The Hospitality Industry.
What I do for work...
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Hospitality is my industry of choice and it’s what I’ve done professionally for the past 10 years. I started working in hotels back in 2008. I was a NCAA swimmer back in college and so in the summers I would lifeguard a pool at a hotel near school. The front desk manager of the hotel saw how good I was with the families and asked if I wanted to work the front desk during the winter months. I agreed, and so began my very long career in the hospitality industry.
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I would later manage food and beverage departments in large Vegas style hotels in Miami Beach all the way through to small boutique luxury hotels in New York City. My experience also includes consulting work for a major US airline, restaurants, and corporate hospitality. One of my favorite aspects of what I get to do each day is interior design and renovation. I’ve most recently had the pleasure of helping to renovate a 40,000 sqft. office space in Manhattan.
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I love the hospitality industry and all that it provides to guests. It’s an industry living and breathing “service to others” and I’m all about that. We create environments and experiences that are memorable and evoke feelings. Very few industries can say that what they do professionally is help others to feel.
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Think about it. You get all packed up and head out on vacation, you walk into a hotel and... you feel. You feel the escape maybe? The scent that lingers in the air of the nicely fragrant hotel lobby? The front desk agent greets you in a way that... makes you feel welcomed? Or the hotel bartender remembers your drink from yesterday and you...feel special? Or you go out to eat, and your waiter is above and beyond what you expected from your casual Thursday dinner, and it is memorable. So memorable that you probably tell your friends about it the next morning. Hospitality is all about creating long lasting memorable experiences. So memorable that people become loyal to brands. They’ll even spend more, to experience that brand almost exclusively. “Oh I only fly Delta.” But why? People are not loyal to that brand. People are loyal to the experience that brand provides.
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With all that being said, hospitality has a special place in my heart. I’ve been blessed with the opportunity to make a living off of getting to make a difference in the days and lives of those around me - and I think that’s pretty darn special.