A unique marketing opportunity, affordable vacations for innkeepers, great prices for guests.

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As we said before, our aim is to create a win-win-win situation (good for innkeepers, for their guests, and for us).

For the vacationing innkeeper, it's a way to get access to top-quality accommodations for very little cash ($75 for three nights in our Ben and Barbara scenario), with his or her own unsold room-nights inventory covering most of the cost.

For the host innkeeper, exchanges with other people in the B&B business are no longer a losing proposition. He or she can hang on to the room-swap paperwork and use it on a future trip, with the $25 overhead charge applying in reverse, or the reciprocation can be sold to the public in the B&BInnterchange Marketplace and turned into "folding green."

For the subscribing B&B guest, at least a 30% savings on every purchased room-night is guaranteed, promising a room rated at $300 a night for $180, with the understanding that the host Inn can turn down the reservation for any reason (with no payment due until it is accepted, naturally).

B&BInnterchange charges subscribers an annual fee equal to about $20 a month for access to the B&B bargains, but with savings of $80 to $120 for each night purchased, the membership dues can be very quickly recovered and for the rest of the year, it's discounts all the way.

All B&B properties participating in B&BInnterchange are fully described and illustrated in the Marketplace pages, with links that include a custom-designed page of their own on the B&BI website. They are also featured in regular promo and marketing bulletins sent out to subscribers, providing them with effective access to potential guests who might not otherwise discover them.

Their participation also brings them inclusion in the exchange's GPS section, short not just for Global Positioning Satellite(s) but for our very own Getaway Planning Service, a high-tech vacation-enhancing tool that makes it impossible for B&B travelers to lose their way anywhere on the road.

Site visitors click on the GPS option, then use it to select one or more listed B&Bs that they would like to visit. Each B&B home page within the B&BInnterchange website includes local places of interest, restaurants, galleries, parks and so on, along with their GPS coordinates or "Geocode" (ours is N38°57.07176, W119°50.42256).

A customer selects a starting point, an ending point (if it's different) and a midpoint, and the Getaway Planning Service does the rest. Another click will download a file suitable for transfer to the selected model/brand of GPS device.

It's all about convenience and peace of mind, the certainty that no valuable vacation time will be wasted on wrestling with maps and struggling to get back on the right road!

B&BInnterchange subscribers who do not own a portable GPS unit will be offered the option to either buy or borrow one, which will come preloaded with their vacation itinery. "Loaners" will be billed to the credit card on file, with the purchase price refunded (less an affordable rental and handling fee) when it is returned to us. And our price for all units will be competitive with other Internet retailers.

B&Bs that link up with BBI will also be encouraged to buy or lease a GPS unit of their own, preloaded with all their local information, for use by guests who are nervous about getting lost in an unfamiliar part of the country. It's up to the innkeeper to choose whether to boost guest relations by making the unit a complimentary service bonus, or to charge a nominal rental fee for it!

B&BInnterchange is unlike any other service available to innkeepers or their potential guests.

Its biggest plus for hospitality industry participants is that unlike most other Internet marketing opportunities, it is free of charge, and even better than that, it offers cooperation with other professionals that will turn unsold inventory into added revenue.

Existing B&B marketing websites either charge a whopping commission on reservations generated (30% at BedandBreakfast.com, for example) or hundreds of dollars a year for listings that cannot be effectively evaluated.

Keep in mind that participating innkeepers can refuse a reservation for any reason, so there is no risk of discounted room-nights displacing guests who are ready to pay top dollar.

Non-industry subscribers to B&BInnterchange are encouraged to make last-minute choices whenever possible, because those are the ones most likely to be readily accepted.

Remember also that in most cases, each room night posted in the B&BInnterchange Marketplace is there because the owner or manager of the listed B&B has already received full value for it in the form of a bargain-priced stay at another Inn!

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