Running a Bed and Breakfast - Four Tips to Success

Starting a Bed and Breakfast Business If you are thinking of starting your own b&b business and already dreaming of the time spent raking in the tourist dollars, review these tips before you start and save some heartaches.
1.
What's for breakfast? Regardless of what you think about the scenic location you have chosen or the amazing tourism activities nearby, your range of breakfast is a big factor in being booked.
Travellers want a good hearty breakfast to start the day with.
This means understanding that healthy food is least desired, and the big breakfast or bacon and eggs will dominate the menu.
Ensure that you are able to cook these foods to suitable restaurant standards.
Travellers do not want cold scraggly looking dishes put in front of them.
2.
Are you located at the travel destination? Most travellers select bed and breakfast locations based on the fact that they are near their selected destination point.
Either because they want to get an early start at the activity or they want a place to sleep after visiting the tourist attractions.
If your bed and breakfast is located along the travel path, or worse, not on the travel path, you will have to work really hard to get travellers stopping halfway along their journey to sleep.
3.
Sharing your home You need to think carefully about the major issues involved when strangers sleep in your bed and breakfast rooms if they are part of your own accommodation.
You need to be comfortable with the fact that they will often walk around your rooms at all hours of the night.

• Are your valuables secured and out of sight
• If they are injured, what is your first aid like
• Do you have safety plans for potential violence or problems with travellers
• If they come back later in the day, is someone you trust always looking after the rooms.
  

4.
Give them space Travellers are not there for your own amusement or to be a solution to the isolated location you find yourself in.
If you find yourself talking too much to them and always hanging around them, give them some space and find other friends to socialise with.
Tourists often want to share their holiday experiences with their own friends or family, and not with you.
Once you have welcomed them and has a short friendly chat, get out of their sight.
The biggest problem I have seen with bed and breakfast operators is that they fail to understand the tourism seasonal patterns which cause vacancy rates to drop rapidly in the off-season.
Most of the time your B&B will be empty and rely on the summer season to be fully booked just to cover annual expenses.
Make sure all your projected budgets allow for the variety in vacancy rates in your type of business.