We just signed up as members of a Yahoo group (as distinct from a group of yahoos) called the Caucus of American Inn Keepers, or CAIK. The acronym isn't exactly evocative -- PANCAIK, while more breakfast-y, would have been a stretch! -- but there seem to be more than 150 members who are also B&B owners, so the connection will hopefully prove to be mutually beneficial.
Members responding to our request to join seemed concerned that we don't have an inn-related URL, although at least one was intrigued by our reason for applying, which I worded as follows: My wife Jenny and I have been in the B&B business since 2003 and are planning to set up a new innkeeper exchange service that will also be accessible to potential guests.
What is an innkeeper exchange service? was a fair question asked within hours of our sign-up, so I guess I should get cracking on providing an answer.
B&BInnterchange started to form inside my fevered brain when we were running the Artists Inn and had regular calls from other B&B owners or managers wanting to know if we participated in exchanges. One was from Hawaii, I remember, and that was the only inquiry that really sounded promising, the downside being that we would have to dig deep for a couple of airfares and the added cost of the trip would pretty much offset any advantage enjoyed from free room(s)!
Other calls were from Maine, Arizona, Oregon and various parts of California, and in every case I agreed to discounts as "a professional courtesy" although I doubted that we would ever have the time or the inclination to take up offers of reciprocation.
It seemed like a waste of a potentially useful resource, and the more I thought about it, the more I became convinced that B&B operators would benefit from having access to a service that made room-night exchanges more attractive and practical.
There are plenty of state and local innkeeper associations, but their focus is always (and quite sensibly) on marketing and reservations, and I started to think about other needs that people in the B&B biz might like to see covered.
While we were in South Pasadena, we ventured out to only two other B&Bs, both of them in Southern California. One was the breathtakingly gorgeous (and mind-poppingly expensive!) Inn on Mount Ada in Avalon on Catalina Island, and the other was in San Juan Capistrano (the Mission Inn, a onetime motel upgraded into an oddly charming B&B).
The most we could afford at the Inn on Mount Ada was lunch at $25 apiece, and that was not a bad deal. The burgers were good and the supply of Anchor Steam beer bottomless -- and the view from on high out over Avalon Harbor was mind-blowing.
We got chatting to the ladies who own and operate the place (it's actually the former Wrigley Mansion, leased from, I think, USC) and they were friendly and happy to give us a tour.
The folks in "SJC" as it's locally known (as with SLO up north, the full name is much prettier!) turned out to be former employees of Janet's and were happy to give us two nights for free...a hell of a deal.
In both B&Bs, I noticed a sad lack of information about other bed and breakfasts in L.A. County, and wondered if I was wrong in seeing an obvious advantage to some kind of mutually helpful cross-marketing arrangement whereby at the very least, every B&B carries a selection of brochures for every other B&B within a radius of, say, 100 miles.
By then, Jenny and I had been in the B&B biz long enough to know that guests are only very rarely B&B first-timers. The vast majority are people who travel regularly and prefer B&Bs to hotels, even if choosing a family-owned business over a chain "store" ends up costing them a little more money. We even had a handful of guests who knew us from Long Beach (and were, I should add, delighted to see us again!).
It might not make a whole lot of sense for a B&B to in effect direct guests to nearby competition (as in South Pasadena, where there are now three Inns barely a mile apart) but another B&B 20 miles or more down the road could hardly be considered the enemy! Jenny and I got a great deal out of our rather limited contact with other B&B operators, and if we had had the time, would have explored many more connections with a potential for mutual benefit.
One of the many things B&B regulars enjoy is access to reliable local knowledge, and while that is mostly limited to nearby restaurants and sights worth seeing, directions, tips and so on, there is no reason why it could not extend to places to stay. The key word here is reliable, since discerning guests (like anyone else) hate to be given bad advice.
And so the idea of B&BInnterchange began to evolve...
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