MEMORY LANE: The Hotel Days

I was looking for some photos and came across some photos from the old hotel I was the general manager of in Ohio.

• The inflatable bellman was the closest thing we had to a bellman. Hey it was a limited service hotel.
• I had a HUGE office. The inn I was assigned to manage was a new inn that was built to impress owner operators so I was very lucky. ...most of the other standard inns of that brand had an office slightly bigger than a closet since the company wanted the general managers out on the property.
• The towels embroidered with the word, "Princess" were a gift from my staff for boss' day. Can you believe that? I know it was mainly one key employee who did it for me, but it was special. I immediately had the maintenance guy install a towel rack in my office and hung them up. HOT!
  

More Hotel Photos

Here are some of the other, but not all of, the photos that Lisa found and we scanned from our hotel manager days.

I don't know exactly what this was, but man, how about the days when I used to use a Rolodex instead of Outlook. Whoa. I don't know what look I was going for here, but it must have been stressed based on the zits I have here. ...and not to mention the missed blond hair color I was going for. Yeah... ...at least I had the tie.

This must have been a day I was doing housekeeping or something. I had on a t-shirt for one of the employee incentive programs we had at the time, THINK RED. (Responsible Employees Deliver) Deliver what? Pizza?
My desk was just as much an organized cluttered mess as it is now. ...could it be a little more crowded please?

This was one bosses day, the staff got me these towels. (I think staff meant Lisa and she said it was the staff...) I had my maintenance guy install a towel rack in my office and I put 'em right up.

This was my maintenance guys. God bless them. ...that's all I have to say.

Hotel Photos

Lisa and I found some photos from when we worked at the hotel in Ohio too that I scanned.
I could not wait to share them.

These are of me working with one of the girls in laundry.
This one was also named Lisa. She worked on a program that she had a job coach with a development program that she worked through. She worked very hard at getting the stains out of every piece of laundry.
She was so cute, she called the "Olive Garden" the "Oliver Garden" and was so excited we all went there after I took the staff to a haunted house and to eat one year. She also used to cut photos out of her magazine and bring them in for me. She used to like Nick Lachey. (I agree.)
I stayed in touch with her for a bit after I left the inn, but have lost touch with her.

Sometimes, like once a month, I used to help the housekeepers kids with homework.
Okay, it sounds nice, but let me tell you, fifth grade math was hard. I don't remember doing compound fractions in fifth grade.
This looks like we were playing cards after something at my desk and I like to think it was homework Thursday.

Believe it or not, I still keep in touch here and there with the housekeepers daughter in this photo. I think she was working at the local stadium taking tickets a few months ago.

Manual Labor

I had another hotel story to tell you. *wink* I am loving this. I miss the hotel business, if you couldn't tell.

See that room to the right?
It WAS a breakfast area.
I had a new prototype build inn in the system and they had tried a continental breakfast in the brand in a few inns and ultimately scrapped it in order to keep the costs low.
A few months later I had empty room that was literally non-revenue.
I had to have a meeting one day and thought I would convert that old breakfast room into a meeting room and sell that space for at least some revenue.
In a limited service brand, that's not standard. Meeting space is not something that the managers focused on if at all. It was all about the sleeping rooms.
I had French doors put in, (You can see they were unfinished in order to save money.) ordered a inexpensive dining room table using my maintenance guys connections, and some rolling chairs from Office Depot that cost so much, I got to make it a capital purchase and not have it fuck up my monthly bottom line and renamed the breakfast room to the boardroom.
This photo is my maintenance guy and I putting together the chairs.
I can tell the truth, I didn't do too much manual labor at the hotel, and when I did, I made a big deal of it. This time I wanted photos! *wink*

I Recall the Riches

I blogged about that new show on FX called, 'The Riches' the other day HERE. I mentioned how it reminded me about a group I had at the hotel I worked at for a few years. I have a couple of scrapbooks from my hotel days and these photos are from that time in my life. I knew I had some photos at home that I had to find. I found them this weekend.

The girls were all beautiful. They would come down and talk to me here and there and seriously, I never could get over how beautiful they were.
During the day when the guys would go out work, the girls would all stay at the hotel. The would go shopping and come back and show me some new shoes they bought or check on a place for dinner.
The youngest girls were so adorable, she would come run down and be so friendly with all of my staff.
One of the mom's would come and pay every day for months for the rooms. I don't think I ever saw a credit card from any of them. It was all done in cash.
I thought they were fierce and it was guaranteed income. As long as they were not selling drugs or doing something illegal, I didn't need to know what they were doing. We all had speculations but in some cases, the less I know, the better. I would much rather feed the speculation than uncover the truth. Chew on that!
Plus, I worked out a deal for a better rate for them and saved me some labor money since they didn't need housekeeping every day and I only had housekeeping take care of their rooms a few times a week. (Plus that way I could keep an eye on what WAS going on in the rooms. It's one of the many red flags that something is up if you don't let housekeepers in your room during your stay.)
They were the worst kind of ideal guests. I mean, I absolutely adored them, but... ARGH! I think most of my staff felt the same way.
Quite a few times I had to explain to my boss why I stood behind a decision that I didn't want to talk about but felt confident about. It's really strange.
It was another red flag that they stayed so long. In Ohio, and other states, anything over 28 days is a different type of lease and different laws and taxes apply, so I would always have to do a formal check out on them after 27 days and then check them back in. (I laughed because I say, I would check them back in. I mean, I would ask Lisa to do it. My staff hated it when I worked the front desk, because I would fuck it all up.) *hehe* (Thanks, Lisa!)

The first year that they came, I think they stayed for like three or four months and had two or three rooms at a time.
There was always something going on with them. Something administrative missing, something late, something broken, something, something, something. It was never REALLY bad, but just SOMETHING. Know what I mean?
I remember that one time, one of the older girls came to the desk and told me one of the younger boys was golfing down the hallway and broke one of my sconces in the hallway. (Fore!) Since I had a standard sconce in the hotel brand, I had to order a new one using our company intranet. Yea, not that easy. When I went to order that style was discontinued. I had to take down all the sconces on that floor, and keep them for spares for if another floor had a problem or sell to another of my type inn and put all new matching but different sconces on that floor. I couldn't have one on that floor that did not match. I sure hope he got a hole in one for all that mess. ARGH! I did tell them no more golfing down the hallway, I would prefer them to go out in the grass and golf all he wants, but stay away from the pricer sign and the bulbs. *wink*
They would leave for a couple of seasons and then they would return.

I think back and think how it would be too entertaining to make a TV show or movie about them, but wait, they just might have. *wink*
I can't help but wonder what they are up to these days and where life has taken them. I remember the last name they used on the registration and Googled it, but there is so much.

I like that I got to tell this story, and I seriously hope they are all doing well wherever they are.