. We launched it, um, in in June and peak season, which was crazy, and we're still working a few bugs out here or there. But, um, the community service aspect was, yes, we're very, very involved in our community. I love that.

Speaker 5: 4:04

I love that. Your team is amazing and it's just. I think it's cool to kind of look back, because we interviewed you guys earlier in the year and you talked about the laundry and you talked about kind of like your long range succession plan. It included all the all the key players from your team. It wasn't just like one or two and it wasn't like a family thing you were going to pass on or you're looking to sell Um. So involving your team obviously was crucial to win this award. But the laundry um, I know we talked about that, we made jokes about it because it was um.

Speaker 1: 4:30

Holy sheets was the the joking name in the way, so did you actually what did?

Speaker 3: 4:34

you end up naming it anyway. No, we didn't but, we tell that joke a lot.

Speaker 4: 4:38

We launched the laundry and we got so darned busy that we haven't really had a ceremony or named it, or we just got into doing laundry. Uh was talking to one of our laundry mentors Uh, I think it was uh well too, joe Rufosco and Tim Cafferty and I told him. I said they said how did it go? And I said we had a great year. Everybody got sheets, we never missed a delivery. It wasn't always conventional much like well, nothing in our business is but some water issues and we got the job done.

Speaker 3: 5:09

Yeah, and we learned from. We have so many people to be thankful for, like he said, joe and Tim, and um, actually, we're going to visit Doug Brinley next week. We're going to spend a week in B Hawkins, spend a few days with him, and um, of course we'd be. We have to mention Amy and Carrie. During COVID, when we first started the research for our laundry, went out and spent a week with them. Um, so there's so many smart people in this business and, as you guys know, everybody wants to give back, everyone wants to share what they know. Yeah, absolutely, and it's.

Speaker 2: 5:39

I mean, laundry is definitely one of the least sexy parts of the business and probably one of the least exciting sides of the business, but at the same time, it can be a game changer in terms of your profitability. Um, I'm curious, cause we do. We have people that ask about this quite a bit when they're thinking about you know doing bringing this in house. What got you to that point and how did you make that decision To take this undertaking?

Speaker 3: 6:05

Well, I'm going to let Lance answer that, because he has truly been the laundry guru. But I want to lead with one thing a lot of people out there might not know no one in our market included linens. You could rent linens. We had to drive an hour to pick them up and it was at a pretty hefty cost to us and, of course, we had to pass that along and it was hefty to the guests. So it's something we have wanted to do for years and years and it's been an interesting transition because now we're also dealing with cleaners who have to make beds, who've never had to make beds. They don't really want to make beds. So there have been many challenges along the way and we even had an owner or two say is this going to hurt my reservations, like they. You know they had to look right and it obviously it did, and it has been a game changer for us. But we are still the only ones who not only include linens in the rental but make the beds.

Speaker 5: 6:58

Yeah, we find that I have actually been surprised. So I grew up in Virginia and vacationed on the East Coast, so in the Carolinas, and then my best friend, they had a family house up in the Cape Cod area and it's that's just kind of the norm of the East Coast is that you just don't provide linens. You always bring them, and so I was amazed in my current role with Merritt Hemsenville is like how many people we run into that still don't provide that level of service. So, going into that, do you think that that's going to change your market? Do you think that that's going to make people want to do it? Because, again, it's a big undertaking. But I, interestingly enough, I didn't think about the fact that you have to like now tell your linen runners that they have to like make the beds, or your cleaners to make the bed, like that's a whole different conversation.

Speaker 4: 7:44

It is a different conversation, but it's actually gone fairly well. I think it has been a. It has made a shift in the market locally. For us, it's just something who wants to arrive at 10 o'clock in the evening and walk in and have to make eight beds and you know after they've been in the car for four or five hours and you know as far as how we got here. For us it's been on our roadmap for probably about four years. One of the biggest challenges was finding the right facility in the right location. In our markets on the Eastern shore we have a lot of septic systems and only a few towns that have sewer that could handle the capacity of doing a laundry project. And I was literally just looking at listings online one day because we have a real estate brokerage as well and I came across a church for sale, but I knew where it was and I knew that it had the sewer capacity, I knew it had the water capacity and I was thinking a little bit outside of the box.

Speaker 3: 8:47

Do you remember the timing of this? Though? We had just gotten back from spring conference in Chicago and I came home with COVID, as did a whole bunch of other people, and so we were more. You know, we were isolating at home at that time, and he finds this and he drags me to see this laundry with COVID. Obviously, it was a vacant building, nobody else was there, but it was like no, we have to go now. So here we were, trudging over there.

Speaker 4: 9:11

And for anybody else that wants to. You know, take this journey. It is the most simple, easiest complex math problem ever.

Speaker 2: 9:21

Yeah yeah, deceptively simple, endlessly complicated.

Speaker 3: 9:27

He could tell you everything you want to know, and I'm fairly certain he does not know where the washer and dryer is in our current house.

Speaker 4: 9:38

And the laundry project is kind of like the same with this award that we've been blessed with this year and that you know we owe a debt of gratitude to so many people that have come before us and helped us along the way. You know we always joke that nobody goes to school for this stuff. You just jump in and learn how to do it. And you know, listening to podcasts like this one, you can learn how to build an executive vacation rental company. You know nobody else is going to do the work for you, but there's so much sharing that goes on in this industry. That's the most amazing aspect of what we do.

Speaker 3: 10:18

To me, One of the coolest things at this last conference was we met a young couple. Well, they're not young. They're younger than us, so they're young. They had only had their business for about a year and a half and they have 21 properties. And they came to us and it just reminded me of the day that we were turning, you know, to Joe and Jodi and all of our other friends, and we were so excited, like we ended up sitting with them at the bar in the hotel and, just, you know, pouring everything on them, and they had that excitement and passion that you need to have to succeed in this business and they were just soaking everything up and I think they'll be great, but it's so fun to be able to, you know, turn the tables and pass what we've learned along.

Speaker 5: 11:00

So, literally, you can thank God for the church that you got to do, the laundry which led you to a successful year, led you to all of these great things which led you to this award. So you've been very blessed and we too have been very blessed with your presence, and I set off camera. You guys represent everything that is good about our business and our industry and you know your your comment about people like to share I mean, I think that's the one thing Alex and I talk about all the time is that the people in this industry are very forgiving and very giving and very open and kind, and you just don't find it. I've worked in the hotel sector and other sectors and it's just, it's the case around older are not like anything else. So thank you for everything that you've contributed to make this a great business.

Speaker 3: 11:42

Thank you guys. We couldn't do this without you. I mean, I think, didn't we meet you guys in 2020? I think that was the first time we really cross paths and we've grown in amazing friendship.

Speaker 2: 11:53

I think the first time I met you guys in person was in Chicago, actually, because I think I had followed you online for a long time. Yeah, I thought I kind of want to meet them, because it's like they're always having fun.

Speaker 4: 12:05

I feel like that. I know that I've crossed paths with Annie in the past, but that's been a few minutes ago.

Speaker 3: 12:12

Yeah, One thing that I try to get through to our team when we go to a conference is these friendships don't. They don't happen because you sit with the people you came to the conference with. You have to step outside your comfort zone and sit with people you don't know. Look for people who do what you do and just talk and solve problems together. But if we just remained wallflowers we would have missed out on so much.

Speaker 2: 12:37

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we've got a great group of friends within the industry and we're all blessed to have these opportunities. It feels like we get to go on these little mini vacations together. I mean, somebody said to me the other day it's the same for me as well. I see my industry friends more than I see my regular friends back home. In a lot of cases because we have so many events and market visits and things that we're doing to travel.

Speaker 3: 12:59

Well, and that's what makes it so much fun, and I agree with you about this conference Vegas was huge and a bit overwhelming and I feel like it really lacked those connections, those meetings where you could really talk to people, but as big as Orlando was. When I first got there I thought, oh my gosh, look at all these people. And people do this with kids and they come here on purpose and they spend a lot of money for it. But it was amazing and it was very warm and there were lots of opportunities to just chat with people and I thought it was a fabulous conference.

Speaker 4: 13:31

Yeah while no venue is perfect, I really felt like it was a great venue and I figured out what the difference was this year, because when we were in Vegas, they took our group of about 2,500 people and dropped us in the midst of another 50,000 people.

Speaker 2: 13:45

Yeah, exactly that's exactly what it was.

Speaker 4: 13:50

And this year it was mostly the VRMA crowd that was at the resort and certainly in the conference hall, and you didn't have to go through the casino to get there and you could actually look across the room and see the people that you wanted to connect with, whereas that was so difficult last year. So that's off the VRMA on a great location.

Speaker 3: 14:09

And you can feel the energy as we all get excited for Durham and the Women's Summit. I mean, that was just bubbling over there, so yeah.

Speaker 2: 14:17

Yeah, no, we've got that coming up and that's definitely gonna be a nice or a really great two conferences just back to back. I do want to mention one thing, annie. I don't think I told you this, but Steve Trover had mentioned on his show it was one of our very early episodes about how he was out of VRMA conference one year and he got lost and ended up in the lunch for a different conference that was nearby. And he got his lunch and then he went and he sat down and he said I realized he was like I just I didn't know the people, but he was like I just knew this was not the industry, this was not the conference that clearly I'd come for, but he was like I just knew from the energy that it wasn't anything like what our group really had together. And so at this event in Orlando, my husband and I stayed on I had that session on Wednesday and so we stayed Wednesday night before we flew out on Thursday. Wednesday night a new group came in a new conference and so they were dressed much more fancy than we all dress, which I'm all about dressing up. So I was like they look like they probably having fun, but it was not the same vibe at all. The rest of the, just the conversations and just being around them and it just it made me grateful of what we have, and I think we all see each other fairly often and that leads to why we have these close relationships and foster that creativity and collaboration. But so, leading out of Orlando, now we're just about a month away from the women's conference and the Darm conference, and tell us, are you both attending both, or are you splitting it up, or what's the plan?

Speaker 3: 15:51

No we are. We were super excited that they were back to back like that and we're yeah, we're bringing we have seven or eight coming to the women's summit, and then a couple of the ladies are going home and then we have another crew coming in. So I think we're bringing 10 or 11 people in all.

Speaker 5: 16:11

Great, that's so great that you do that with your staff. I know I worked for a company years ago that it was. If we went to conferences it was like one or two people went and they were supposed to come back and disseminate all the information out to 300 employees. And it's just. It's so great when you can bring your leadership that you're trying to mold into future leaders to take on the company, to participate. They feel valued, they feel part of the industry and I think that's what makes the energy so exciting at our conferences is that people are there. They're there to learn and they're there to meet their peers and otherwise they would never meet their peers outside of their market.

Speaker 3: 16:47

A perfect example of this is we brought George, our new laundry operations manager, and of course we hooked him up immediately with Dirk and with Sean and with a few other people so he got to make some connections and talk. There weren't a lot of sessions that really focused on what he does, but he walked away with a real feel for what our business is about and he felt like he was part of something bigger. I think it ignited his excitement and passion for the industry, because y'all know, over there in the laundry building that's not exactly glamorous, but he was so excited just to be a part of it and he came back and he has been cranking stuff out to us all week long. I had this idea and I had that idea. So that's really great, yeah, and we're trying to bring people from every department and a few people who've never come to a conference before. I mean, I think you guys know us well enough to know it's hard to bring a lot of people, but we invest in our people and they're the future of our company.

Speaker 2: 17:43

Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 4: 17:45

Rolling into the women's summit, I believe this will be my second we've been to. This will be the second one, so this will be our second women's summit. And not that the bathrooms are crowded at VRMA, but from a guy's.

Speaker 2: 17:58

You have no lines, no problems. Oh, that's funny.

Speaker 5: 18:02

Well, and besides being one of the few guys at a time I know I have Steve Trevor who said he'd definitely be there. But you know, being one of the few guys, it's like. You're like golden, like all the women love you.

Speaker 3: 18:11

You're our token date for everything right, I think we're going to see more guys at this one. I really do.

Speaker 2: 18:19

I agree, I think so too, and and they're honestly the last one, which was in 2021, I believe.

Speaker 5: 18:25

For the.

Speaker 2: 18:25

New. Orleans yeah there there's a definitely a good amount of guys. I mean we hosted a panel of all guys and like a talk show type format and that was a lot of fun. But Andrew McConnell I remember of course he was there and was in some of the interesting sessions that he so awkwardly didn't realize what he signed up for, I don't think, but he was a good sport about it. But it's, we're looking forward to it and I think you know, on the revenue side, I wanted to take this opportunity to hear from you guys and see how things have been going. I know you use wheelhouse and you helped us last year really kind of get an idea of all the amazing things and tools that they have built for the industry, along with Revin Research, ben Coleman and Rebecca Ballard to help decipher all the information that is there. I'm interested to hear your take on what revenue management has been like this year and how it's been working with those two vendors.

Speaker 4: 19:20

So it's been a really good year for us. Obviously, we've come down from the COVID high of 20 and a half through. I call it about the Q3 of 2022. That's that's when the high was for us. But looking back, 2023 is probably 20-25% over 2019. If you take a year four years ago and you add 5% a year, that's not horrible growth. We were able to maintain occupancy rates where we wanted them to be and, of course, that's always balanced with average daily rate. The entire field of revenue management is a whirlwind, especially if it's not the only hat you wear, which is why we enlist the help of Revin Research, because it's not the only hat we wear. We've got other jobs. But the tools that wheelhouses continue to roll out, and the refinement of their product has been nothing less than extraordinarily and at the simplest level, just very helpful and very useful yeah.

Speaker 2: 20:30

If you're up that much, you guys are having a great year, to be honest, because we talked to yeah, andy and I both talked to companies all over and that's a resounding high.

Speaker 3: 20:40

And on the owner side of things, I will say we all, I'm sure, ended up with some homeowners that bought over the last couple of years. They're the ones that have been really challenging because they paid too much for the property and they were hoping that this gravy train would last forever. And now they're struggling and we're starting to see a few houses go on the market and we knew it would happen. But it's hard helping them to understand, in particular if they worked with a realtor who does not understand vacation rentals.

Speaker 4: 21:09

Yeah, and you know, looking back at the year, and we've had a very good year that I have no complaints at all, but if there was one area that we kind of missed, I feel like we could have done a better job with rate management in the spring. Yeah, spring was late, but we learned from those mistakes back in April and we were able to capitalize on the rest of the year.

Speaker 5: 21:31

Yeah, I talked to a lot of people that well, alex and I talked. We, you know, looked at our forward-looking show kind of at the end of last year and one of the things I said was like people need to be mindful of like the rates need to come down. We can't keep with these elevated rates. And I talked to a lot of people that said I wish I'd listened, because I waited too long to take my rates to where they should have been and I ended up having to discount them by so much that I compromised kind of like the flow for the year and where we were headed. But the people that just kind of sat there and just said no, no, we're going to get it, don't worry about it, we're going to. You know, and then it was like at the last minute it was like markets just started falling off the the panhandle. It's, you know, great example. Some of these homes on 30a were doing ridiculous numbers. And then, again to your point, a lot of owners bought at the height of the market and they can't get there. They just they weren't going to recoup it to begin with, but they were given some false promises and I saw a stat recently that said that one in 500 homes bought in the last three years is under foreclosure in the state of Florida. That's a high. I mean one in 500 is not a ton when you look at the grant, but one in 500 is a lot just over the last three years so, and I think yeah, so yeah, I do too. I don't think it's going to be bad like the last sort of real estate. You know problems that we had, but how are you guys I'm kind of going to the revenue management again. I think that having a tool and having someone like Ben Coleman in his team be there for you, how do you feel like? Has that given you guardrails? Has it given you comfort? Has it given you, like you know, an education that you didn't know that you were going to need or have access to? Like what do you? What do you feel is like the biggest benefit of working with both wheelhouse and the families and friends?

Speaker 4: 23:12

There's several different benefits. For me it's a higher level conversation that I have access to, with Andrew for Wheelhouse and Ben just talking about overall market dynamics and not just what's happening in our market but what's happening in neighboring markets and even other markets along the East Coast and the Gulf Coast as well, because I like to look at overall traffic patterns. I only actively manage rates for half of our inventory, so Jason McConnell in Up in Ocean City takes care of the other half of the inventory, but I lean on Ben to keep a closer eye on that, because I simply don't have the bandwidth to be involved in every single rate conversation.

Speaker 3: 23:59

And they take great care of us. They take great care of us. They're always there. I think I mean you talked to Ben. We made a joke last time about him being at our house Thanksgiving dinner. He was here from Memorial Day.

Speaker 5: 24:10

He did. He was here at Memorial. He picked a holiday and just showed up.

Speaker 3: 24:14

Yeah, but, they're very attentive and always there.

Speaker 4: 24:17

And we talked about the change in the real estate market. It is affecting vacation rentals and I've got one of my favorite lines that applies to both and I use it with owners all the time is. I said look, the market never lies. If you are priced too high, you will sit empty or you will not sell. If you are priced too low, you're going to sell too quickly or you're going to fill up, and it's you know. At the end of the day, it's a you know. It's just a basic equation of managing occupancy versus rate in order to maximize what you can do with the property.

Speaker 3: 24:50

One takeaway from this conference. I went into it wanting to talk to some of our industry friends to see what other people are doing, and my instincts were right we have to loosen our cancellation policy. You know, we have to limit it really tight the past couple of years and I mean we recently lost a guest to a VRBO reservation because the policy there was more lenient than our direct booking. That's just stupid. We cannot have that happen. So we're figuring that out right now. We'll make some adjustments and I think we have to allow more. You know, during during the past three years, covid and everything people did start to expect flexibility and it's something you're not willing to give up, even though it's over now.

Speaker 5: 25:28

Yeah, I think it was interesting. I was talking to somebody in another market out west. I was with John Hildebrand I'm not sure if you know him from Arizona and he was. He was putting out the question or the, you know, the possibility that people would include cleaning in their rates. So it wasn't a separate call out because Airbnb was going to start listing that out. And I told him I'd done that with two management companies before and it's great in season. I think it sets you apart and people love it because it's just one clean price and not a problem. When you get into the off season and things get really competitive, it becomes a problem. And I think my my belief that I've always sort of like leaned on, is that you have to be what the market wants to be. You can't force the market to be what you want it to be. You have to be in tune with it. You have to know what the consumers want and so you can change things. But if everybody in the market doesn't kind of go with you to that, you know again, including it, you're just going to lose out. So you know to your point, lance, being in tune with what's happening, not only in your market but other markets is really important, and I think that that's what's great by having a partnership with someone like wheelhouse and then is that they have access to all of that data and all those information to kind of give you that, you know, you don't have to get granular on it, but that 30,000 foot view of all your competitive markets.

Speaker 2: 26:43

And even just knowing. I mean in your market you guys have there's a lot of I mean, historical players that have been doing this for a long time and guess that I'm in coming to your area for a long time. So they know there are other ways to book reservations besides just on Verbo near BNB. And you know, I know in my former role at condo world we were much more cognizant and always watching what our competitor sites were doing, because that was really where the bulk of the business was going between all of us. And that's changed, obviously, in the last few years. But that was that was important, and it's not just I mean I mean whether you're including the cleaning fees, whether you're including the tax on search results, I mean all these different things that can add up and you really do. It's almost like you have to all decide together how you're going to do it, because otherwise it's misleading to the guest and you have to compare apples to apples. I know we would always try and make sure very clearly at the top of the search results it said you know this either does or does not include X, y and Z, so that however we were doing it at that time it was clear, if somebody's looking side by side, what that looked like.

Speaker 4: 27:44

So I agree with most of what you guys have stated here, but my viewpoint is shifting. If you get back to pre COVID, you know vacation models were still probably properly branded as alternative accommodations. We were growing and becoming mainstream. In the 10 or 11 years I've been around this crowd now I feel like we've. I think we have become mainstream and I believe that the consumers have gotten much more astute. People will search multiple listing sites. They'll search many, many different ways. At the end of the day, I really believe the consumer is smart enough to realize that this reservation is going to be $3,000 on this platform and 3200 on the other and 3150 on the other. The ones that are putting the time into booking, which is usually mom. Mom is going to find the deal. There's no doubt about it. She's been trained to do that most of her life. Mom's going to figure out where the best price is.

Speaker 2: 28:55

Should we as an industry, should we make it easier on mom? Are we going to keep trying to make it a complete puzzle to try and solve, to have to go to all these different sites?

Speaker 3: 29:03

On top of the financial side of things, something that we encountered a couple of times, aside from the cancellation policy, was the trust factor. I mean, as a whole, our industry is becoming more and more trusted by guests, but I think we still have a little way to go, because they still think they're a little bit safer if they book with Airbnb or VRBO. We all know that there's a whole group of people out there that have learned to find a feather pillow and say they're allergic to feathers and then get a refund back from Airbnb. So I mean there's still reasons aside. I mean, I've seen them pay a higher price and still go to the channels.

Speaker 4: 29:40

So that, to me, says that we still have our work cut out for us because we don't want that obviously yeah, and I think as an industry we are going to make it easier on mom to use that example, because most people are like I said, they're getting better at these searches. But I think that I don't think there's anything wrong with all inclusive pricing. I think you can use that model and be fairly successful. I think the most important thing is to keep it simple. We typically just display rate, rate, taxes and cleaning, so it's all there. Occasionally we'll get a little bit of pushback from the Airbnb channel because people sometimes they just see that lowest advertised rate, yeah, your February rate yeah.

Speaker 3: 30:29

It might be.

Speaker 4: 30:30

In our market. It might be our February first rate when our occupants?

Speaker 2: 30:34

Yeah, $59 a night.

Speaker 4: 30:36

Exactly and they put. They plugged that in for the 4th of July and like, oh, it said it was as low as $99 or whatever, and sometimes it's an education. But even most of those people are smart enough to know about or they're just playing the angle.

Speaker 5: 30:52

Yeah, so I wanted to take back or take back, go back to this award that you guys have won. I think again really incredible, and I'll be honest, since I've not been in property management since like 2015, 2012. So it's been a while that I've not been in the business. What do you think sets you apart to win this year? What do you think was the factor? Was it the laundry? Was it you guys stepping on doing something that far apart for the rest of the market? Or what advice would you give someone who wanted to win this award next year?

Speaker 3: 31:26

I think the laundry it demonstrated our innovation, but honestly, I think so much of it has to do with our culture, our team. We've built this living, breathing thing that is seaside vacations, and it's not just us. A couple of people said to me that was really nice that you brought your team on the stage. Well, why wouldn't I? And actually I wanted to shed a tear that the entire team wasn't there for that. So I think it's everything, but I really think that our culture sets us apart, because it's just, it's an amazing thing, yeah.

Speaker 4: 32:00

And it's not. It's not about the, it's certainly not about the. It's about the journey is what it's. So it's ultimately comes down to and we started this a little over eight years ago and it has been. We've been on the hunt for excellence every single day and we've been relentless about it and we've still got room to. We've still got room to make things better and room to grow. You think yeah, I think we all do, and but I think it was just becoming a well rounded organization with a great team that's involved in the community, that's innovative and in support of and involved in the industry as well. So I really don't feel like there's any one particular thing. I think it's the culmination of putting all of the pieces together and, honestly, it's still sinking in. But at the end of the day, when people were coming up and you know friends and mentors were coming up and congratulating us on the war, on the award, and I'm turning around and saying I said thank you for helping. Yeah yeah, because everybody, everybody has had a piece, everybody's had a piece of in getting us to where we are, because we couldn't have done it without all our friends.

Speaker 2: 33:19

Well, I think you guys are very humble, to say the least, and authentic, and that that comes across and how you're perceived within within the industry and certainly had a big role in why you won the award. And I'm sure back home that's what is ingrained in your team as well and that makes a big difference. I was just at a chamber event this morning with Coastal Carolina University and there are several probably about 20 graduates that were part of this accelerated class and they met with several of us to ask questions about how to navigate the career field and what they were going to do, and a lot of them in marketing asked me about you know what, like what should I want to do? Like, what type of marketing job do I want to have? And it was very. Their questions are very tactical and I said you know, at the end of the day, it's less about what you actually do and it's more about the people that you do it with. If you enjoy the culture, if the values align with your values, that that you can take menial work that you don't like and make it much better if you're doing it in the right environment. And that's definitely something that I've learned and I think, at the end of the day, the cool thing is we're all in the business of making memories and creating guest experience and helping people follow through with real estate, you know dreams and building their investments and there's so many good things that come of what we are doing as an actual output of the work. But, as we always say, it's a lot more fun than selling insurance. There could be worse things to sell, but the culture is big and I do think that we've seen more of a shift at these events to talk about culture more often, which has been a big thing, and certainly at the Women's Conference I know Amy's got some great topics there about culture, professional development and how you help your teams.

Speaker 3: 35:08

Yeah, yeah, and I think when you, when you realize that you have to hire for your culture and train for the job, it's a game changer. Then you suddenly find you're surrounded by all the right people.

Speaker 2: 35:20

Yeah, exactly yeah, that's a great point.

Speaker 4: 35:23

So feel free to edit this part out. I'm going to create a little bit more work for the editor. How cool for the 100 collection to have back to back winners of the Vacation Model Manager Management Company.

Speaker 2: 35:40

Oh, yeah, that was great and we wouldn't edit that out. No, I mean, we're friends with that group, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3: 35:48

And I think again, it just shows that you have to have passion for this industry. What we do is incredibly hard, and if you're not passionate about it, yeah, very, very true, very very true. And we were very un-follow in their footsteps, and actually so we've gotten to know Ginger and Hunter over. You know the past few months a little bit better and our journeys are very, very, very similar. The way we built our business.

Speaker 5: 36:11

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 36:12

We have a lot in common with them.

Speaker 5: 36:14

You really do and it's interesting, but I think that at the core, it's the passion. It's the passion for the business and I had recently. You know, we got to interview Ginger and Hunter recently and just had to talk about their. You know their journey and it's exciting and again it's, it really makes it great to cheer on your friends, but cheer on people that are good representation. I think we've we've seen, you know, over the years we've seen some people that are not good stewards of the business and don't represent what we really are. And I think, you know, that was one of the things that I felt was great about this conference was there was not any negativity at the conference. It felt so positive, it felt so inclusive, it didn't feel like anybody was worried about who was going to be on stage and who was going to say what you know, just things. And it was great, it was just so wonderful to feel like this big warm hug.

Speaker 4: 37:04

And you know, I am a hugger, so I loved all of I loved all of the positivity of it.

Speaker 5: 37:09

So again, having you guys win is just like. Just to me was like the perfect thing for the conference. It was like these are, these are huggers, these are my people. So we're so, we're so, we're so proud of you and so honored to call you friends. But what is so you? You got back and you told the rest of your team that wasn't able to attend. How did they receive that? And then, like, what do you? How do you set the bar, like to excel and go pass that and win again. You know, I mean, maybe we two time winners.

Speaker 2: 37:38

I asked Gizran how do that too, Cause they came on our show just a few episodes ago. Can you even do that? I didn't think we could I?

Speaker 5: 37:44

don't know. I don't know, maybe you could probably win again and be on the road.

Speaker 4: 37:47

Well, to answer your question, our team was incredibly proud because we made it, but also sad, you know they weren't there with us.

Speaker 3: 37:53

Yeah.

Speaker 4: 37:54

Very clear that they all had a significant part in that and actually, as we were walking off stage with the team that we had there, we were not even back to our seats yet and I was like, guys, this just set the bar. There's only one way to go from here. And that's so. Yeah, my staff probably gave me a little bit of an eye roll because I filled up two white boards of conference takeaways and they were like, uh, what's he gotten into now?

Speaker 2: 38:24

Well, thank you guys so much for joining us here today. This was great to recap and always happy to see your smiling faces and just excited to see you again in a month in Nashville. I know after this episode, there's going to be people that want to reach out to you, that they want to hear about more about the laundry business, more about how you won the award. So what's the best way for anybody to reach out to you?

Speaker 4: 38:46

Oh gosh, I think the easiest way for either one of us these days is probably on LinkedIn Lance Stitcher, Elaine Stitcher we're both pretty active in that community or Lance at seasidevacationsrentals, or Elaine at seasidevacationsrentals Okay, great.

Speaker 2: 39:03

We will include that in the show notes and we'd like to say a special thank you to Revan Research for sponsoring this episode. And until next time, if anybody wants to get in touch with Annie and I, you can go to Alex and AnniePodcastcom, and we will see you next time. Thanks, everybody.

Speaker 3: 39:23

Thank you guys so much, and I will see you at Kid Rock's honky tonk in just a few weeks. Oh yeah you will.