🌟 EXPERIENTIAL HOSPITALITY EXPERTS 🌟 Todd Burbage and People-First Leadership: Crafting the Heartfelt Guest Experience

Speaker 1: 0:21

We just met. I sent you a copy of my book. Did you receive it?

Speaker 2: 0:26

I have it right here on my desk.

Speaker 1: 0:28

Today, if you are open to it. I know you haven't read my comment on you, but the reason I wanted to talk with you, todd, when I met you at the show, the way you greeted me a person you've never met before you treated me as if I was the only person that mattered, and you exuded what I call hospitality. I wonder if today we could talk a little bit about that.

Speaker 2: 1:04

I'd love to. It's my favorite part.

Speaker 1: 1:06

Why do you say your favorite part?

Speaker 2: 1:09

Well, you know, if it's all about money, at the end of the day you're never going to give the experience that people deserve. Because if you're worried about how many shekels you get at the end of the year, then you're going to cut corners on cutting the grass, cut corners on catbags, cut corners on everything else. In my personal world, we've always put the business in sort of this order.

Speaker 2: 1:40

Our colleagues are always first, and so I don't have any employees. I have all colleagues. Every one of them are. There is virtually no hierarchy in our organization. It's very flat. As a matter of fact, up until 10 or 15 years ago, I didn't even put CEO on my business card, and when they made me do it one time, I put farmer on there because that's my passion, and then they made me do it the real way because you know I don't. I'll be completely transparent with you. I don't even know how to. I don't have a key to a single hotel or campground in my entire portfolio. There are actually assets that we own that I've never seen before, and so I had these amazing individuals and every single one of them, from the oldest, oldest individual that's been working for me time wise, all the way to the newest. They're the ones that that drive the heartbeat of the company. I'm helpful in creating the culture and having the vision in the future, but they're the ones that are day in and day out doing the hard work.

Speaker 2: 2:52

My work's not that hard, it's. It's pretty easy, really.

Speaker 2: 2:56

They're the ones that have to show up every day when it's been your baby's been up all night crying, or you know you have a family tragedy and you just have to pull through. Whatever it may be, they're the ones that have to show up every day, be present and be happy. And so we have this corporate philosophy that all of our colleagues are first, and we even have something that's called Todd's Day around there, and that is not. Everybody can be happy every day. Todd's not happy every day. Right, it's impossible. Wish we could, but we can't. And so if you come in some days and you're just not not there, you can go home and it doesn't go against your PTO.

Speaker 1: 3:37

What you are doing with that one statement is tremendous. It's like you're safe here, so you're communicating, it's safe to be you and it's to be human.

Speaker 2: 3:47

Yes, well, and just in that same vein, the other, the other thing, and everybody will tell you, I say this a thousand times I will be upset with you if you're not stubbing your toe every single day, which means some form of failure. Where I will be upset is if you stub your toe on the same threshold day in and day out, right?

Speaker 2: 4:08

Yes, but go out there and go out there and fail. Because if you're not, if you're not failing, you're not innovating, and if you're not failing, you're not trying hard enough. And if you're not trying, if you're too worried about everything being perfect, then you're not doing the best service to yourself, the company, your own, your own growth, everything. So I encourage all of that and so all of my colleagues. I have an open door with all of them. Very flat organization. I hate being called the CEO. I sit at a table with some of the brightest people in this industry.

Speaker 2: 4:49

And it is not an oligarchy at all Tied. All I do is I give my opinion and then if there's a tie on the tiebreaker, and that's it.

Speaker 1: 5:00

It's amazing You're so humble. It sounds like everything you are doing is designed to encourage engagement with your colleagues, with your staff, your team members, whatever term you know, your family, which is really what it feels more like, like your family. You care about them. What are some other things that you do for to build your culture?

Speaker 2: 5:25

It's a great question. So we always have retreats, we always. So we have a big one coming up in a couple of weeks and just people flying in GMs, agms, from all over the country.

Speaker 1: 5:39

And we spend a week together talk about the new year.

Speaker 2: 5:43

We do team building events, all that fun stuff. The other thing that we do and I really don't like to, I really don't like to even talk about some of these things. But just because you ask and I want to be fully transparent I've paid for more funerals this past year than I don't even know the people's names.

Speaker 2: 6:03

So these were people that were either an integral part of our community, as in blue water community, or they're actually, you know, staff spouses or whatever it may be. You know, we had a massive unfortunate event of beautiful young girls. She's 16 years old One.

Speaker 2: 6:26

she, her mother, works for us down in Virginia and she was diagnosed with cancer and I just bought a brand new home in Isla Marrata, florida, and all the daughters wanted to do in the moms and the family was go down to Florida, and so they went to the house. They I never even stepped foot in it. They were the first ones that ever sleep there.

Speaker 1: 6:50

Wow.

Speaker 2: 6:52

And so we sent a boat down for them make sure everything was okay.

Speaker 2: 6:55

But we try to do it as if they're all part of the family. Now, there's limitations, right At some point, but whatever we can do within our powers to try to make sure that that that people are treated like family, that's what we do Every time. We call them blue babies. Every time a blue baby is born they get they get six weeks of meals delivered for six weeks, so that the mom and the dad can just focus on the child and that, and that you know they don't have to worry about food for you know, and if they need it longer, they need it longer.

Speaker 2: 7:30

If there's a death in the family with us with us spouse or a grandparent or whoever, we do the same thing for them. We've done the same for we've done the same for clients that have been there. This past summer, little fella fell into a fire and burn himself pretty bad. He had to go fly to Boston Children's Hospital and well, it wasn't our fault that we've done nothing wrong and we just paid for the parents full stay and the child's treatment and the grandparents airfare. But you know, it's just part of it's part of what we do. If you're not focused on the dollar every single day, then it's more focused on the community and and the my colleagues and our guests are part of that community.

Speaker 1: 8:20

This is the absolute essence of the heart of hospitality. This is what I felt when I met you. I didn't know all these things, I just know. You know how in hospitality, no matter what version indoor, outdoor, restaurant, bar, you know anything is any kind of customer service. When you experience it, you just know it, you feel it, it's love, basically, it's, it's kindness, it's other centered focus right, and you are doing is remarkable, with your colleagues, your staff, your team, your guests, all of them. You're living and breathing this in everything you do. So no wonder your resorts reflect that it's. It's such a different approach, right Then, like the outside in approach where here's our mission statement and now we're gonna slap that on to everything and and up the revenue, and like you're saying that's backwards and it will, it's not sustainable and people sense it. They may not know what's wrong, but but it's that, it's how you feel. Wow, I did not expect all of that.

Speaker 2: 9:41

Yeah, I mean, and I could go on and on and on. But just this past summer I sent a friend to a hotel that we own in North Carolina and he told me. He said I don't know what the kids name, but there's an 18 year old boy who, every single day, was taking care of me on the beach. He said if you had an entire staff full of those types of individuals, you know you would be the best in the business. And so I wrote the kid a note, gave him $500 and mailed it down to him, and he called me up almost crying. I was like I just want you to know you're doing a great job.

Speaker 2: 10:18

Yeah, and so you know you impacted a friend of mine and so you needed to know how impactful you are. And so when you, when you empower and you make it impactful, because even what we do even further is, it doesn't matter who the guests are, but if somebody has a special occasion, any staff is allowed to get flowers sent to the room, about a line sent to the room and it's all on, it's all in the house, right? We take care of the, take care of the, you take care of the colleagues and they're super happy the guests. What you try to do, then, is to make them super happy because you have happy, happy colleagues. It'll trickle down to the guests, because our resorts are always going to be first class.

Speaker 2: 11:01

And what we try to do, even in our hotel platform. So, by way of example, Ocean City, where we live and got started, it has 118 hotels within seven miles. Right, so we're competing with 117 other hotels. So how do you make yourself different from everybody else? Right, so what we do is we try to build resorts within the resort and so every single, every single hotel we have.

Speaker 2: 11:29

We actually we were the first ones to do it we rented the beach. Stand in front of them, In front of each of the properties that used to be leased out, and people would go rent the beach. We went and rented them ourselves and gave it to our guests free, as part of the experience. Right? We, yeah, and we also always provide kayaks and canoes and everything else for free on the hotel business.

Speaker 2: 11:55

Nobody's ever done this right, they just normally a hotel is a place to lay your head, and then you go out into the town and do what you want to do. What we try to do is create the resort within the resort, make it so you want to stay and maybe you go out for dinner, but you come back because you love it so much, right. And so we make our lobbies engaging, make them you know we make multiple sitting areas for everybody's, for little groups.

Speaker 2: 12:22

It can be a congregation area. It's a place to communicate. You know, a lot of times you go in the hotels, people hit the button and the elevator and they don't even look up to see who their neighbors are saying anything right.

Speaker 1: 12:34

Right.

Speaker 2: 12:35

We try to change that whole aspect from the minute you walk in the door.

Speaker 1: 12:40

What happens the moment I walk in the door? It's, it's, I'm going to be greeted by a human right.

Speaker 2: 12:47

Absolutely.

Speaker 1: 12:48

Yeah, they're going to welcome you.

Speaker 2: 12:51

They're going to offer you a bottle of water. They're going to see if they can be helpful with any luggage you may have. They're going to see you know if it's in the campground, we'll get you straight to your lot Help. Get set up Then we'll check in later, so you don't have to worry about all of it right then. And there it's not like they're going to go anywhere.

Speaker 2: 13:10

Right, we can always come back at your convenience. They probably just got done driving for six hours. They don't want to stand in line. You know, check in is for four hours. They want to get straight to their lot, start setting up, let the kids out so they can run around, start riding their bicycles, get their energy out. So the idea is, yeah, what I always try to do is put myself in the shoes of the guests.

Speaker 1: 13:33

Yes.

Speaker 2: 13:35

And so it's. It's how Todd shows up and I have two little kids, when they're not so little anymore. But two kids, they're antsy, no matter what you want to get them out.

Speaker 1: 13:46

Exactly. Yeah, so you have empathy for the guest, and I do want to back up a little bit, because what you said, I think, is so important and so few people I don't know why, because it's so intuitive, but so few people really do empower their teams or their staff to make these decisions. But what it, what it does, is not only empower them, but they then become your business like it's their business.

Speaker 2: 14:20

What I actually do. We call every, what most people call GMs and properties. I call them the CEO of that asset. Beautiful. They're the CEO of that, not me. I don't, I don't know, I can't be at that place every single day.

Speaker 1: 14:36

They are the.

Speaker 2: 14:37

CEO of that hotel, campground, marina. Whatever it may be, they're in charge of it. They are the CEO. They have full decision making capacities. You know they need to give away a free night. You don't have call me, just do it. Do what's right by the guest always, and you know the guest is always right, even when they're wrong.

Speaker 1: 15:02

Yes, when did that go away? I?

Speaker 2: 15:05

don't know.

Speaker 1: 15:06

I don't know that's that's. It's so simple, isn't it, to execute on these things? And what I see you doing is you're you're modeling this like you are training people to pour out generosity. To me, that's a huge part of what hospitality is. It's just it's being generous with everything, generous with your love, generous with. The solution is always there, there's no problem. That is a problem because it's always an opportunity and, as you, you are modeling this for them. Your staff gets to do this. And then what happens to the guest? They become delighted I mean I hate using all these cliche words, but there's no other better way to say it they, they almost are overwhelmed, like people are not used to that. That that boring, overflowing generosity, right.

Speaker 2: 16:08

Right, that's very. But the you know and the other thing is is what? What, even on the business side of it? It's it's 100 times cheaper to keep a guest than to go find a new guest. And so so if you're able to keep everybody happy, you know, we all stub our toes, we all always will, but always, always make it right, always invite them back, always apologize for your shortcomings and celebrate their victories Right and and that's what we try to do.

Speaker 1: 16:40

Really nice. Yeah, it's basically have a human relationship Instead of trying to to turn it into some, you know, strategic operations manual. It kind of break right through all that Right. So talk to me a little bit if you would talk about the transformations that you've had, because I've heard a little bit about your story of starting like you kind of didn't even mean to get into the outdoor hospitality.

Speaker 2: 17:11

Right.

Speaker 1: 17:12

There was a complete.

Speaker 2: 17:13

It was a complete mistake. I don't know if you do, you want me to go all the way back and did the nickel tour of it.

Speaker 1: 17:21

If you, if you don't mind, like I think it's a charming story. I don't know how many people have heard it and I'd love to hear it again, yeah.

Speaker 2: 17:30

Sure so. So when I got out of college it's, it's a family business is my father and I. We started blue water in 2004, but before that he had always been in land development and and he's a pretty smart entrepreneur, great guy, super, super benevolent, gives back to the community big time. He is, he is the center and the rock of the company. He's. He's close to retirement but but he comes in every single day. He's our guiding compass and everybody loves it. We call him, we call him happy Jack.

Speaker 1: 18:08

Every day.

Speaker 2: 18:09

Every day still comes in every day Wow every day, and so when I got out of college, he asked me to come work for him and at first I wasn't going to, but he, he could jolt me into doing it and he actually, he actually did it the right way, and that was he made me learn the business from the bottom up. So, yeah, I was literally, we were building homes, I was shoveling dirt underneath houses, I was driving equipment, I was putting in sewer pipes, water pipes, building wastewater treatment facilities and, with all due respect to him, he made me do it, but he doesn't know how to do any of it.

Speaker 2: 18:51

He would always hire people and so, but it was the difference, right, but what made me really? What made me?

Speaker 2: 19:00

wise enough and later in the years is that when, when I no longer was working in the fields and was hired, hiring engineers and hiring subcontractors. I know if they were doing it right or wrong. Right and so you know. We bought a piece of property that was a campground. It used to be called Eagles landing campground and it's right here in West Ocean City and it has these beautiful vistas of the Aztec National Seashore with the ponies. You can see the ocean, land, ocean on the other side, big bay in front of it. But when you drove in there it was a complete dump. I mean it looked worse than the Worcester County dump it had. It had potholes in the roadways that was Swallow up. My pickup truck and it would. It had septic systems all over the place that would percolate up into the ground.

Speaker 2: 19:53

My god, it was absolutely disgusting. The reason we bought it was we were going to convert it into an upscale housing community. Because it had all the entitlements and it had it had sewage there, we would just have to redo it. Well, we ran it for a couple years while we were, while we were going through the entitlement process, and lo and behold in this blighted state and we didn't steal the property at all.

Speaker 2: 20:22

We paid a handsome pay for it but, in the blighted state it was in, it was making Making money and we're like you got to be kidding.

Speaker 1: 20:31

How is that happening? Yeah, how does that? Happen.

Speaker 2: 20:33

Miracle property yeah, and so we we thought about it and the crash came and we decided that let's pivot and just build a world-class campground there. And so we changed it Put in a state-of-the-art wastewater treatment facility, your welcome center, nice bathhouses, tons of cottages, and we went with a bohemian theme. So all there was bright tropical colors. We brought in palm trees.

Speaker 2: 21:06

Every year we had a little tiki bar on the beach, and that's being just printed money from then, right from then forward, and and what happened was we would give telephone call from a broker once a year Saying I have a buyer that wants to buy it. I was like it's you know. We would be like it's not for sale, it's not for sale, it's not for sale. So finally, in 2013, they, they, they, they called, said well, we'd like to buy it. And we said, well, it's not for sale. And they said, well, how about if we make you an offer? And so they did it and it ended up.

Speaker 2: 21:41

It ended up they offered me literally 40% more than I had it on my personal Entertainment as being value, and so we sold it, and what happened was and it's- again it's just our culture.

Speaker 2: 21:59

It's how we are. You know, we had some co-mingling of assets where a truck would be used at this, you know subdivision that we would use there, and at my personal farm I had a backhoe that was nicer than the one that was, that, that castaways, and whole bunch of instances like this, and I would always call up son, who was the buyer, and say, well, you know how about I give you this instead of that one, because you know it's just nicer and it's better and you need to do it.

Speaker 2: 22:31

Well, when we walked out of the settlement the day we were there, Gary Shiffman, who's become a great friend and is probably one of the nicest, most honorable Straight shooting Wall Street guys you'll ever know. He's not a Wall Street, he's from the Midwest but Detroit, but he's just an amazing human being, he said. Todd, this has been one of the greatest settlements.

Speaker 1: 22:55

That and transactions and then son, that time, that son has ever done.

Speaker 2: 22:59

He's like we should do more of them. And I said well. I said well, big Gary, I really appreciate it and I've had the time on my life. I was like now I was being facetious, but it's like I don't have two hundred million dollars in my pocket to go do more of these. He's like well, if you keep treating me the way you are right now, if you keep doing what? You're doing. He's like yes, you do, and so, from that point on, Son and I.

Speaker 2: 23:22

He became sort of son, became the big brother to blue water, and we just went around the country. We would go and find all waterfront assets, campgrounds, and either do straight ground-up developments or we would buy Existing ones and read the position.

Speaker 1: 23:42

Okay. So this is really interesting because you are coming at everything from. It sounds like like who you and your dad are. It's just who you are. You're just generous and big-hearted, and it's not like you were trained in hospitality. And then you apply these principles and yet and everything you do your business Transactions is just the way you treat people. It's like you live out from your values.

Speaker 2: 24:15

What I mean? What a novel idea Todd. Right, and we started blue water where it was 12 of us right. Okay, now, whether directly or indirectly, it's close to 4000.

Speaker 2: 24:28

Wow so, and so we've. You know it's emanated from that little core principle and and We've just been able to to Keep pushing that out as we grow. We love to hire from within and promote from within, and that growth from within we actually have a Program is called blue water University. Yeah, come up and we we try to train from within and Give everybody the opportunities of a lifetime. There's one lady that worked for us. I can remember back when we did our first hotel. She was, she was a. She worked the breakfast buffet at a fairfield in that we built and, and today she's a regional manager of drive and all over the East Coast and has an amazing job, amazing career. She's been with us I don't know 10 or 15 years now. I love her like she's family, you know and as some of the American dream success stories.

Speaker 1: 25:37

I'm speechless. If there were a template for how to build a life and build a business and transform people's lives, I think that you have your finger on the pulse of it, and what's remarkable to me is that it comes from such a simple value that you have put on repeat again and again, and again, which is generosity.

Speaker 2: 26:07

It's generosity.

Speaker 1: 26:08

It started with that, with over giving or maybe pouring from a less full cup. Initially, right Seems, for it started with transforming a property and walking through a door and giving more, and giving more, and giving more, and it's, it's absolutely inspiring, it's remarkable.

Speaker 2: 26:34

Well, thank you, but it again, it takes an entire team and it's everybody's committed to, to that philosophy.

Speaker 1: 26:43

It's certainly and here you are again being generous, right, and I understand because I bootstrapped, you know, every business I've ever had and the only reason it works is because people are looking for a purpose and when you can provide that for them and give them free reign and show them that you have confidence and allow them to grow.

Speaker 2: 27:09

Right.

Speaker 1: 27:11

Magical things happen right.

Speaker 2: 27:13

That's right.

Speaker 1: 27:14

Human beings. So the fact that you've been able to do this at such a scale and impact so many people, it just I just it just makes me so happy, because not everybody, very few people, I think. Here's what I think very few people continue to do it. There's a lot of temptation along the way and sometimes the vision in the heart gets lost and forget, and you have not done that so.

Speaker 2: 27:49

Thank you. I don't know why you have a fly swatter on the wall behind, prominently displayed subject. I thought maybe there was some kind of meaning, but I could there's probably one of my children, I don't know mess it with me?

Speaker 1: 28:21

How has this changed you? How has it changed you to move from? You know what you were doing initially, or and I know you're humble humility comes from learning. You know putting the shovel in the ground or being the dishwasher or whatever, but how has it changed you to to to move from there to where you are today, from the business.

Speaker 2: 28:48

I'll be honest, other than other than my bank account, which I really don't care about. I mean I actually I have a foundation set up and I plan on giving away 90%, everything I have before I die. But other than that, I just straight stay true to my, my humble beginnings. I mean I grew up in a little town of 600 people and I was the dentist, the menace of that town. I mean I didn't do anything bad, but I jumped on the train and would drive on the grain train and take it all the way to the next town and then turn around and come back and the police would pick me up and take me home to my mom and you know I've never gotten any trouble. But you know, I was just, I was just a quintessential American kid and I've been lucky and I've had a lot of great influences in my life. And again, other than other than my bank account, nothing's changed and I plan on being the same old redneck that I was when I was five years old, that I am at 50.

Speaker 1: 29:57

What has kept you so humble? It's. It's not. This is not your average human to respond like this. What has happened in your life that's allowed you to maintain perspective? You haven't gone off the rails, you haven't indulged, you haven't lost your humanity, and what has happened that allows this to be? I don't know?

Speaker 2: 30:28

It's you know, it's probably a large part of my personal upbringing my mom, by the way of example. She comes, she'll be here today. It's Wednesday, right? She comes every Wednesday and Thursday and helps me with my kids and loves to see them and we all went on vacation together last week and you know she's a, she's just an amazing woman who you know she'll put me in check, don't worry, she's not afraid that. Her age to grab my ear.

Speaker 1: 31:02

So you are essentially providing this family environment for all of these thousands of people, because a lot of people don't have that kind of family. They're seeking that. They want community, they want a place where people hold them to their highest and best. I think that that has sadly diminished in our world, like, overall, there isn't much of a North Star. We're all free to just kind of, you know, go down any path. So when you can provide that as part of your culture, it really creates that structure that people yearn for, even if they don't know it. It seems like you're creating this family environment that you came from for other people.

Speaker 2: 31:51

Yeah, well, and again, I just think, if it's, if it starts at the top and it trickles down, and if you listen every I say hello, I leave.

Speaker 2: 32:00

I'm a subservient leader so I could tell you a thousand stories of some of them are hilarious, but a thousand stories.

Speaker 2: 32:08

But when I go to a property and I walk around with my GM's or CEOs or whomever they are, you know I'm not too proud to pick up all the trash. I'll even do it before I walk in so that they recognize that if Todd can do it, then I should be doing it right. And then you know, whether it's whatever it may be pulling the weeds in the flower, I do it at the headquarters and at the hotels and at the campgrounds all the time, and I do it purposefully, so that the people see that Todd's doing it. And you know the other things that I do, just on the business side, is that even when we go to some of our, some of our properties that we have, I pay the full price and put it on my personal credit card because I want people to recognize that you know it's not to be given away, right, I give it to your friends and Todd's if the owner is going to pay for it, then.

Speaker 2: 33:01

but setting it's setting an example that people need to follow, and you have to do it day in and day out, picking up the phone and calling up the CEO of the commander hotel and saying, you know, the place is dirty around outside, go pick it up. It's completely different than going over there and saying, hey, spencer, come walk with me around here. We're going to pick this up together. You know, next time I don't, you don't need to, you don't necessarily need to be the person that does it, but just cause it to be done with me. Will you help me with that Big difference?

Speaker 1: 33:36

Tremendous difference. I don't know that I've ever met anyone that is so, that is actually walking their talk with this much integrity. I don't mean to be like flattering you or I just am legitimately amazed and impressed and encouraged because this is the way, this is the opportunity we have as business owners, even if it's just a mom and pop right and often you find this kind of integrity within a mom and pop organization but this is the opportunity that we have to literally change lives and to show people that character actually makes a difference.

Speaker 2: 34:29

If you don't show them.

Speaker 1: 34:30

It's just an operations manual and people feel the emptiness of that. You're so hungry for connection and show me. Don't tell me you know. So, wow, I am just. I know I've said wow like a thousand times during this, but I'm so happy to know this about what you are doing and the way you are so generous with me and open to having another, yet another conversation is just so telling. So you're setting such a beautiful example. Okay, so, as we close this out, because I know that I could talk to you for hours- I could too.

Speaker 1: 35:16

Is there something you would like? Do you want to tell us about what's in store for 2024? Do you want to share one of those fun, you know, inspiring stories? What comes to your heart and mind that you'd like to leave?

Speaker 2: 35:32

out. I'll tell you two things maybe, if that's okay.

Speaker 2: 35:37

Number one one of the things that you've probably heard me tell people a hundred times is that I always try to tell my colleagues that you know, there are people in this world that save for 360 days a year to go on a five day vacation to be able to take their kids, and we owe them the best that we can give them right. So if I was from a different class and I had my little boy and little girl and I took them to Virginia, to one of the campgrounds down there, and the experience wasn't perfect because the staff, or what I would call my colleagues, weren't perfect and generous and happy and all that, what's that? Do right? That's ruining an entire person's years of efforts to give their kids one opportunity to spend the best vacation they have. So I always try to put that perspective into everybody's mind, because you never know where somebody's coming from.

Speaker 2: 36:47

And it really doesn't matter where they're coming from.

Speaker 2: 36:49

Everybody deserves the best we can give.

Speaker 2: 36:52

But when you think of it in the sense of somebody who may only make $15 an hour whatever minimum wage is anymore and they're saving just to take their kid to a safari tent, to a water park, so that they can provide a decent life form and give them an experience, that I owe them everything I can give them.

Speaker 2: 37:14

I do, todd does right, and so do you, and so I would hope that everybody in the hospitality industry recognizes that. Because we owe our guests everything we can give them every single day, because you never know where they're coming from or what they've gone through or anything else. You owe them the empathy of it, you owe them the respect of being hospitable and greeting them and saying hello, and so I'll leave that part with that, and then I will tell you that there's probably going to be a giant announcement around blue water within the next 60 days. We're getting ready to do a JV with a really enormous family office and a couple of other people, and it looks like there's going to be a lot of growth in blue waters future and it's going to be a little bit different from what it looks like today, hopefully and again, it's all because of the amazing people that I've been able to surround myself with.

Speaker 1: 38:21

Well, I can't wait to hear. You're just giving us a little cliffhanger. That's a little cliffhanger. I'll tell you what. Sorry, I can't let Michelle win it when.

Speaker 2: 38:31

I'm allowed to, when I'm allowed to make the announcement. I promise you this I'll call you first.

Speaker 1: 38:37

Oh, really Okay, I'll hold you to that then.

Speaker 2: 38:42

I promise you, I don't I never forget.

Speaker 1: 38:44

I'm going to ask you to share one more thing. Okay, get the sign behind you, because nature is such a big part of what heals people and inspires them and allows them to experience you know, kind of their soul again, and you guys are all about water. Can you just share a little bit about, maybe, how nature has impacted you and why you feel that's important You're, if you're a farm boy and like well, that's just it. Tell me a little about that.

Speaker 2: 39:20

Yeah, so when I was growing up, I told you about the little town, but one of the most influential people in my life were my grandparents on my mom's side, and they lived on a farm 45 minutes away from where where I grew up, and you know, it was just free range and I was able to be an outdoors kid and I never was into Atari or any of that stuff.

Speaker 2: 39:44

I was always outside fishing, hunting, hiking, building forts, doing all that good stuff. When we, when we came up with blue water, it really wasn't intended to be what it was. Sometimes there's just these universal things that line up and you know what happened was we always had this corporate mantra around real estate that waterfront is everything and that if, even though it's a little bit more expensive, water is a life giving element of breathing, giving cleansing element that everybody's naturally drawn to to either the mountains or water, right One of the two. And so literally with with I mean our headquarters isn't on the water, but literally 90, 98% of all of our assets, no matter what they are, are waterfront, and so that was now that messes with you when insurance time comes around, but oh for sure that's the facts.

Speaker 2: 40:48

If you think about this, and I'll give you an example, to even in Ocean City. But you know, an oceanfront hotel to build costs the exact same. Can't ground to cost the exact same as one that's not as a six bricks and everything else.

Speaker 1: 41:05

Right the difference.

Speaker 2: 41:07

The difference is your, your land cost, but the big difference is that, you know, an oceanfront hotel, you can get $600 a night, that's right, and an interior one with no real natural features or amenities, you're going to cap out it, you know, as a hotel world, $200 a night. And the campground world you know some of our campgrounds we get $195 a night for a campsite Wow, not a VR, but a campsite. Where it's interior, you're going to be $45.

Speaker 1: 41:39

Yes.

Speaker 2: 41:41

And so and so. For all those reasons, we've just found the exponential value in waterfront, and that's where we've always got.

Speaker 1: 41:50

Certainly. That makes so much sense and it's the risk is worth the reward in any way. You get it for sure. That's wonderful. Oh my gosh, I have enjoyed this so much. I hope that you've enjoyed it. I love that A small percentage of how much I have. It is just extraordinary what you have done and who you are, and sorry I'm gushing, but to have when you have an opportunity to impact and influence so many people and you take it seriously and you do it with the highest and best values. What's better than that, you know?

Speaker 1: 42:36

it's really blows my mind.

Speaker 2: 42:39

I'm very, very grateful for your time and all the great things that you've said and humbles me, and I'm thankful for them all. Listen, you and all your fans out there. Anybody can call me anytime or email me. I'm happy to share everything I'm about as transparent as anybody ever gets.

Speaker 1: 42:58

I never.

Speaker 2: 42:59

I tell everybody I never even signed NDAs on our side. If people want them signed, I'll sign them for them, but I always had this theory that you're either going to treat me right when I'm rounding first base, or you're not going to treat me right and I'm just going to go with my gut and sometimes you get burnt, but most of the time, most of the time, and I plan on living my life seeing it from a sunnier side. So that's the way we look at it.

Speaker 1: 43:32

Yes, I really align with that, because why not? You know, at the end of the day and I think we've all been burned anybody that's been in business you trust and you get hurt, and yet at the end of the day you're going to have to climb out of that hit. So why not just assume the best at all times?

Speaker 2: 43:56

That's right, allegra.

Speaker 1: 43:58

Yes, well, this has just been a delight. Again, I appreciate your time. I appreciate who you are, everything that you have shared, thank you, thank you a million times, todd. I'm Terri Богiles.