CEO Of Pebblebrook Hotel Trust, Jon Bortz is 'Curating' a New Brand Collective

Anthony, I'm excited. I think today we're going to curate a really excellent show. You are so smart. I am clever. I'm Anthony, welcome to No Vacancy Live. That's my friend Glenn. You're watching the number one show in hospitality.

Anthony McCurry, so great to see you on a Tuesday. How are you, sir? You know what I learned about us? Even when we're irritated with each other, we still like each other. I'm sorry that you're irritated with me, but it happens from time to time. Just ask my wife, she'll give you all the lessons on how irritating I can be, and then honestly you'll feel relieved you're not that irritated. How are you, my brother?

I'm doing really good, buddy. Somebody excited about today's show, man.

I'm excited about today's show too, because we have John Bortz, the CEO of Pebblebrook, on today, and Jennifer Bardwell, who's the President of Curator Hotel and Resorts, a brand new company that was just announced, I believe on November 18th, also known as my birthday back then, so that's pretty exciting. And everything's right with the world because Colleen, our favorite fan, is here. Yes, welcome back, Colleen. And I noticed she's watching more regularly, so that's great. Speaking of things that are great, thank you Best Buy for being a great sponsor and for allowing us to promote. Because guys, remember, Best Buy Business is a leader in providing technology solutions for hotels, and they carry all major brands of hospitality TVs, but most importantly they've got over 4,000 Geek Squad agents that are there to help you and do absolutely everything. So even if you're technologically illiterate, it doesn't matter. The Geek Squad is there to help you. Be sure to visit bestbuy.com/hospitality to learn more about them and connect with dedicated hospitality. We could have helped you yesterday, huh?

Oh my god, I definitely needed the Geek Squad yesterday. But we are figuring out what these problems are. You know, I've got so many different things going on with the computers that sometimes technology says F you, Glenn, and that's just too bad. But we're gonna get through it. Also, I want to thank Ecotec for being such a great advertiser with us. They've got these great disposable trash cans that cost very little, a lot less than it would be for you to have your housekeeping team continuing to clean them and empty them and all of that kind of great stuff. Eco Technology is an awesome company. Check them out at ecodashtechwaste.com.

You know what I like about them? When you're in the room, it's a real waste paper basket. Like it has, it's not one of those small ones where you put a container of whatever in it and you fill it up. It's a real container, a real waste paper basket, and you get rid of it, and it's inexpensive, and you don't have to clean it and waste labor dollars.

So, my brother from a different mother, what are we talking about? All right, well I think let's tease everybody right now. I'm sitting right here, or I should say I'm not sitting right here at the old Number 77 Hotel in New Orleans. Beautiful hotel. Let's take a quick look at it.

You know, it reminds me of a hotel I built in Brooklyn called The Brooklyn Hotel, and it looks very similar to that with the brick walls. They really did a great job of bringing the brick walls into the room. And really, I mean you don't need a lot of art and you don't need a lot of ornamental decoration because the brick is just gorgeous. That's a gorgeous room, and what I like about it, it's simple. They didn't over decorate it. It's just absolutely perfect. It feels classic yet modern at the same time and extremely comfortable. And to me, I have a feeling that's pretty much the new theme of the Curator Hotel and Resorts brand, brought to you by Pebblebrook. And to talk about it, we've got the CEO of Pebblebrook, Mr. John Bortz, and the President of Curator Hotel and Resorts, Jennifer Bardwell. Hey guys, welcome to No Vacancy Live. Boy, are we excited to have you too today.

So John, welcome. I mean, what you guys have done at Pebblebrook is legendary, and it's just like one of those stories of like, where'd they come from, right? And I was talking to your CFO, Ray Martin, yesterday, and he was telling me a little bit about the story, and it's interesting. And then Jennifer, in the green room, her and I were talking about our days at Tishman. It was the greatest school I could have ever gone to, even though it wasn't a school, and we have the same friends in common. And Jennifer, I was looking at your biography on LinkedIn and I was like, oh, she was a PR Vice President of Tishman. I was First Vice President, so I outranked her. And I'm Glenn's sidekick.

Well, you know, when you think you're at the top, you only have down to go. So welcome, Anthony.

I'm really glad, Mr. Bortz, so great to see you today. I think the best place to start, before we get into the wider understanding of what's going on currently at Pebblebrook, but tell us a little bit about Curator. Why create something new? It's a brand new collection of existing hotels and ones that are forthcoming. What was the impetus for putting this particular collection together?

Because no, I don't know why you just command respect. Unlike Anthony, no, I'm going to call you John if it's okay. I'm just going to tell you, Jennifer's with Kristen, is that okay?

I like that one. We're gonna use that one.

But don't worry, it's the internet, we've got all the time.

I thought so too. Very excellent. I should say also Mickey Mouse's birthday, but this is no Mickey Mouse company.

Yeah, I was gonna say, Glenn picked the perfect hotel because we've both been there and we know the general manager well. It's absolutely beautiful, and of course that's a Provenance managed hotel, and Provenance is one of our founding members. The whole idea behind Curator is that Provenance can stay Provenance, the Old 77 can stay the Old 77. We're not going to say you need to do this, that, or the other. Curator is really a way that you can remain flexible, you can be independent, you can be creative. We're not here to tell you what to do, we're just here to provide you a financial opportunity to do better. And so that's really what's behind it. I think down the road, the opportunity to co-locate together and associate together and be a place where folks want to go to find unique hotels would be great, but really where we're starting here is with the most important thing, particularly in a pandemic, which is how can we help you improve performance.

You know, and Jennifer, I want to, before the next question to you, one of the things John said was that basically it will help you save money and it will help you financially. So what does that mean? What does that look like? And then I want for both of you, I want to ask you, like, why so long? Why did it take a company like you to finally do this when owners have been desperate for this for so long and brands didn't seem so interested in this part of the business? So Jennifer, first the first question is, like, how do you save owners money? And I love the name by the way, I don't know how you came to that name, but you could have picked a better name. Tell them who came up with the name, Jen.

Ray came up with the name. Ray's son, of course.

Oh, so how, tell me the story real quick.

I don't know that the story is much more complicated than, I mean, typically when we name things, we kind of bring it in house and ask our whole team, you know, this is what we're doing, this is kind of the story behind it, you know, brainstorm. And I think it's as simple as that. Ray was just talking to his sons about it and one of his sons came up with it.

No, it's a perfect name. I do think what was behind it was this idea that we would curate these products and services. So you know, you think about our industry and the constant innovation that's going on, and as an individual property owner or operator, it's really hard for you to get in the middle of all of that, right? And spend the time it takes to figure out that technology that said is going to save me a gallon of water or the new system that Oracle might develop or whatever it might be. It's a lot easier for us with so many hotels to test those things and then recommend it to the group. And so we can curate what we think is good quality at the right price.

You know, that tells me, I'm sorry John, I'll give you a second to answer the question, but what I love about that is being in the business as long as I've been in the business, his son and your son come up with names tells me what kind of environment Pebblebrook is. It tells me what kind of dynamic is there, because when companies get so big and they start hiring a lot of consultants and they start getting a lot of smart people in a room talking about smart ideas that really don't need to be that smart and don't need to be, you know, it just needs to be simple and it makes sense. A curator makes perfect sense for what you're trying to deliver. So how do you deliver that and how do you save people money?

Yeah, so I can adjust that. So the goal is to take advantage of economies of scale clearly, so bring this collection together and leverage it and use that leverage to get much better deals. I mean, that's the whole point. When we're reaching out, we're trying to touch every single discipline within a hotel operation, and we go to these vendors and service providers and explain the opportunity. Like, even if they work with some of our hotels today, there's no way they're working with all of them, and Curator's going to continue to grow. So use that leverage of scale to work out and negotiate master service agreements that absolutely no individual hotel would be able to get on its own. But even, I mean, you've seen our list of founding members that are part of Curator, you know, it's got to be better than any independent operator can get on their own today as well. So we're just going through the list of everything we could possibly touch, you know, everything from bottled water to market intelligence reports, AV, credit card processing, energy procurement, Wi-Fi, TV service, insurance. I mean, there's so many things we can touch with economies of scale to bring those costs down. And then the other part of it is sharing some of our proprietary processes that we've been executing on within Pebblebrook for many years, whether that's benchmarking in a very, very detailed manner on the cost side that can help hotels identify where they have opportunities to save costs compared to another grouping of like hotels. And we have some proprietary systems and software that we've created ourselves related to contract management, meaning keeping track of all your contracts and your licenses and permits to make sure you don't miss anything, and also the way we run our capital process here at Pebblebrook, roll that out to Curator hotels in terms of keeping track of all of your capital planning, all your capital budgeting approvals, and the draw process themselves. So we're trying to take somewhat of a holistic view on the operation side of trying to deliver a lot of cost savings and then roll out some things we've been doing at Pebblebrook for a number of years to help those hotels out.

So, so let me ask you guys, there's two things I wanted to say. One, there's a lot of projects I'm working on that I can use your help with, and so I'm sure I'm gonna send you my number right after this.

What's funny is, Jennifer, when you're going down the list of things you can help people with, you kind of did a shimmy. So as a marketing guy, I was thinking about as soon as you did that, I was like, we can do a rap song to say the thing that we can help you with. So we can help you with so, yeah.

Yeah, you do the beatboxing and I'll do the rapping.

I do not want to see that. We'll put some practice in first. Glenn, that's good. I got a question for you. Jennifer and John, all the major brands are very focused on these types of collections, right? Most notably you got Autograph Collection from Marriott, Curio Collection from Hilton, the first one, let's give them credit, Choice Hotels at the Ascend Collection. What makes this different and in your opinion a better choice for hoteliers out there?

You know, one of the things I say is like, people hate third parties and people hate brands. They're like, the brands take all my fees, third parties take all their fees. Well, you know what? It wasn't for the third parties and it wasn't for the brands, a lot of hotels wouldn't be in business. So I'm with you. It's like my job as an asset manager or a developer or an owner or a general manager is to use those brands and those third parties to my benefit, not to their benefit, but to my benefit. And you can do it, and you can do it in a way where it doesn't hurt the bottom line, it actually enhances the bottom line. But you've got to be a real operator to understand how to use them. When you rely on them because you're lazy, you rely on them because you have mediocre people around you, that's when you get in trouble. When you have high performers around you, and Pebblebrook's all about high performers, you know, they don't want to use those relationships to benefit them, but they don't need them for a lot of things. Like bringing in Curator, that makes perfect sense, and it's so over, you know, it's so just, I couldn't even say timely. It's like we should have prevented this a long time ago because everybody wants it. When you talk to owners today, never ever in the industry do I think owners are more fed up with all of it, just all of it. They're getting killed with taxes, they're getting killed with higher wages, they're getting killed with third parties, they're getting killed with brand fees. So even when you see a hotel in Times Square that has had the best year revenue wise it's ever had and can't make its debt service, right? Or you can't make its payroll, and that's a problem.

Wait, Anthony, let's just clarify that was pre-COVID scenarios. Are these hotels that are having problems that are now closed, that are reopening, they had problems way before. If you look at the New York Hilton on 42nd Street, they were having a lot of problems way before the pandemic.

Yeah, there's just to clarify something I said. I agree with you 100%. They could use help. Every hotel could use help. And I don't think if the brands were as strong as they are, I don't think the travel experience would be as great as it is. If you think 25 years ago when you were traveling around, whether it be a brand or an independent, it was like you were taking your chances. Now, because of the internet, because the brands are so strong, because they have incredible people working for them and they've standardized so much, I mean, I can't remember the last time I stayed at a bad hotel. And not because I like to stay in the fancy hotels, just because hotels are so much better than they were 20 years ago, in large part because of the brands.

Yeah, that is really important. So I think a great thing for us to do right now to get a better understanding of it is we've got a short little video, so all of you out there can understand exactly what Curator Hotels and Resorts is all about.

It's so great. Someone pointed out that Xena was part of this group as well, which is excellent. John, I gotta tell you, we love that hotel so much and can't wait. Today I'd be lying if I didn't tell you I may have one or two of those buttons from that wall in my daughter's room. My daughter loved that hotel so much. She loved it very much. And I loved the Ruth Bader Ginsburg painting. And I don't know if you heard, but I had a cheeseburger and I was quoted. I can't say what I said now, but I literally flung out of my chair. So we're sitting, the chef is, and we were tired, so we weren't really that much in the mood for kind of a chef buffet because we had a long day, but we're like, listen, they're putting us up, let's show respect. So we sat there and it was the best freaking thing I did. He started, they cut a cheeseburger to four. I tasted the cheeseburger, I jumped out of my seat, I tried to find the kitchen to find the chef, and I'm yelling over and over again, it's the best effing cheeseburger I've ever had in my life. And it literally is. Anybody that is in Washington, go to the Xena and get the cheeseburger. I guarantee you it is the best cheeseburger you'll ever have. And not to belabor the point, John, but Producer Dave actually stayed the next day till they opened at five just to have the cheeseburger before.

All right, I do want to point out, I don't want to make the chicken sandwich feel bad because that was pretty awesome.

Black Tap, Joe's a very, he's my family at this point, and we're working on a project that we talked about in Long Beach together. It's an amazing burger, amazing place, and I got a lot of funny stories about that place. But anyway, I just think Curator is at the right time at the right place. And if there was a company that was going to create it, I'm glad it was Pebblebrook because the way you were built, you were built from the ground up, you were built from the root. And when you built something like Curator, it is so critical to have that knowledge, that history. But before I go, Glenn asked a question. I want to ask about the logo. I noticed the logo. Tell me how and why the logo. I love it.

Yeah, I work with a company called Alternatives in New York, and it's Mike, it's the branding kind of company I use, and they're fantastic. And same thing, we have so much fun. And when you see it, you know it. As a matter of fact, we did a great podcast with the good folks over there. I will rerun that as a bonus episode as well. So be sure to download, check in, Checking In with Anthony & Glenn audio podcast feed for all of you folks out there watching us on video. Go to Checking In with Anthony & Glenn on iTunes, Google Play, wherever you get your shows, and subscribe over there.

And Anthony, that sizzle reel you just showed, that was the same group, it's Fine Design out of Portland. I hesitate to mention their name because we like to use them, we want them to only want to do business with us and spend their creative energies on our projects. But they also were involved with the logo and the branding for Hotel Xena where you did your show, and quite a few of our unofficial Z Collection hotels.

Yeah, and I want to again get back to Xena for a second. I just, you know, it was so exciting to see a hotel like that exist. I have three girls, right? And they're growing up, my baby's 18 and my twins are 21, and they're growing up in a time where it's challenging for all of us. So they're pretty vocal in how they feel. And to see that kind of woman empowerment, to see that kind of hotel, I cannot wait to go there. As a matter of fact, I think we're going for the inauguration. We're going down there, and hopefully we'll stop by the dinner and do a podcast for New Zealand again.

So we're really talking about branding. I think essentially Curator brand, individual brands, how do you create a collection where all the individual brands have the opportunity to shine and make impact in the consumer zeitgeist while also being under the umbrella of a master brand? Jennifer, you ask really good questions.

Well, it's all my goal to make you less irritated with me, Anthony. You know, the way I'd answer that is it goes back to some of what John said earlier. We're hands off. I mean, completely flexible. There's nothing required or mandated to be part of Curator because we want these hotels and the operators to continue doing what they're doing. I mean, they're focused on their own top line, they're focused on their operation and delivering amazing, hopefully unique, creative guest experiences. And the way we view, if you want to call it the membership in Curator, the only thing we look at are the online ratings because we feel like, you know, let the customer decide. It's important to deliver what the customers want. So as long as they fall within a specific range of the online ratings, that's good enough for us because they're delivering what the customer wants. And even in terms of exactly what we deliver for Curator, it is a pick and choose what works for you. Hopefully, by virtue of the website, the visuals we're delivering, you can see the type of hotel that is going to kind of fit within Curator under that umbrella. And we're focused on vendors and service providers that are a good fit for those kind of hotels. But again, it's pick and choose what works for you. Continual communication with the member hotels and the operators, what are you looking for, what challenges are you having, what offerings do you want to see so that we can deliver to them on the platform and the proposition we put forth.

You know, and I'm so glad you said that you look at the ratings and how customers are reacting to the hotel because that's where it's at. Right? When we went from comment cards to online, you know, the hard comment cards, I was the most excited person in the world because now my housekeepers couldn't throw the comment cards away, so I knew exactly where. I remember when TripAdvisor, I was at the InterContinental Hotel on the Upper West Side. I literally got all the comment cards, I put them on my desk, I got everybody in my office, a relatively big office, and I said, hey, we're no longer going to use comment cards because our guests are going to know how we're doing. They're going to tell the person in Europe or China or wherever how we're doing. So this is great. Everybody was horrified. You remember when people were going on TripAdvisor and online, all the owners and managers were horrified. I was so excited because I like being transparent. I like, I always say, if I suck, tell me. If I'm not doing a good job, tell me I'm not doing the job and I'll do a better job tomorrow. So I think that you're looking at that, and also as you know, fellow asset managers, you understand how much pressure we put on operators and general managers and directors of sales. They don't need another pressure point from Curator to kind of hold them to a standard outside of, are you taking care of the guests well?

You know, and I think that's so true now because growing up in this business, the five-star rating, the four-star rating, and in some instances are still important, but what's better? If you're a five-star hotel with a three-star review rating from guests, or are you better to have a three-star rating but five-star rating from the guest? I'd stay at a three-star with a five-star rating from the guest way before I would stay at a five-star three-star rated from the guest. And I think that that's a good point. And now in today's transparency, I was telling Glenn this in one of the shows, I love the word authentic and transparent when people, like in the last five years, I say that's the word of the year, that's the word of the day. Well, the only way I built my career is to be transparent and authentic. I mean, I don't know how you build a company, and that's why Pebblebrook grew so quickly and you're able to attract talent, because authenticity and transparency is what guests want and there is no substitute for it.

Yeah, I mean, I was just gonna say, you know, just to clarify, so we launched with, you could say seven groups including Pebblebrook, that's right. But day one, we had all 31 Pebblebrook owned boutique hotels in there, so you could view those on the website right away. When you go through the list of our other six founding members and what's in their portfolio that will go into Curator, including Pebblebrook, you get to that 120 number pretty quickly. So right now, we've got the additional 10 Provenance hotels featured on our website, they've already officially signed up, and we've got a group coming from Noble House very quickly as well to get us to 50. And frankly, hopefully it's just, we have a pretty high hit ratio with the rest because they're all attached to the founding members, and we get to 120 pretty quickly. So that's kind of what we're looking at trajectory wise. And since we've launched, we've had an incredible amount of interest. Again, as John was saying earlier, the industry is fairly small, a lot of us have worked together at different companies or we've done deals together over the years. So we've had a whole lot of outreach, and it's been really fun for me to get back to my roots. I mean, Anthony, you know, when I was at Tishman, I was dealing with a lot of other owners and trying to do deals with other owners and managing for other owners. So I've been able to make connections with a lot of these other operators and owners that we didn't necessarily talk to day-to-day as an asset manager at Pebblebrook, but are very intrigued by what we're trying to do and very interested in it.

So Jennifer, something doesn't make sense. You graduated from Cornell, you worked as an asset manager pretty quickly at Tishman, and you have empathy and you understand operations. What happened to you?

Listen, when I was at school, I did every job in that Statler Hotel, and that's when I figured out how hard the work is and how wonderful the people are that work at hotels and they love what they do. And it just resonated with me. I appreciate it so much. I just tend to be more of a kind of analytical, contract type person, so it wasn't a good fit for me. My sister is a hotel GM, she's amazing, she works so hard every day. But I get it because I've done all those jobs myself.

Well, I remember, you know, growing up in this industry before I got to Tishman, I was probably in the industry 20 years plus running and turning around hotels. I became a general manager pretty early on in my career, 29. And I remember showing up and I remember going into that little office at the Westin down at the hall. And by the way, when Robert, who's our friend, was on vacation, I renovated the office after he told me not to renovate it, but that's a whole nother story. So I'm at the corner because we were doing the construction, I needed some more room in the office. But anyway, so I walk into the office my first day, I'm nervous as could be because I'm an operator, like I don't know this world. I feel like I'm punching way above my weight category. And I walk in and basically everybody reporting into me has a master's degree from Cornell and is 10 times smarter than me and about 20 years younger than me. And I remember the first day I walked in and I was like, oh, that's where you guys are. Because I've been in the industry 20 years, I haven't seen a Cornell grad in 20 years. That's where you guys are. You got your fisherman. But I would tell you, there's one I want to shout out one person individually. First of all, Andrea Kepic, who's both friends, was amazing, hardest working person in the world. But John Paulson, I write about in my book that's going to be published in a couple of months, and I went out of my way to make sure I mentioned John Paulson. John Paulson, as you probably know, Jennifer, right?

Yeah.

He should have got my job, to be honest with you. I got the job because I had a relationship, a long-term relationship, and I was in operations, so he brought me in, Robert. But John wasn't sure they got my job. And John Paulson, knowing that he was better and smarter than me, never made me feel that way. And he really taught me the ropes. He taught me cash flows, he taught me P&Ls. I asked every stupid question the human being can ask. I stayed up without anybody knowing on Sunday, spent 18 hours trying to figure out cash flows and P&Ls and LIBOR and figure it all out, and I come in the morning just as dumb as I was when I left on Sunday. And John would always, always be patient and respectful and never showed if he had any resentment because I had his job, what I thought should have been his job. He was always respectful, and I'll never forget that. So John Paulson, if you listen, I love you and thank you.

Yeah, he is a wonderful person, no doubt. We reconnected because he became an asset manager too. We reconnected through the Hotel Asset Management Association, through HAMA, so I've stayed in touch with him and he's fantastic. I agree. I'm so glad you brought him up.

Oh, he is. Yeah, I would have to leave his office every once in a while because I was like, I gotta go look up the words you just used. Hold on. That's why I learned all my fancy words from Anthony.

So Jennifer, we gotta ask a question. So what does Curator offer to some people? Digital marketing, sales? What are some of those benefits to being part of the collection out there?

Yeah, so in relation to anything that has to do with top line, driving top line or providing promotions or digital marketing strategies, that's not the offering for Curator, at least at this point with the launch. I mean, we are completely focused on trying to bring in cost savings for these ownership groups and trying to roll out, like I said earlier, some of the processes and other platforms that we've been using at Pebblebrook for years.

All right, so if you think about it in its simplest form, any product and service that you buy at a hotel, we hope that we can buy it less expensively and save the owner money. So if you want to go out and do digital marketing or you want to work with a web provider or you want to work with a distribution channel or a technology company, our intention is that we're going to have a more attractive financial arrangement for you. So how do you show that to me? I think again, being an asset manager, how do you show that to me at the end of the month or the end of the year? Like, how do you qualify that?

So, to answer your question directly, it'll be part of the onboarding process. So when a new hotel signs up for Curator, there'll be an onboarding process mainly through our Salesforce CRM that we've already set up, and there'll be a portal for member hotels. And we do have to collect a lot of this information on the front end during onboarding. Obviously, we have all that for our own hotels, but we don't have it for the hotels that we don't own. So we've been trying to be very focused on setting up a process where we can get the starting point to be able to calculate these numbers. So when you get onboarded, there's going to be a comprehensive amount of information we need from you so that we can figure out what those savings are and then we can report out to those member hotels again to prove out the value proposition. And it's also, at a more detailed level, every time these hotels are referencing our MSAs and talking to the vendors, the discussion, I mean, that's the whole point, to save money. So if you want to participate in our bottled water deal, as a member hotel, you're going to see all of the detail related to the costs and the terms of that contract. And we'll have an account management individual here at Curator that's going to help through that process to make sure that those calculations are done at the point of signing up for it as well, and then we can carry that forward and prove out those savings over time.

So John, what you didn't see when you were saying that, I said it's here and I gave you a standing ovation. For those of the people not in the industry, they may not understand what you just said, but having a STAR report for those kind of things and those kind of line items and expense reports is like I'd rather have that than a brand new Bentley. I mean, yeah, like that. Because again, STAR reports, cash flows, I was looking at a P&L yesterday and I literally couldn't wait to get home to look at my P&L. I was so excited to go through a new P&L. And you know, I'm a geek on that side also. I love numbers. So if I had a STAR report for that part of the business, it's like kind of like when Starwood came out with the Heavenly Bed, it's like STAR report for expense stuff. It's the same thing. It's to me the Heavenly Bed of asset management.

Absolutely. And John, you know, I don't want to correct you, but I have to correct you. Asset managers aren't capable of love.

There's a lot of love here. I know, I'm teasing you. Asset managers with a heart, that should be your logo. Asset managers with a heart.

No, apparently. Okay, first of all, David Lilly is basically my best friend. He's been in this industry for a long time, and Ray and him grew up together, so that's how I know Ray. And apparently Ray had just told me yesterday that I remember having coffee with him and Dave back in the day, and apparently he was kind of snooping me for asset management of New York properties. And I didn't know that because if I did, I would have probably left the F-bombs out. I probably dropped a few. But no, I had no idea. It's an honor that he would even consider me to come into Pebblebrook. And listen, if you have a job, as quick as I can get away from Glenn and everything I'm doing, I'll be happy.

Sorry, buddy. You're trapped here with me now.

Before we run out of time, because we are starting to get a little bit closer to the top of the hour. John, we have a lot of folks here that are still learning the hospitality business, and obviously you're with one of the most well-known REITs that are out there. REIT stands for Real Estate Investment Trust. Could you explain to them exactly what that means, what its role is in hospitality, and then how the heck do you go and start one?

Right. So if I can't afford to buy a hotel, I could buy X amount of shares in Pebblebrook and then feel like I have hotel ownership which is spread over a portfolio as opposed to a single property. But John, how do you wake up one day and go, I'm gonna start a REIT? How does that, what is that process like?

Yeah, Ray was telling me the story yesterday and I was hysterical. He said something, you had to like figure out a bank account to put the $400 million. It's, you know what, but what I like about that story, John, is you dispel the notion that it started with this glamorous preparation. What you had was you had authenticity and transparency and a track record, and people took a chance on you. Even though you were an experienced person, you needed people to take a chance on you. And it was like you got $400 million before you had a hotel, before you really had a plan. But because you and Ray are such legends in the industry, people took a shot at you. So one of the things I'm going to ask Jennifer, we're going to kind of take a little turn because we're going to end soon, so I want to make this John, this is your life moment.

We've all worked with a lot of different people, and are you going to put my job on the line right now?

What is different about working at Pebblebrook as opposed to other companies? Again, I worked at Tishman, I love Tishman, you worked at Tishman, I know you're very close to that group, so it's not comparing them to any other group, but what makes Pebblebrook different?

The way I would answer that is a couple of things. Number one for me was the culture. So I was the first asset manager hired in, and because Pebblebrook just as John just said, it was a startup, everyone that was hired was hand-picked. And that means it was a function of you've worked with at least one other person here before, you like each other, you get along, you know each of you can handle your responsibilities. And from day one, Pebblebrook has a set of values that, of course, we want to be successful and we want to provide great returns for our shareholders, but it's not just that. It's the value system of celebrating success and having fun and respecting the stakeholders that you work with. So I'd answer that number one. And number two is also just how John operates the company. We all have direct access to him, but it's not overwhelming in a sense that he's not micromanaging everyone. He gives us all so much autonomy to get things done, and we can always go to him to ask him questions. And what I also like is, I mean, it really is, and I don't know why I'm kind of laughing about it, I mean, he really loves everybody here. Like, we go to, before the pandemic, if he was in the office, he wanted to go to lunch with whoever's in the office. And sure, we talk about a little bit of work stuff, but we talk about a lot of personal stuff too. And he just loves everyone here and is so happy to be a mentor. Because like you said, Anthony, Tishman was amazing and I learned so much there, but I didn't come into Pebblebrook knowing everything by any means. And John was so patient and such a good mentor to help me learn everything else I needed to know, and I'm still learning.

Well, Jennifer, just to make a note, it seems that you were looking at me as an asset manager for you, just to keep that right.

Yeah, I can't agree more. I can't agree more. I remember the one thing in the hotel business that always drove me crazy. I started at the Plaza Hotel, where actually I started the first Embassy Suites ever built in Overland Park, Kansas. Bob Legler and Arlene gave me a great opportunity there after I got in the military. And then I went into the Embassy Suites Times Square and then the Plaza Hotel. And one of the things I saw over and over again was we were fixing the same guest complaint, which meant we were fixing the guests, we were getting the guests happy, but we weren't fixing the core problem. And at that front desk, I remember saying to myself, self, yes, Anthony, I will absolutely 100% fix the issues. So what became my absolute focus was room change orders. Why are we room changing? And then engineering slips. Why is that engineering slip not being fixed? Once I focused on that, because in our industry, we have a great way of solving the guest issue but not solving our issue. And I think when you allow people to give suggestions and you allow an openness to fix those problems, they get fixed. When you're just putting band-aids all day long, which a lot of hotels do and we've all seen it, nothing gets fixed.

Right. And what I love about that story is one, you went out of your way to say you weren't inspecting because you don't want anybody to think you're going to inspect hotels. I love that. It was a little nuanced, but that was important. And number two, that the employee wasn't worried about his job safety by saying I don't want to do this five times, because a lot of employees would be like, no, I love doing this five times. It's a great tree. Don't cut the tree down, because they're looking for job security. He was incredibly passionate about it. And that's important, right? As a human being, when somebody's passionate about something, you know it's important to them. And passionate people aren't worried about their job, they're worried about doing a good job. And there's a big difference there. I'm worried about getting fired versus I'm worried about doing my job the right way. And if I have to tell the owner of the property something that could potentially get me in trouble, they have to feel that openness with you and with their team to be able to tell you that. So there's a lesson just in that one little story. There's literally an entire class you can teach at Cornell about that moment.

Yeah, for sure. So just wrapping up, Curator Hotel and Resorts, a great new collection with companies such as Benchmark Global Hospitality participating, of course, Thirsty Alex Cabanas is joining us, I think January 11th on the show. Also Davidson Hotels, Noble House Hotels and Resorts, of course Pebblebrook, Provenance, and I'm talking right now with Ambassador Sommelins' people trying to get him onto the show as well. Springboard Hospitality and Viceroy Hotels and Resorts. And we've had Bill Walsh on the show. Go check our catalog of shows from the beginning of November, late October, I believe was his last appearance. This is very exciting, guys. Any final thoughts before we wrap up today? Let's start with Jennifer and then go to John.

Listen, this was a lot of fun today, guys. Thanks for giving us this opportunity. We appreciate the support, and let us know whenever we can give you any more information about Curator. Thanks for giving us this opportunity.

Awesome. Thank you so much. We really appreciate you guys. Congratulations and lots of luck and success into the new year. We'll have you back real soon. Thank you. Thank you, John. Thank you, Jennifer.

You know, again, the show's built on the backs of people like that. They get coming on, you know, announcing Curator on our show is important for our show. It's a big deal. For them to do that, they can do it anywhere, and they came on and they did it on our show. It's why the show continues to be the place everybody comes to. And John and Jennifer, thank you again. Ray, thank you again. And Dave, thank you for introducing me to Ray a long time ago. So anyway, all right.

I definitely feel blessed to be in the position that we're in to help tell great stories of empowerment and success and innovation in our particular industry. Thanks to Best Buy for being a great sponsor. Thanks to Eco Technology for being a great sponsor. We got a lot more great sponsors coming on in the next couple of months as we move forward. But also, Anthony, I'm just so excited about all the great content that we're doing day after day. And tomorrow, we're taking things a little bit differently. We got Jim Holthauser, who's a top executive, former top executive from Hilton, who went and retired and then went and took a CEO position with a major management company for an ownership group, franchise company for restaurants such as Moe's and Schlotzsky's and Auntie Anne's and lots of great companies. Looking forward to that. Then Thursday, we're going to be getting a tour of Atwell Suites with their brand leader, so that's going to be a lot of fun. Hey, Colleen, stop complaining. We're in New York. We're freezing over here.

Yeah, seriously. I've got somebody outside wrapping my outside furniture right now.

Yeah, I did that before the show. So freaking cold. My fingers were freezing up. I was having a hard time on the controls. I did that yesterday. For the people listening on the podcast, Colleen said send some warm weather to Florida, where we have no warm weather to send. Suzanne, I'm so glad you were watching this show because I think we've learned something for our class. Suzanne is a professor, a doctor, over at Boston University. And we did our first Boston University class yesterday. I came in, she taught the class, she's been teaching it all semester, and I came in and I basically answered a lot of students' questions. And Suzanne, it was so much fun. I just, I, and we're supposed to do an hour, I could have done 10. I think we did an hour and a half because I demanded that we stay on because I was having so much fun. So I can't wait to do more classes, Suzanne. And it was a lot of fun. And thank you for all your work. You can tell how much work you put into the course, and I truly appreciate it. And remember everybody, our show is distributed in a lot of different places, not just in the channel you're watching right now, but we're on YouTube, Anthony's LinkedIn page, my LinkedIn page, our No Vacancy News.com pages, and other places too. But most important, don't forget about the audio version of this podcast. If you aren't subscribed to No Vacancy with the Glenn Houseman feed or the Checking In with Anthony and Glenn feed, go to your favorite podcast provider and subscribe today. It doesn't cost you anything, and it'll educate, empower, and hopefully entertain. And again, most people listen on our audio podcast. That's where I'd say 90% of people get this content. They listen on the audio podcast. The visual on Facebook and LinkedIn is kind of just for you to see each other, even though we still get 7,000 to 10,000 views per show visual views.

Oh, absolutely. We're online so it pales in comparison to the podcast, but it's amazing. It's amazing. Thank you everybody. This was a fun show. And one of the things I love is I love when I can talk to people that I can relate to. And of course John, and especially Jennifer, I can relate to them. And we have the same kind of stories and we know the same people. And I can talk about the little receipt at the front desk for room changes. And those are little things that run hotels. And I used to say it, you know, back before I was an asset manager, you want to run a successful hotel, pay attention to your room changes. You have to know why people are leaving the room. Why are they leaving the room? Could be simply the desk is too small. Okay, so when we do a new room, maybe build a bigger desk. Remember, for 30 seconds everybody wanted to get rid of the desk. Well, guess what's back in the room? The desk. Listen to the customer. That's why I know. I went to a brand new hotel once. I was the first guest ever to check into this particular hotel. Went to my room and I'm like, where's the desk? I guess that they didn't finish putting in all the furniture yet because I'm the first person to arrive. Turns out they were gonna have no desks. I wasn't gonna have any part of that. I never stayed in that hotel again. But that's just me.

No, no, I listen. I use the desk for mostly putting my luggage on or putting my room service tray on, but I want a desk.

Excellent. All right, everybody, be sure to subscribe to our newsletter. Text the word HOTEL to 66866. We appreciate you sticking around this far in the show. So if you did and you're watching on YouTube, smash that like button, subscribe to the shows wherever you get your shows, and thank you so much. And remember guys, you've got one life, so have fun.