GMH Hotels: The Supply Gap That Could Change Hotel Pricing.

On this week’s Good Morning Hospitality, A Skift Podcast: Hotels Edition, Sarah Dandashy and Steve Turk break down a week where the infrastructure of hospitality is being rebuilt from every angle.

They open with the news of Mews cutting 15% of its staff and pointing to AI and what that means for hotel operators who depend on its platform. From there, the conversation digs into why extended-stay demand just hit a four-year high while the supply pipeline thins, a setup that could open real pricing power in 2027.

They also unpack Hilton‘s new direct booking connection with Navan that bypasses GDS middlemen, and close with how British Airways, Delta Air Lines, and Cathay Pacific are wiring loyalty programs into concert venues and theaters and what hotels should be taking notes on.

This episode is presented by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠StayFi⁠⁠ & ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Bilt⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.

If you’re leaving direct bookings on the table, StayFi turns your wifi into a guest relationship engine. Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://stayfi.com/goodmorninghospitality/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠to learn more about their special offer of 50% off for GMH listeners!

And for hotels with restaurants and restaurant owners, Bilt Hospitality is finally here. Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠joinbilt.com/gmh⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to learn more.

Watch This Episode

Well, good morning.

Well, hello, Steve.

Sarah, I’m gonna do the show on my own.

Oh, my gosh. You got nervous for that split second. You’re like, Sarah’s outy.

Sarah’s not here, but I could do it for our live viewers.

We already got Lou here watching.

Can we talk about how the fact that we kind of like color coordinate without ever trying? I know we’re not wearing the same color per se, but like the color’s the same.

We got our summary Safari.

Summer Safari. Well, we got Safari Sarah when she’s outdoors, and I presume Safari Steve.

Have you been on a Safari before, Sarah?

I have not. I was looking forward to doing it at some point. Maybe like a pseudo Safari in Sri Lanka, but not like in Africa, not like the classic Safari that way.

Got it.

Oh, my God. Kay Frederick in here.

Oh, my goodness. Good morning.

Wow. Steve has Miami Vice Look going today. Hey, man.

Yeah.

We got to be ready for Miami.

It’s steaming out there.

What is the weather like right now for you?

In Miami?

Yeah.

We are steamy. It is probably 90 some degrees, feel like temperature over 100, but I love it. I love this time of jungle heat in Miami.

I went for a run this morning. Working out in a sauna, same thing last night. Felt good working out outdoors and just drenched.

I dig it, but you got to be careful.

It’s like working out in a steam room. If you’re in the desert, it’s like a sauna.

Hanzi Digital pre-show meeting actually takes place 24 hours in advance. Never.

No.

We need to show up here. We need to show up here.

That’s just our Gemini connection.

That’s right. Well, we got a lot going on in our world. I don’t think I can announce mine yet, but I got a little surprise.

I have a special guest joining us in 47 days. I will announce it soon.

Okay.

I keep watching the show, so I’m trying to keep it as a surprise for them too. But we got that.

Oh my gosh. Don’t share yet.

Yeah. But we haven’t traveled much this week. You and I have been, I think, homebound unless you were out and about.

Okay.

No. I am grounded literally for the next three weeks, and I am going stir crazy. And it’s not because I need to travel, but just because I am not stimulated where I am.

But I’m just like, oh, all I do is work at my computer and work out. I’m like, my life is so boring.

People will call Sarah, let her know you’re in town.

No, no, no, no, no. I’m not trying to hang out with people. In fact, I’m turning down invitations to hang out with people.

I’m in my hibernation phase.

Well, I’m grateful that you get to hang out here with us every single week here, Sarah.

That I like.

With that, listen, this episode is always great. You know why? Because brought to you by StayFi.

StayFi helps short-term rental operators build direct guest relationships through branded Wi-Fi portals, email marketing, and guest data tools that turn on-time bookers into repeatable guests.

Start growing your direct booking revenue today at stayfi.com/goodmorninghospitality. That’s stayfi.com/goodmorninghospitality. Thank you, StayFi.

Wow.

I love that read. I just sit quietly and I just watch magic happen.

I’ve been listening to your podcast. You know Jason Bateman, the actor? Jason Bateman.

Oh yeah, of course I do.

He does great ad reads.

I’ve been listening to him on his podcast. My god, that’s good. I’m gonna start using some of his.

Yeah.

Lou said ad read score?

Nice, nine.

Yeah, I would say.

I’m trying to work up to 9.5. We’re almost there.

We’re almost there.

Oh, we have a lot of news to cover today.

We do.

You wanna talk about the first one and get into the first?

5:44

AI Reshaping Workforce

Yeah, before we get into our big topic, before we get into our big topic, just kind of like a quick mention, came out yesterday, our dear friends at Mews.

They are cutting roughly about 15% of staff, basically pointing to AI, AI restructuring. They announced that they’re cutting 15% of it, roughly 1,350 person staff in its deepest restructuring since the pandemic.

Obviously, a lot of this is due to AI, making certain roles obsolete. We have talked about this before, right?

Yeah, we’ve talked about this many times, many times. I was talking about this, I remember three years ago when we were first starting the show, and you’re like, no, I don’t know. But it’s going to happen.

I think we know Richard really well, and this is what you have to do to stay competitive, stay efficient, and continue to grow because you have these positions that are not revenue generating positions that a lot of them, I’m not talking specifically

for Mews, but just I see it in hotels, I see it in all different operations. If you’re answering things into a spreadsheet, if you’re answering phones, if you’re in a cost making department like accounting or HR or support departments, those things

very soon, I could see getting trimmed more and more and more, especially with all the technology that’s out there. In my company, we’re not a gigantic company, but we’re already doing things where we used to pay people thousands and thousands of

dollars. A team member can now do it with the help of AI, and there’s all different kinds of things out there right now.

So I see it in the consulting world, and I talked about this, where I used to get calls all the time for little things, those little things are no longer phone calls, right?

It’s more bigger projects, things that are a lot more complex because people can now figure out solutions. So no hit against Mews.

We hate to see people lose their jobs, but I’m telling you all now, if you’re doing those kinds of things, you got to start figuring out a way that you, I got to help team members and people I work with all time, how can you pay for yourself?

How are you paying for your salary and giving extra value to that company you’re working for?

Because if you’re not and you’re just a cost, those positions are soon, I think, going to get more and more eliminated and get slimmer and slimmer as the years go.

I think more than just being a cost, I think it just depends on what the job duties are, but it’s interesting. I’m actually a big fan of watching the diary of a CEO podcast.

I listen to that a lot and he has a lot of discussions with different AI experts, economists, all of that, and even Stephen Bartlett, the CEO of that, and he’s grown his company tremendously.

He even says that even in the past year, for example, he’s making very different hiring decisions and roles of different team members are actually changing. It really is all over. It’s not the point necessarily at AI being a bad.

I mean, look, we’ve gone through different technological jumps at different times with the Internet, with this, whatever. And so this is just going to be kind of that new wave.

And depending how you utilize it in your current job, I mean, it will obviously impact so many ways. Everything’s changing. Yeah.

I don’t think the bad thing is.

Like the 1930s, 1940s, and it was an office space, like a Fortune 500 company from back in that time. And there was just a giant room filled with people on typewriters.

And their title in that picture, all those people’s titles, their job title was computer. They were computing data and all those things. And then 30 years later, the first computer, as we know, it came out and all those people got wiped out.

So I think it’s something similar, but they all found new kind of jobs and places to work. But I think we’re going through that wave more and more, and it’s going to speed up over the next 24.

Even in the concierge world, I mean, they’ve been kind of, their knees have kind of been buckling a little bit to be like, oh my gosh, how do we stay relevant?

We follow the AI tools that were at Hitech. They were saying, hey, we can answer the phones that sound like a voice. We can recommend events and all these things, and you get a commission for what you book.

So all of a sudden, that money that concierge is like, you used to get things, I’m sure that-

Oh, yeah. More than half of my salary was in commissions. That’s why we got paid so little because we did very well, but now it’s just not quite the same.

Now that commission, the hotel companies want that commission.

So little by little, things are changing. I’m sure we’ll even out, but we want to make sure we touch on that. But Mews, it’s a big decision.

It’s a hard decision, I’m sure, for those founders, it’s never easy to make those decisions. But-

No, never easy to make those decisions.

10:17

Extended Stay Growth

All right.

Let’s go into our big main topic for today. Switching gears a little bit here. Extended stay demand hits a four-year high as supply thin.

So extended stay hotel demand grew 6.2% year-over-year May, which is the fastest monthly gain since February of 2022, and the fourth straight month just above the sector’s 5% long-term average.

To give you an idea, comparable conventional hotel demand grew just about 0.7%. So, yeah, I mean, this is an interesting time. I mean, obviously, we’re seeing the long-term success of this.

Extended stay demand has grown. I mean, it’s grown by 41 out of the past 42 months. Yeah, it continues.

I mean, a lot of things have changed, obviously, in the past five, six years. And so workforce housing needs, displaced residents, non-discretionary demand, all of that on top of the business traveler base has just increased that need.

So, yeah, it’s very interesting.

We’ve talked about it now for a little bit where it’s the barbell, right? Where we see at the very top, you have all the ultra-luxury properties growing and they continue to grow.

And you see more and more of those continue to be successful and people in that high net worth will pay whatever it takes to have that experience and that what they want. But then that mid-tier, that upscale has not been growing at all.

Those mid-tier brands, people just don’t have the money for it and they’re spending it in a different way. They want more space that the extended stay gives you.

You can cook in those rooms, you can stay there for longer periods and not feel cramped up because you’re getting a suite basically for a very reasonable price because there’s not much staff on that hotel property.

And I think the other thing too I was thinking about today was people are used to it now.

I don’t need a room service or mini bar, things I can do in the room or door dash, or if I need certain things done, I can just get on a certain app and have it delivered directly to me.

And so these are all things that really start pushing that, and they’re less expensive to build. Like you don’t need to have that much staff, you don’t need much things there.

And you want to insulate revenue, whether it’s laundry, facilities on-site, the vending machines. There’s a ton of things that you can add to extend to stay that don’t require labor that also generate money.

So it’s an interesting model that you see the brands keep growing with.

It’s funny that you say this because I remember back in the day when it just kind of like when people were finally doing Uber Eats and all that, when I would say to hotel, I actually felt guilty ordering Uber Eats at a hotel because I was like, oh my

God, I like it like you’re bringing outside food in, which it’s like, duh, you can do whatever you’d like. But now it’s so much more commonplace.

But before, you know, it felt like, oh no, I’m being sneaky, like going around the hotel and getting all these food offerings.

Yeah, it was a whole big thing. I even remember prior to pandemic, I was trying to set up our own ghost kitchen in our hotel.

Oh yeah.

I got shut down. But I wanted to because we were losing our room service revenue out to Uber Eats and DoorDash and all the others out there.

I was like, well, we’ll create our own brand that shows up on these sites and had conversations with Uber Eats and we could create, I don’t know, Steve Sushi that existed in the back of house and it would get delivered to your room at a different

price, but we wouldn’t lose out on that revenue. So, you know, there’s a lot of fun things that our hotels are not doing in that space.

No, totally. Well, so to quickly just kind of go back to this article, just to talk about a little bit more.

So more than just extended stay, what’s interesting is upscale extended stay, which you were kind of talking about, obviously like upscale markets.

And so what’ll be cool is to see what kind of develops of this over the next few years, because now we’ll have a different option for just extended stay that’s going to be a little bit more elevated.

I think it’s those branded apartments. The branded apartments is what’s going to fill in. That’s where that’s going to come in.

That actually makes sense.

Yep.

And I see Lou, he’s a perfect example of what we’re talking about. So he stayed in an extended stay place when he first moved to Charleston because his house wasn’t ready and it worked fine.

And we see it too, like a lot of the guests that stay in our short-term rentals for our hospitality management company, Tangie, they stay for two weeks, three weeks because they’re having work done in their homes or they need a part to stay or

they’re moving or they’re just checking out a city like we were talking about backstage. That’s where we see a lot of it too. So we see people staying for three, four weeks in these locations. So it’s been around a long time.

I think it will continue to grow, especially if you can have it branded, use your points and get some benefits while you’re there. It’ll be interesting to see how it goes.

But Hilton, Marriott, Hyatt, Choice and Wyndham, they’re all continuing to invest there. So I think we’re going to keep having new brands to add to whose brand is it anyway at the end of the show.

Definitely. Definitely.

15:10

Loyalty and Hospitality Tech

All right. Well, why don’t we do, we’ve got another sponsor mention to do. I’ll go ahead.

I’ll take this.

All right. Don’t get nervous.

I’ll take this. So before we move on, a quick shout out to our sponsor, Bilt. They’ve helped restaurants and hotel F&B teams better understand their guests and create more personalized experiences that drive repeat visits.

So if you care about loyalty and guest experiences, it’s worth checking out. Head to joinbilt.com/gmh. So thank you, Bilt.

Millions of people use Bilt every day to earn rewards on housing and in their neighborhoods.

Now it extends to your restaurant. Bilt Hospitality shapes how guests are recognized and taken care of. Bilt’s restaurant-facing platform is designed specifically for dining operators to drive loyalty with their guests.

It combines reservations, guest preferences, VIP management, and payments into one platform alongside an agentic concierge that thoughtfully designs and executes the experience around your guests’ tastes.

When a guest walks in, your team already knows what they like without digging through notes.

Bilt Hospitality works across the entire guest journey, from delivering a complimentary course at the right moment to sending a personalized offer that brings them right back. Make every guest feel like a regular and keep them coming back.

Bilt Hospitality is available now for hotels with restaurants and restaurant groups everywhere. Learn more at biltdining.com/gmh. That’s Bilt, biltdining.com/g-m-h.

Nicely done.

All right, Lou, what do you get a rating on there on that one? Let’s see.

No, that was not one of my- No, no, no.

Although, well, I don’t know how much I can mention this, but I do have their card and I’ve been playing around with their points and probably one of my next trips to New York, I am going to be looking into booking a hotel through them just because I

get a lot of interesting perks. So from a consumer perspective, big fan, and I literally have it here next to me. It stays here with me, which I love. So why don’t we go ahead and go to our next topic here?

Hilton.

Yeah.

This is interesting. So Hilton is opening up a direct line to Navan, cutting out the middleman. So I don’t know if for those that might not be familiar with Navan, they are a booking platform specifically for business travel.

And so they are launching a direct booking connection that pulls rates, availability, marketing content, all of that straight from Hilton’s reservation system, bypassing the GDS middleman who have traditionally charged about $4 to $8 per stay.

And also had limited hotel marketing. So as little as 80 characters a text. So what is interesting with this, I mean, this will change a lot when it comes to the world of business travel.

You do a lot of booking of travel for people.

So how do you see this? How do you think it’s going to affect? Is it a big thing?

Because I had not heard of Navan until I read the article. I’m excited for companies and business travel.

Well, I’m familiar with Navan and some of the other bookings companies. I mean, I understand.

So what they are is they’re basically a tool that their employees can use in-house to book their trips and they make it super user-friendly, really easy to basically keep costs all in one place and or offer up, okay, these are hotels within this

price point, et cetera. So it will, it’s definitely going to be interesting. I don’t use that system because I just, I mean, I have travel agent capabilities, so I’m going kind of direct to source with it.

It’s interesting to say, I mean, I’m trying to totally, it’s going to change landscape. I don’t know that I have like my full finger on the pulse yet of how it’s going to change it.

Yeah, I think what’s interesting is like, all right, I understand, Navan, you have a big company, you have a lot of business travel coming through it.

They get to choose where they want to stay within the guidelines that the company sets up, and then it’s easier to kind of do accounting and track everything in one place. But the big thing here is really the savings, right?

Four to $8 per booking saved for the Hilton, gigantic, right? And so if you start doing that over hundreds of thousands of reservations, that comes straight to the bottom line. Yeah, and that’s really where the big difference comes.

If you can wipe out, I think this is a good test to see, like, all right, we don’t need the GDS systems, and then we really want to get away from OTAs because we keep marketing, book directly with us, get into our app, use our system.

That’s really where the big savings come because you’re still getting that booking. And if you can make that booking more valuable by not having commissions come out, that’s where this is going to work big time if they can get it to work.

Well, and the trick is going to be having those relationships with these specific hotel companies. So it’s great, for example, that Navan has Hilton, but then what about Marriott, obviously, what about IHG, what about all of that?

So once you get the big brands, I think that, I mean, that makes sense. It will make it challenging for more smaller and boutique properties that might not necessarily have the capability to have that direct access, to maybe build out that feature.

But also with business travel, especially in some of these bigger companies, how many people are staying at independent hotels? I don’t know. Are they really, you know, so it’s gonna change some things.

Good morning, Lonnie.

Good to see you, man.

Good morning.

We will change some things. Let’s hope I’m cheering them on.

I’m always a big fan of the direct bookings, especially when I see how much we pay out in commissions to these OTAs, like we get the business from them, but it is the nice chunk of the revenue or the net income at the bottom.

So keep it going, Hilton. Let’s see what comes up. We’ll follow up on this one.

This is what I’m curious about.

I’m excited for you. So airlines are basically turning live entertainment into loyalty strategies. So I love this.

So this comes on the heels of British Airways securing naming rights for the new Arc concert venue in West London, which is a dedicated theater opening in 2027. This will be the largest permanent theater built in London in almost 50 years.

What’s cool is that club members, they get reserved tickets, branded lounge access, and they also earn. How do you pronounce that? Is it avios or avios?

I think it’s avios. Somebody let us know. Do you know what it is?

No, I don’t know.

I would say avios.

But basically, what this is talking about is we’re now seeing a lot of these airlines investing in these spaces. So for example, you’ve got Delta, they’ve got their clubs, they also have their most recent club that opened up actually in Las Vegas.

But they’ve got clubs like in Madison Square Garden, Yankee Stadium, The Sphere. Cathay Pacific, they partnered with Andrew Lloyd Webber’s LW Theaters. They’ve been doing that since 2024.

So it’s interesting because it’s more than just putting your name on the outside of a building, but it’s really kind of owning that whole experience. In adjacent industries, I think. Which I like it.

Again, if you’re a diehard fan of that brand, I know you are with Delta, right?

I could see it very soon. We talked about it with the name of the airline that was over in, was it Europe or in Asia that bought hotels, and now they have really vertical integration where it’s like airline, hotel, and travel, and experiences.

I think we’re going to see more and more of that. We talked about what airline we would want to see get into the hotel game.

Yeah.

A lot of you guys listening and watching put in all the brands you would like to see. We’re already used to fighting to get into these clubs anyway when we go to the airports and waiting in line just to get some free items in those places.

I know with the American Express one, I do that, you’re in with Delta, and there’s American Airlines has their new lounge, and so I think it’s just a natural extension of what you’re used to.

If you can get points and get credit and all these fun kind of activations, it’s going to continue to grow.

Well, I will say this just to quickly address the Amex Lounge versus the Delta or United, etc. You got to think about this with Amex. Amex is airline agnostic.

So it doesn’t matter what you’re flying, and it has to do with the credit card, and that’s why Amex lounges are so full, because it doesn’t matter what airline you’re flying.

Whereas, in my particular case with Delta, obviously, I’m going to opt for the Delta Lounge.

Most likely, I’m flying Delta, but because I have status and because of how much I spent with Delta, I will get on the short end of that line should there end up being one. So this is again, where loyalty pays.

But what’s interesting going back to this experiences thing is actually seeing how much these spaces end up actually converting into flight bookings. So they haven’t really-

Let’s say American Airlines, that’s what I fly a lot because out of Miami, I’ve never flown as much as I have in the past 12 months other than this year. This is the most I’ve ever flown.

I’m now very focused on, I want to get my points, I want to get my upgrades. If American Express had a lounge where the Miami Play and you could get access to it by spending a certain amount of dollars on the flights, I’d be all about it.

So I think we’re going to see more and more of these interesting ways that connect to the airlines. And I would book more flights if I could get into that concert that I really want to get to and have access to that box during that time.

It’s a very different perspective when you start getting into that loyalty game. Because definitely like at a certain part of the year, you’re like, oh, that’s fine.

I will actually pay for a more expensive flight because that will get me closer to my next status level. Where, you know, if you’re flying one trip and…

Yeah, before when the tour started this, I was flying, I don’t know, once or twice a year. But this year has been like over 20 flights. I’m like, oh my gosh, like I want to start getting more and more.

Once you get a taste of loyalty, it is hard to go back.

I’m not going to lie. It is hard to go back.

My group number is over at the top and I don’t have to worry about too many things and I get some upgrade lists. It makes a big difference.

I never have to pay for checked bags. Everything is expedited and seamless. If I need to change anything, I’m first on the list.

I mean, yeah.

So what do you think, viewers and listeners? Put it here in the comments. Does it make a difference to you, these lounges, would you care?

You can say yes or no really quick or give a thumbs up or a thumbs down. Just we want to get a pulse here of what people are thinking when you see these lounges that airlines are creating.

Would that sway you to book with them if they gave you something special for doing that? Curious what you think?

Yeah, and not just actually in the airport, but also out.

Yeah, out and about, like in the stadiums, in the theaters, like imagine they had one for World Cup. Lou says yes, and you get to get to the lounge, and Shakira sings her World Cup song for you in there. I would do it.

Let’s do it, Shakira.

Oh my gosh, Shakira, stop. Hey, she’s a Lebanese sister with me. Okay, anyway.

Yeah, she should be great.

She’s here in Miami, we see her all the time.

Of course. Oh, I have a fun Shakira story. I’ll quickly think of my concierge days.

It’s a super quick one. But she used to stay at one of my properties quite frequently. One of the times she actually left, there was a guitar that was left there.

So I get a call and somebody calls and they’re like, there should be a guitar there for Shakira. And I was like, wait, what? This is crazy.

Oh my gosh, wait, I’m remembering it incorrectly. My bad, we had a guitar. It was in storage forever.

And finally I had to dig around, figured it out, and I could see that it was for Shakira. So then I had to call the right people to be like, hey, you guys left a guitar here. Does anyone want to come get it?

That’s what it was, because it was very strange that nobody thought about it. And they’re like, oh yeah, actually that would be great. And then they ended up sending somebody to come get the guitar.

But yeah, that’s my fun little Shakira story. But she’d stay at our hotels all the time, back when I was at the Lermontese.

She’s always very nice to everyone. She goes, I don’t want to stick, I don’t want to blow up the spot. But her kids go to the same place.

My kids do swim lessons and they do sports there. And she’s always very nice to everybody when she’s there.

Yeah, of course.

All good. She’s one of those celebrities that I’m a big fan of.

28:08

Fun and Life

All right, your favorite segment of the day.

All right, everybody.

I know this is the only reason you join and watch us live for this show.

The only reason you join.

That’s true. That’s true. It’s for Whose Brand Is It Anyway?

Where our producer, Will, shows us an image on the screen of a brand and we have to guess which parent company owns that brand. Lou, I know you love this part. So Whose Brand Is It Anyway?

Sponsored by no one yet, but it will be. So if you want to be sponsoring Whose Brand Is It Anyway? This is the most popular part of the show.

You let us know. We’ll have you on here. So let’s get into it here.

What brand are we? This is not a real brand.

What?

Avid. All right. Avid.

Avid.

I would say A-B-I-D.

A-I-D. Wow. I’m going to strike out a big one on this one.

I’m going to go with, let’s see here. And listeners and viewers, put in your guess. I’m going with Best Western.

Best Western is my guess here today. We got Hilton. We got IHG.

We got people guessing here. Five seconds. Five seconds.

Five, four, three, two, one. Whose brand is it anyway, Will?

Oh.

So let me play this. Avid Hotels, I’m looking this up right now. Who are they?

You’re an Avid, like you’re an Avid traveler.

Doesn’t even show up.

Oh my, what do you mean?

Avid, here it is.

So at Avid Hotels, we are championing everyday travel at a fair price, meeting the needs of the guests who are all too often, have to pay more for things they don’t need, or compromise on the quality they expect.

So an extended stay, hotel, actually looks very nice. So sorry for the hood on the logo, Avid, but it looks very nice. Good setup here.

Make sure to check it out. ISG Hotels and Resorts. I was way off, but Amber got it, Lonnie got it.

Who else got it here today?

The closest one is in Victorville.

Lou said two weeks in a row for people in Northwestern. I know, it’s Lou. I was like, I’m gonna get it right if I just keep guessing the same one over and over again.

Weird.

I actually know exactly where the closest one is to me. I charge my car there all the time.

Oh my gosh.

It’s in between in a very small place between Los Angeles and Las Vegas.

Very cool.

So it’s fascinating. All right.

Paul Manzi, same tonight. I was way off.

Oh my gosh. Oh, yeah, definitely. No, Paul, you got jokes in you, huh?

Yeah.

Wow. Wow. What a show today.

We covered a lot. I can’t believe we’re already coming to the end here. I always love my Whose Brand Is It Anyway segment here.

Sarah, we haven’t done a real time recap in a long time here. What are you seeing out there? Have you been seeing anything in your town?

Oh, gosh.

I told you, I have been a hermit. When I am home, I go to the grocery store in the gym. You guys, if you think my life is exciting, you see all my travels, and when I am home, I have a very boring life.

Any fireworks?

What’s going on? Come on, July 4th.

Oh, yeah, we had July 4th weekend. No, I just went to the top of… I just saw…

I watched a movie with my mom, and we went to the top of the building and watched. Yeah, very uneventful. Yes, firework.

So what happened for your 4th of July? I’m sure way more exciting than mine.

Well, listen, I’ve become a beach expert here, and I’ll tell you why.

I used to, with my kids and my family, go to the hotels I used to work at, and we would go to the beach at, you know, like the Lowsmine Beach Hotel, one of the best family-friendly hotels on the beach.

You know, I still get hooked up and get a beautiful day bed, and they set us up very nicely, and they serve us. But my kids thought that’s what the beach was, right? Like, every time we would go to the beach, that’s what they associated with.

It was like, no, no, no, we got to shake this off. So we got some beach chairs, did things. So the first time we went to the beach, they were like, where’s our server?

Where’s our day bed? I was like, no, no, no.

Where’s our server?

So now I’ve got a pretty great beach set up and card and chairs and a little cabana that I put together. But this 4th of July, always special. We went over to Joe’s Stone Crab, which has a great takeaway.

So you don’t have to dine in Joe’s Stone Crab. And if you don’t know, it’s one of the most historic restaurants here in Miami. I’ll say it was busy.

It was a little bit delayed. And the manager of the takeaway area is like, I’m so sorry it took too long to get it. You didn’t know who I was.

I didn’t prep this ahead. But gave cookies, rice krispie treats, and some other things for the kids to enjoy. And then we had a great 4th of July on South Beach with fireworks and music and all the other stuff.

So a great time on South Beach. So it’s a little thing that could have gone a long way where you get hungry, you get a little hangry, the food’s taking a long time. Yeah, yeah.

They turn around with a couple of sweets and really authentic apologies. So shout out to Joe Stone Crabbe. I’ll keep them back for sure.

Love. And he did the thing, truly the sweet life. Truly, I had to teach the kids, like this is their hotel life.

It’s the proper way to beach.

Not the proper way. This is the way 99.9% of people beach. Yes.

When I realized they were looking for the server the first time, I was like, okay.

Oh, man.

Bloody hell.

Anyway, that did remind me, I did play some Pickleball, but we should talk about that on a future show.

Because Pickleball is really growing in a lot of different places. I have a couple of friends of mine that own different Pickleball venues in different cities. So but the hospitality aspect has been super fascinating.

So I’ll plant that seed that we put a pin in that and come back to that later.

But I’m curious, listen to views. Are you Padel or Pickleballers? I’m trying to Padel is the down here.

Pickleball is not too much.

So it’s different. You know what’s so funny? Admittedly, when I first heard Padel, I was like, is this just like you guys?

It’s like the difference of calling it Target or Tarjay. And then I was like, oh, Padel is actually different than Pickleball.

There’s a whole scene around it. I’m trying to see a little promo. There’s a lot of people socialize there.

It’s like the new place the business gets done. A lot of people are making things happen. And there’s like the exclusive clubs with restaurants and celebrities.

It’s crazy what’s going on.

It’s a thing. It’s a thing.

I like it. Well, listen, we could talk all day about all the fun things going on in our cities and listeners and viewers love when you tune in as always and participate in all of our fun segments here.

And if you like something, make sure to subscribe because it will be alerting you and making sure you’re staying on top of what we have going on. And please send this to one of your friends. There’s definitely some value in this show.

And if it was valuable to you, it’ll be valuable to your friends. Until next week, Sarah, stay hospital.