In this episode of the Hotel Moment podcast, Bree Brostko, Chief Operating Officer and Head of Brand Strategy at Retro Hospitality, joins podcast host and Revinate CMO Karen Stephens to share the art of transforming unlikely properties into remarkable hotels, where guests can find joy in staying in night after night. Bree explains how brand storytelling shapes the guest experience and why planning out every guest touchpoint is part of building your brand narrative, which is key to your property’s success.

Listen in and find out if your brand story could use a few more chapters while identifying guest touchpoints you may be lacking. Hint: your email channel is a good place to start.

Meet your host

As Chief Marketing Officer at Revinate, Karen Stephens is focused on driving long-term growth by building Revinate’s brand equity, product marketing, and customer acquisition strategies. Her deep connections with hospitality industry leaders play a key role in crafting strategic partnerships.

Karen is also the host of The Hotel Moment Podcast, where she interviews top players in the hospitality industry. Karen has been with Revinate for over 11 years, leading Revinate’s global GTM teams. Her most recent transition was from Chief Revenue Officer, where she led the team in their highest booking quarter to date in Q4 2023.

Karen has more than 25 years of expertise in global hospitality technology and online distribution — including managing global accounts in travel and hospitality organizations such as Travelocity and lastminute.com

Connect with Karen

Transcript

Intro – 00:00:04: Welcome to the Hotel Moment podcast presented by Revinate, the podcast where we discuss how hotel technology shapes every moment of the hotelier’s experience. Tune in as we explore the cutting-edge technology transforming the hospitality industry and hear from experts and visionaries shaping the future of guest experiences. Whether you’re a hotelier or a tech enthusiast, you’re in the right place. Let’s dive in and discover how we can elevate the art of hospitality together.

Karen Stephens- 00:00:37: Hello, and welcome to the Hotel Moment podcast. I am your host, Karen Stephens, the Chief Marketing Officer of Revinate. On today’s episode of Hotel Moment, we are thrilled to have Bree Brostko. Bree is currently serving as the Chief Operating Officer and Head of Brand Strategy at Retro Hospitality. With a robust background in marketing and communications, Bree excels in forging strategic partnerships and driving brand success. Her career includes notable roles such as Chief Marketing Officer at Retro Hospitality, Vice President of Communications at the Resort Hotel Association, and Managing Director at Kindred Resorts & Hotels. Recognized as one of the top 25 most extraordinary minds in sales, marketing, and revenue optimization by HSMAI, Bree combines her passion for travel with a keen expertise in stakeholder engagement and brand strategy. I have to say what I love so much about this conversation — you’ll see that we kick this off and I asked Bree about one of her travel experiences that kind of informed her career and her approach today. And she tells a story about the Grand Hotel in Mackinac Island. And it’s really a fun conversation about the true essence of brand loyalty. So customers who are so loyal to the brand that they want to show up on closing weekend and actually help the hotel shutter its doors for the season. So that’s a great way to kick this off. And I think it also tells a little bit about as a marketing professional and a brand strategist, and that’s really what Bree’s career is in. She has an excellent way of telling stories. And that is clear in the way that she talks to me and also in the way that she talks about Retro hospitality and the unique experiences and brand identity of all the hotels that she represents. So we have a great time understanding how she thinks about bringing new hotels online, and how to identify that strategy, and promote that hotel across the customer base. The other thing that we talked about is the fact that email isn’t dead. So thank you, Bree. She gives a little bit of a plug to Revinate, which we definitely appreciate. But really what she’s focusing on is just letting everybody know that email is still her most effective channel when it comes to cross-promoting and getting her guests excited about their stay. She makes a comment about the fact, which I 100% agree with, that the booking experience and the stay experience really picks up from the confirmation email. So you can hear her talk about how her approach to that carries on. And then the last thing to mention, Bree and I have something in common. We both kind of moved from one role to the other. So I was the Chief Revenue Officer. Now I’m Chief Marketing Officer. She kind of went the other direction — Chief Marketing Officer, now as a Chief Operating Officer. But I love the fact that she really hits on the importance of understanding at the end of the day, no matter what role you’re in, in hospitality, you have to understand your numbers and how that impacts all of your strategic stakeholders in the business at large. So really great conversation with Bree. I hope you enjoy it. And here you go. I give you Bree.

Welcome to the podcast, Bree. It’s nice to have you here.

Bree Brostko – 00:03:29: Thanks so much for inviting me, Karen. I’m looking forward to speaking with you.

Karen Stephens – 00:03:32: To warm us up, I wanted to ask you, because I had a look at your website and your experience, and I know you’ve been in the industry for a while. And so many of us that have travel and hospitality experiences have travel memories that inform our work today. So to warm us up, is there a memorable travel experience that has particularly influenced your perspective on what it means to build a hotel brand that guests love?

Bree Brostko – 00:03:55: What a great question. Yes. I mean, one certainly sticks out in my mind. Years ago, I ran a marketing and PR co-op for independent boutique hotels. And we had about 63 properties throughout the United States. And they were all incredibly special. But one that was extra special in my heart is called the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island. I don’t know if you know that property, but it’s one of the beautiful kind of old wood Grand Dame hotels from the railroad era. And on Mackinac, no cars, just horse-drawn carriages. And so I worked quite closely with them when they were owned by the Muster family and had this fabulous DOS, Annie. And the interesting thing about the Grand is that each room is very different. It’s a Dorothy Draper design style. And so guests really like to see the different rooms because one room type is not like the other types. I mean, we really gave themselves headaches over having so many different room types. But the hotel, it’s seasonal. And because it’s seasonal and because it has such a dedicated fan base, it’s basically 99 to 100% occupancy the entire time it’s open. So guests don’t have the opportunity to peek in another room because basically everything’s occupied the whole season. And so sort of to address that topic and to fill some shoulders — so, towards kind of the end of the season, October, when it’s getting colder, they have more occupancy. And so the hotel had started this idea called Closing Weekend. And the purpose was that they would invite their dedicated fans and guests and open up the doors to all of the rooms. So you come and stay for the weekend and you can peek into all of the rooms that you hadn’t been able to see and see all the different room types, and then help the hotel close its doors for the season. And so it was this amazing idea. The interesting thing that happened is that that closing weekend became so popular that now that’s also sold out. So you can’t really see the rooms, but Annie Farrell, the DOS, had invited me to Mackinac Island to experience this closing weekend. And this is a long story to get to your point of a really unique experience. It was so beautiful to be there because really, if you think about it, the closing of a hotel is really just a lot of work. There’s so many things that need to be done and how the hotel gets shuttered for the season, but they made it this beautiful experience for the guests. And so on the last day, at the point in time, everyone goes out to the porch. It’s the longest porch, I think, in the world. The longest front porch in the world. And all the guests stand by the chairs. And when someone announces that we’re closing, the guests all pick up chairs and move them inside, you walk through the hotel, and guests are taking sheets and draping them over furniture. And it’s so remarkable. And I think such an interesting example of really loyal guests and activations. And the fact that when guests are sort of drawn to a property or an experience, like they want to be there for all of the experience. And so I think about that a lot of how you can give sort of maybe more unusual hospitality experiences, but that people might be looking for that because they want to have an even deeper connection to the property.

Karen Stephens – 00:07:04: I love that. I mean, you get people engaged. And on top of that, everybody’s got issues with staff. You get people doing all the closing. They’re loving it, and they’re closing the hotel. I mean, that’s fantastic. Yeah. So that’s a great segue into talking about what you do today. So I mentioned that you’re the Chief Operating Officer of Retro Hospitality. Can you tell us a little bit about Retro Hospitality?

Bree Brostko – 00:07:26: Absolutely. So Retro is a boutique hospitality management firm based in Richmond, Virginia. And right now we have five properties under management and another two in development. We have one scheduled to open this fall, and one scheduled for spring 2025. Retro is we’re very proud that we are the largest operator of boutique hotels in the state of Virginia. So I’m based in New York City, but the management firm is based in Richmond, and we have a great presence throughout the Commonwealth. Retro really specializes in experiential properties. And actually, qweryi][ all of our properties are adaptive reuse. So that’s a special niche and value proposition for Retro is working with owners and developers on adaptive reuse properties and helping them tell that story within the marketplace.

Karen Stephens – 00:08:15: And can you tell me what is adaptive reuse?

Bree Brostko – 00:08:18: Absolutely. So adaptive reuse is a, I don’t know if it’s an architectural term or a construction term, but basically it’s the idea of taking an existing building or structure and converting it to something else.

Karen Stephens – 00:08:31: Like a historic property and then…

Bree Brostko – 00:08:33: Exactly. So our owners tend to be sometimes developers, but often just people who maybe have a vision and a building that they think would make an interesting hotel. And so we have former department stores as hotels, former hospitals as hotels, a former — in Danville, Virginia, the former location of the local newspaper, the newspaper offices converted to a hotel. And so what’s really interesting about that is that you’re starting from a really interesting storytelling point. You have all of that history to pull on, and it also provides some really interesting hospitality, design challenges. You’re going into a historic building. Often there’s historic tax credits associated. And so you need to leave certain elements in place or work around something, which would be much different if you were doing sort of a new construction build.

Karen Stephens – 00:09:22: Yeah, this is so fascinating. So I love this idea because when I think of boutique hotels, you think about intimate, fashionable, sophisticated spaces. So here you have these historic buildings or buildings that are being repurposed. So how do you think of that as the Chief Operating Officer? How do you then transform that hotel? And how do you think about brand identity? So can you just give me an example of maybe one of those hotels that you converted in your approach there? Because that is just fascinating.

Bree Brostko – 00:09:50: Absolutely. One that I think is particularly interesting is slated to open next spring, summer 2025. And it’s in a little town called Bedford, Virginia. And this is a renovated school building, kind of that 1920s style with like large hallways. And this hotel is going to be named Hotel Fauna. And what’s interesting about the town of Bedford is that it’s a very small town in Virginia, but it is known for a group called the Bedford Boys. And they were a group of men that left the town of Bedford for World War II. And they all died on D-Day. And because the town only had 7,000 people at the time, it was the largest loss for a community per capita in all of World War II. And so it sort of almost even really felt today. And so the entire community, the US D-Day Memorial, is located in Bedford. And so the whole community kind of really acknowledges and is tied to this story. And so we had this really interesting opportunity to want to celebrate the fact of this sort of historic moment from this town and also bring an interesting boutique experience. There isn’t really any boutique lodging in this community. And so with the Hotel Fauna, we wanted to really lean into more the natural elements like — the Appalachian Trail is right there. And you’re really in the kind of the beautiful mountains. And then also weave in elements of the Bedford story. So for instance, the gymnasium at the school, hosted the last dance before the Bedford Boys went off to war. They had this community dance and there’s a plaque outside of the gym. And so we’re thinking about ways to incorporate that. Like I want to do an annual dance in the gymnasium kind of as a sort of honor and remember and celebrate the Bedford Boys. So I’m really excited about that project. I think it’s really neat and unusual. And so that’s sort of some elements we’ve been thinking about as we’ve been working on that property.

Karen Stephens – 00:11:45: Wow, that is so cool. So I’m going to keep pulling on this thread if that’s okay, because now we know how we get a former school to a boutique hotel. I love the story there. Can you also talk about how you think about a marketing strategy now as that property starts to come to life? So you’ve got a collection of hotels. They’re all bespoke. They’re all unique. Can you talk to us a little bit about how you market the new hotel, what your approach is there? And then I’m also just curious to know if you’re tapping into any of the other guests who might have stayed at some other properties, even though they’re not the same experience, if that makes sense.

Bree Brostko – 00:12:19: Yes. No, I mean, I think that’s such a great point. We are very fortunate that we have this portfolio of boutique hotels in Virginia and people are staying at them for different reasons. But clearly, our guest profile is someone who’s more interested in the boutique experience. And so we do do cross-property marketing. We try to be very thoughtful and purposeful about those types of communications because we certainly don’t want to be overburdening any guests. But we think it’s a great opportunity to sort of activate this population that’s already expressed interest. In terms of marketing a new property, I think obviously so much research and so much data goes into who’s coming to this area. Who is a potential visitor? This property specifically that I’m speaking to, we think is probably going to be a lot of a drive market. In Virginia, you often want to activate the DC metro area because that’s a huge population center that’s interested in getting outdoors. We do a lot of studies about, What are the value propositions of our property? and Who are our guests? and What is that guest profile? So because of our boutique hotels, we don’t have unlimited dollars or unlimited spend. And even in the digital marketing space, we have to be very thoughtful and purposeful because we just can’t afford to appeal to everyone. So creating those guest personas are so important for us. And so for this property specifically, there’s a large active component. I mentioned the Appalachian Trail. There’s also a huge bike-riding community that comes to that area to do road races and general riding. So that’s an area of interest for us. There’s also a very large population of people who come and do frisbee golf there. So it’s like really interesting active population that we’re looking at attracting. And so that certainly informs some of our decisions. We’re thinking about the guest who’s arriving, and maybe they’re planning on spending time outdoors. Where are our water bottle refilling stations instead of having plastic bottles on hand? Will guests have muddy shoes from being on the Appalachian Trail? What’s the sort of guest room entry experience like, and how do you accommodate for that? So really getting into those guest personas are really important for us. The other thing that we do at Retro that we’re very proud of is focus on local, and community partnerships. We feel like that’s one of the values of a boutique hotel, right? People want to be experiencing a place and feeling like they know that place. And so we have this great head of marketing, in partnerships named Katie on our team. And she’s sort of amazing about getting into the community and working with the property to create those partnerships, whether it be with like Amtrak or a local bourbon company or what have you to bring those experiences into the property. And that’s something that we really lean into with those partnerships as well.

Karen Stephens – 00:15:09: Yeah, which is such a great idea. I mean, we’ve heard this a lot on the podcast that it’s way beyond the hotel at this point. It’s about your local experiences. It’s about what else is happening in the community. What can I do on my vacation? I love it that you’re personalizing for people with muddy shoes, and who are not gonna appreciate a plastic water bottle. They’re gonna want that refill station. I love that. Let me ask you, so what are the digital touch points you use or what are the channels that you leverage that are most effective for you to stay in touch with all of these guests? And also really, as you’re saying, make sure that they understand what the local attractions are. So how do you think about that from a marketing perspective?

Bree Brostko – 00:15:46: Absolutely. But I’m a huge revenue brand advocate. And I think that at a certain point in my career, I feel like some people were kind of less excited about email marketing. Sort of everyone felt like, Oh, we’ve been doing this for a while. There’s something else. But I feel like in the numbers that we see consistently are that email continues to be one of our best communication tools. From open rates, from engagement, basically across every metric, email continues to perform for us. And so one of the things that we certainly do, obviously we’re looking at other channels, and we’re leveraging text and trying to play in any sort of new, interesting digital space, but really leaning into this product that we use through Revinate and making sure that we’re continuing to touch the guests before their arrival to give them those nuggets to surprise and delight them or things to look forward to. One of our properties in Richmond has this amazing art gallery and the exhibits change every six, to eight weeks. And it’s such a great opportunity. The gallery is attached to the hotel and it’s a wonderful experience to be able to check this out and see local and regional artists. And so we really lean into the art and the art gallery to be sort of doing a drip campaign to people who have already booked, letting them know about who the artist is that’s displaying. Here’s some examples of their art and this is the hours of the art gallery. So making sure that they’re getting excited about the trip. Thinking about how to — things they might want to do while they’re on site. So we lean into email quite heavily.

Karen Stephens – 00:17:19: I love that. I think the other point that you’re making as well is that there’s the marketing aspect where you’re trying to drive bookings and revenue, which is obviously very important. But the guest experience from the booking on, all of the communications that you can do pre-arrival to get people excited. It’s like the stay starts before the stay and the ramp-up to that.

Bree Brostko – 00:17:39: You’re exactly right. Like, I think from the minute you get that confirmation email, that it has started. You’ve almost had an opportunity to lose it before someone even arrives, right? Depending on the quality of the communication. And so, yes, absolutely. I think I find all of our guests are savvy consumers. Everyone’s experiencing other online purchases, and sort of living their lives, expecting to interact with brands that they are interested in or want to learn more. And so we want to make sure that we’re delivering just as well as any other product they’re purchasing.

Karen Stephens – 00:18:12: Yeah, I’d love that. So your role at Retro, I mentioned in the intro, you were the Chief Marketing Officer, and now you’ve transitioned to the Chief Operating Officer and Head of Brand Strategy, which is such an awesome transition. But can you tell me, has there been any change to your approach to communication and marketing strategy now that you’re on this side of the house? Or does it all kind of come together? What has your journey been like personally making that transition?

Bree Brostko – 00:18:35: Such a good question, Karen. Short answer is yes. One of the reasons I made this transition is that through our organization, we saw a need to have this role that could be really focused on maximizing revenue for our owners, and making sure we’re appropriately staffed, and all of our properties are getting the resources that we need. But I will say that often when you’re in a marketing role or communications role or a public relations role, sometimes, I mean, the feedback I’ve gotten sometimes is that people always feel like I’m just spending money, right? Like you’re just spending money. Where’s the ROI? You just, always want more money. Which was true for excellent reasons, but being more in this operations role and sitting with the number so much more, I have become so much more of a critic or take a critical eye to spending kind of across the board. I think really pushing our team to say, Well, that’s a great idea. What is the ROI? How long till we see that? Like stress testing it a lot more, and really thinking about it through the lens of our owners. Here’s a spend. How long will it be, until they see the return on that or doing this brand or public relations push? Like how can we measure that? And I think I’ve absolutely noticed a change in the way that I approach operations in general.

Karen Stephens – 00:19:53: Right. It sounds like with operations, you have to be able to cultivate stakeholder engagement for life because you’ve got owners, you’ve got your own exec teams to work with, and all of that. So that’s very interesting. I mean, do you have an example that comes to mind? Or if someone is out there thinking, Okay, I’m new in the business, and I’m trying to reach my objectives, and I’ve got to get all of these other people engaged and on board. So what is your approach to stakeholder engagement? And can you think of a good example of how that’s worked for you or an effective strategy?

Bree Brostko – 00:20:23: Earlier in my career, a couple of mentors had guided me to take accounting courses. As a marketer and a comms person, I steered very clear of accounting courses. And so when I was in grad school, getting a communications master’s, I decided to take some accounting courses as electives to really build that muscle, I guess. And one of the reasons that these mentors had guided me to do that was, they said, Marketers and communications people speak a different language than the finance team. And throughout your whole career, you’re going to be needing to talk to them about money and investment and ROI. And if you’re basically coming to the table with a completely different vocabulary than this group of people that it’s going to be so important to communicate with, you’re doing yourself a disservice. And so I did that. And I’m so very glad that I did because they were exactly right. Like being able to sit at the table through budget season or through finance meetings, and have a better understanding of where they’re coming from has really helped me. And I think it’s almost critical to do that. So that’s sort of my advice to everyone. And in this COO role, it’s even more important. Like I’m really leaning into that learning. And I’m so glad that I did that.

Karen Stephens – 00:21:43: I want to double down on that statement because I think a lot of our listeners are marketing professionals. They might be coming up in their career. You’ve had a great career in marketing. You’ve transitioned now, and you’re Chief Operating Officer. Bottom line — know your numbers. I mean, I bang on about net operating income, and I think business runs on dollars and cents. And I think sometimes when you’re on the marketing team, of course, we’re creative individuals, and we want to talk about brand identity and influence and how people, but you need to be able to translate how that impacts the business overall. So that is an awesome piece of advice.

Bree Brostko – 00:22:17: Yeah, thank you. I actually listened to the podcast that you did with the gentleman talking about NOI. And I thought his sort of point about there’s a, particularly in marketing and communications, you’re measuring all of these things. What is your website experience like? What’s your social media engagement? But he was right. Like at the end of the day, the NOI is what matters.

Karen Stephens – 00:22:35: It’s what matters. Yeah, that was Joe Pettigrew from EOS Hospitality. Great. So I have one last question for you. So where do you see hotels having their moment or spark of innovation? So is there anything that comes to mind that you’re seeing out there? And as we’re kind of coming into 2025, what are you seeing in terms of innovation or sparks of technology that are interesting for you?

Bree Brostko – 00:22:57: Yes, great question. Personally, I am very interested in the metaverse. I think that I certainly envision a day in which we’re using the metaverse to experience and book hotels. So I envision the next iteration being leveraging the metaverse. And I see a possibility where we can’t fathom having booked a hotel room without standing in the hotel room and physically seeing the space and seeing what would be out the window. And so I think we’re a ways from that. But I’m really interested in all of the technologies that are sort of steps in that direction, whether it be firms that provide sort of a 3D guest experience through public spaces, which is really popular on the group side. And so that type of technology is becoming more and more accessible. And so I’m really interested in that and want to make sure that we’re leveraging that because I do see a future in which we need to be sort of even more involved in that digital experiential meta-type realm. So I’m really excited about that.

Karen Stephens – 00:23:59: Yeah, that’s really interesting. Let’s see what happens. It’s kind of like the Grand Hotel being able to run into all the rooms, but from your living room. What room type do I want? Where’s the balcony? Where’s the thing? I love that. Well, hey, Bree, thank you so much for joining me today. It’s been an awesome conversation. I appreciate it.

Bree Brostko – 00:24:14: Absolutely. Thank you for having me, Karen. I really enjoyed it.

Outro – 00:24:21: Thank you for joining us on this episode of Hotel Moment by Revinate. Our community of hoteliers is growing every week, and each guest we speak to is tackling industry challenges with the innovation and flexibility that our industry demands. If you enjoyed today’s episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and leave a review. And if you’re listening on YouTube, please like the video and subscribe for more content. For more information, head to revinate.com/hotelmomentpodcast. Until next time, keep innovating.

About Revinate

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Our Guest Data Platform and communication solutions unlock revenue for hoteliers and put them in control of the full guest experience — initial research, booking, check-in, throughout the stay, and even after check out — all via the communication channels that guests prefer, whether it's voice, text, email, or web.

More than 12,000 hotels globally bank on Revinate to drive direct revenue and deliver delightful guest experiences.

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