The Bed and Breakfast Academy Podcast: Recent Episodes
Karen Thorne
Running a B&B is that job that many people dream of. You get to be your own boss, work from home and escape from the stress of the 9-5. Karen Thorne, founder and owner of B&B Academy and award winning B&B owner, shares all the secrets of starting up, running and marketing a successful B&B, getting 5 stars reviews whilst creating a lifestyle you'll love
When bed and breakfasts opened following the first Covid lockdown, many B&B owners, myself included, stopped offering the room tidy.
Now Covid rules are being relaxed and life is starting to feel a bit more normal - in the UK at least.
There have been a few discussions in my Facebook Group for Course Attendees about what happens to room tidies going forward. So I thought I'd use this podcast to discuss:
- What is a room tidy and how long does it take?
- What does a room tidy involve?
- When should you change the bed linen if guests are staying more than one night?
- What if guests leave the room in a mess? What happens if the guests don’t go out?
- What happened to room tidies during Covid?
- What’s the future of the bed and breakfast room tidy?
- Quick tips for managing your room tidies
If you find this podcast useful, you’ll discover everything that’s involved in running a successful B&B in my online course
It’s Karen here, I’m the owner and founder of Bed and Breakfast Academy.
I provide training and ongoing support to aspiring and existing bed and breakfast owners, helping them create a B&B lifestyle they’ll love living, with guests who become repeat fans!
In this week’s podcast, I discuss the best fish finger sandwich I’ve ever had and what that has to do with getting recommendations and reviews for your B&B.
I've included a few tips for increasing the number of recommendations and reviews you receive for your B&B.
Here are a few other posts I think you'll find useful:
How to respond to a negative review about your bed and breakfast
Why repeat guests are so important to most B&Bs
Complete bed and breakfast training course
With increases in the cost of living; energy bills, fuel, food and supplier costs increasing, many bed and breakfast owners are bracing themselves for potentially difficult winter.
Whilst we have little control over rising costs, now is the time to be thinking about taking positive action to help your business through this period. At our latest B&B community meeting, we talked through ideas, both for saving money by reducing costs and also ideas for generating more income.
This podcast includes some of those ideas. I hope you find it useful and are able to implement some of them in your own business.
Find out more about signing up for our online course and joining our B&B community here >> Sign up for the online B&B course and get immediate access
Here are the blog posts and products I referenced in this week's bed and breakfast academy podcast.
Note that the product details contains affiliate links - I receive a small commission at no cost to you if you purchase the item. Any commission I receive goes towards the costs of providing this free podcast for you!
Recommended Products Radiator Thermostats
Tower Air Fryer
Ninja 9 in 1 air fryer
Panasonic bread machine
Blog Posts How to reduce food waste at your B&B
How to have freshly baked bread every morning
Bed and Breakfast Academy recipes
Is it time to put on a summer duvet yet?
10 ways to attract more guests to book directly with you
Pre packaged food legislation
Do you need a licence to sell alcohol at your B&B
How to stay fit as a bed and breakfast owner, especially as you get older. This week's podcast episodes is a bit of a step away from talking about B&Bs, but it really is relevant for bed and breakfast owners, especially those of us who are over 55, even if you're not a B & B owner and never intend to be one, I believe this episode will be of interest.
In the B B course, I go through all of the skills experience and attributes that you need as a Bed and Breakfast owner. And one of the most important of those is being physically fit and strong and maintaining that fitness and strength as we get older can be a real challenge.
So this week I'm joined by a guest, Ollie Halliday from BeMobile physiotherapy, which provides online exercise programs for the over 55s.
I've been a member of BeMobile myself for near a year. And I'm a huge fan. As I've seen great benefits.
You can find BeMobile, at www.bemobilephysio.com.au. And they're also on Instagram and Facebook where they share lots of useful tips daily.
I really hope you enjoy this week's podcast.
Buying or setting up a B&B is not a cheap business so you need to do your research very thoroughly to ensure you’re not about to make a very expensive mistake. If you’re having to borrow money to acquire your business, you will have to prove to the lender that it will be a viable business and that you can keep up on the loan repayments.
Knowing who your customer is is key to running a successful business. Once you know who your customer is you can create and run a B&B experience that matches their requirements, expectations and dreams. You’ll have B&B guests who love your business. They’ll write you great reviews, recommend you to their friends and keep coming back.
Find out more about the Bed and Breakfast Course here >> B&B Academy Training
Running a B&B and owning a dog blog post
Linda's B&B >> Maple House B&B, Hay on Wye
Sign up for my email list and download the free "Is running a B&B the right business for you" work book >> Sign up today
In this podcast I talk you through one of the most popular posts on my Bed and Breakfast Academy Blog - the Top 8 Mistakes I made when starting a bed and breakfast.
You can read the blog post here >> Top 8 Mistakes I made when starting up my B&B
I’ve set up 4 B&B rooms in the 16 years I’ve been running a B&B. And I'm not too proud to admit that I’ve made a fair number of mistakes along the way.
Some of these mistakes have cost me time - an awful lot of time over the years - and others have cost me money.
Hopefully by sharing my mistakes it will help you avoid the same mistakes, save you money and time when setting up your own B&B!
Just a note to say, that whilst some of the things I've done were wrong for my B&B, they may be exactly the right thing for your B&B. It's up to you to assess your potential market and decide.
I had a very enjoyable morning last week when I was joined by Alicia Storie, who is the founder of A Design Storie. She is an award winning eco conscious interior designer who specialises in designing short term lets and bed and breakfasts.
Alicia creates eye catching interior renovations to make the accommodation stand out from the noise and she also runs her own bed and breakfast in Scotland. This gives her a unique perspective into what works well and what doesn't when designing a B&B.
You can find out more about Alicia and her company on her website at https://adesignstorie.com/ and you can find her on Instagram at @adesignstorie
Find out more about the Instagram Workshop that I'm running for bed and breakfast owners here >> How to use Instagram to get more direct bookings at your bed and breakfast
As the spotlight is very much on the environment at the moment, I thought it might be useful to look at how to reduce food waste at your B&B.
Find out more about the live mini workshop I'm running for aspiring B&B owners >>>
First steps to owning a bed and breakfast >>>
First steps to owning a B&B - workshop
Check out all of the recipes I mentioned at >>>
Bed and Breakfast Academy Recipes
Read more on the B&B academy blog >>>
Bed and Breakfast Academy Blog
It's difficult not to take it personally when you receive a negative review about your bed and breakfast. But you can turn a bad review into a great B&B marketing opportunity. In this episode I discuss ways of not taking it personally when you receive a review, turning it to you advantage and include my 10 steps to responding to a negative bed and breakfast review,
Running a bed and breakfast can be an amazing and fun lifestyle. But like any business it can also come with its own problems and it's not for everyone.
In this episode I talk through the main pros and cons of running a B&B.
Further blog posts you may find useful:
Setting boundaries at your B&B
How to respond to a negative review
Online B&B Training Course
In this week's episode I'm going to share the things you need to consider when deciding whether running a bed and breakfast is the right business for you.
You'll find the free download I mentioned here 👉 get the free guide
Find out more about the Online B&B Training here 👉 How to set up, run and market your own B&B
It may be your dream business, but is running a bed and breakfast the right business for you? Owning a B&B might mean you can work from home, be your own boss, have more time for your family and hobbies, maybe live in your dream place by the sea or in the countryside and meet new and interesting people.
It sounds perfect doesn't it?
However owning a B&B is a business like any other small business and it isn’t for everyone. And for it to be a success and for you to enjoy running it, you really need to get clear on a few things first.
In this post, I’ll walk you through deciding whether it really is the right business for you.
I'm going to cover:
- Is running a bed and breakfast the right business for you?
- What is a bed and breakfast?
- What makes a good bed and breakfast?
- What makes a good bed and breakfast owner?
- Buying a bed and breakfast versus setting one up from scratch
- Do your research
- Get clear on your reasons for wanting to run a B&B
- What sort of B&B do you dream of owning?
- What sort of B&B owner do you want to be?
- Who is your ideal B&B guest?
I’ve been running a B&B for over 17 years and I’ve made an awful lot of mistakes along the way! I set up my training courses and started writing my blog to help other new B&B owners avoid those same, often expensive mistakes.
Don’t get me started on the sisal carpets and the chenille headboards ….
If you do decide you want to explore your options for running a bed and breakfast further, I've written a comprehensive online course to get you started. I also run an amazing community of B&B owners, who have gone through my training.
In this episode, I'm joined by Clare Wright, who runs the School House B&B in Shropshire with her husband Dave. Clare and I chat about setting a B&B up from scratch, why it's so important to your business to take time out and the importance in organisation and structure when marketing your B&B.
You can find the School House online:
- On Facebook
- On Instagram
- Website
In this week's podcast I discuss how I found inspiration for my own B&B, share a confession about staying at B&Bs and also let you in on something a bit personal about my weekend. You can listen here... or you can read the transcript below
Join Karen, owner of Bed and Breakfast Academy, and Claire Byrne, owner of The Corner, Broadstairs to find out what it's like to set up a brand new B&B.
You can follow Clare on Instagram here --> The Corner Broadstairs
Find out about the B&B Academy Training Course here --> Learn how to set up, run and market your own B&B
If you've thinking about running a bed and breakfast, then this video is a much watch!
Joining me on this ZOOM call is Claire Byrne who, along with her husband Phil, has just started up a boutique 3 bedroom bed and breakfast, The Corner Broadstairs.
Claire was one of the first 16 people who joined the initial launch of the online bed and breakfast course back in August 2020.
Something of a star student, she and Phil have created a fabulous bed and breakfast, which is already receiving amazing reviews.
I feel like I've got to know Claire quite well over the last 12 months through our ZOOM calls, so I asked her if she'd jump on a ZOOM call with me to share her experience of setting up her B&B and how the course helped her.
"For me it has been one of the most valuable parts of setting up the business... I can't imagine being in this position having not even gone through the course or been party to some of the group work that we've done.
... it's been fundamental really, and I'm super appreciative of it. I actually think I would highly recommend it because, for me, I wouldn't be where I am now, I don't think, or I wouldn't have got here quite so easily, or so quickly, with some of the planning if it hadn't been for the things that we picked up along the way. So thank you."
I've summarised my main thoughts from the call below:
Starting up a bed and breakfast * Claire and Phil have started the B&B slowly rather than jumping right in, taking the time to get feedback, review how things go and make adjustments. * They spent a lot of time on the first modules of the course, doing their research, refining their ideal bed and breakfast customers, defining exactly what the customer might want and thinking very carefully about the type of experience that they wanted to provide. * Being very clear on their reasons for wanting a bed and breakfast, they've created a B&B experience that meets their own lifestyle and goals of spending more time together and having more downtime. * Being able to read and understand individual customers and what they need is an important part of the B&B owner's role. * They've clearly defined their individual roles in the B&B based on their own preferences, skills and experiences. But also share roles and are quite flexible. * Practise your poached eggs and make sure you have enough frying pans!
How the course helped * Starting and running a B&B is not as easy at it looks. Claire decided to take the course to ensure they were aware of the reality of running a B&B and to get they help they needed * The course really helped cement their plans and shape what their B&B would be, which they don't think they would have done without the course. * How important the first modules, defining your WHY for running a B&B and your ideal customer avatar, are in helping to create a blueprint of the type of bed and breakfast you want to run, before diving into the practicalities. * Remembering your WHY for running a B&B helps you make decisions for your business * It's OK to have the confidence to have a niche, to only appeal to a subset of customers. That you can never appeal to everyone. * There is so much information there for your at the tip of your fingers. You could use Google but all of that is time consuming. It brings a whole directory that presents all the information to you in neat modules
Claire's experience of the online course * Claire was in control of the speed she worked through the course and how she worked through the course, spending longer on modules if she needed. * "The online course was super perfect" * Can refer back to specific lessons, even months later. * The online course allowed her to absorb the information at the rate she needed to, rather than being overwhelmed in a 2 day course. * Lots of opportunity to get answer to specific questions or clarification, through ZOOM calls, in the course modules itself and the Facebook group. It never felt missed out on human contact.
The Bed and Breakfast Marketing Membership * Claire has learnt so much about marketing through the training * The community is a very welcoming, learning environment. It's a supportive group as there is never a silly questions * To encourage people to try things in a safe environment * Like the course, there is so much information there for your at the tip of your fingers.