Sarah Eustis started out as a housekeeper in her family's hotel. Now, she is the CEO of Main Street Hospitality which operates over 10 fantastic independent hotels located in the North East. In between, Sarah held leadership roles in the fashion industry working on operations, marketing, design, and development for brands like Ralph Lauren, Gap, and Limited Brands. With that background she is very focused on design and how spaces are designed to foster connection with guests and between guests. We're excited to share this conversation with Sarah Eustis!
In this episode you'll discover:
- Why it's important to surround yourself with people smarter than you
- How to foster connections
- Why you might need to look in the mirror if you're having a hard time finding and keeping staff
- How what you do impacts how guest feel
The Modern Hotelier is presented by Stayflexi
Produced, edited, and published by Make More Media
Quotes
"We're over connected and we're also very disconnected as people, in a lot of ways. The kinds of hotels that we love to create and steward foster connection." - Sarah Eustis
"I wasted no time and surrounding myself with people who are much smarter than I was, or at least had more hospitality experience than I did." - Sarah Eustis
"There's a fundamental humility that enables people to build great cultures and great companies. It's not about pure power." - Sarah Eustis
"Throw out the old traditional assumptions about why people want to work and what will attract them to you." - Sarah Eustis
Episode Links
Sarah Eustis
CEO of Main Street Hospitality
David Millili
Steve Carran
Transcript
Automatic Transcription - please excuse any errors
Steve Carran: And I'm Steve.
David Millili: Steve, who do we have on today?
Steve Carran: Yeah, David, today we have on Sarah Eustace, the founder and CEO of Main Street Hospitality. Before founding Main Street, Sarah was in leadership roles on the retail side of things, working on operations, marketing, design, and development for brands like Ralph Lauren, Gap, and Limited brands. Main Street Hospitality now operates 12 hotels in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New York. Welcome to the show, Sarah Eustis.
Sarah Eustis: Thank you for having me.
Steve Carran: Absolutely.
David Millili: The format here, we have really three sections. We're going to first ask you some questions to get to know you a little bit better and talk about your career. Then we're going to ask for some inputs on the state of the industry and what current trends are going on.
Sarah Eustis: Okay.
David Millili: We're going to start off, dive right in. What was your first job in hospitality?
Sarah Eustis: My first job in hospitality... well, my first job in hospitality remains the most important job in hospitality, which is housekeeping. When I started, I was 14, and that was here at the Red Lion, in our family's hotel. It was the beginning of an incredible training that I got, working pretty much every job in the place, maybe except for facilities maintenance—although I did a little of that probably on the side too. My children are now doing the same thing. So my first job was in housekeeping, and it was where I learned the backbone of the business.
David Millili: Right. So today, if you weren't in hospitality, what field do you think you'd be in? What would you be?
Sarah Eustis: Oh, goodness... well, it's conceivable that I might still be in the retail apparel business. You can call it the fashion business if you want, but it was not as glamorous as everybody thinks. It was an incredibly satisfying career and took me to a lot of amazing places and allowed me to work with incredible people and brands. But there was a moment where it felt like hospitality was maybe the new horizon that I wanted to tackle. If that moment hadn't come, I might still be living in Paris, you know, which might be... don't get me going on that.
David Millili: So, I keep asking this on the podcast and everybody says there's hundreds, but give me one—what's one of the weirdest things you've seen in a hotel?
Sarah Eustis: God, I think it was the people who came for the summer and brought eight cats with them, and we allowed them to bring the cats.
David Millili: Wow.
Sarah Eustis: And it was just, you know... I mean, today, that would probably not ever happen. And I was a housekeeper at that time.
Steve Carran: Did you update the pet policy after that?
Sarah Eustis: We did. Yeah, that was the beginning of it.
David Millili: So, who did you admire?
Sarah Eustis: You know, it's interesting. My two grandmothers on both sides were amazing female pioneers, one in medicine and the other in business. Both of them were way before their time and were doing things and manifesting results and careers, having an impact in a way that perhaps wasn't traditional for women at that time. Both of them were just remarkable, and I think that I am who I am. I have amazing mothers as well—a mother and a stepmother—who were incredible and creative. But I think the pioneering aspect of what both my grandmothers did was really probably the most inspiring for me.
David Millili: What's the best piece of advice you've ever received?
Sarah Eustis: God, David, these are hard questions. I think it was during my time at Limited, where I had a lot of responsibility. I was working in New York City and had just taken on a new role within Limited, where I was for 10 years. I moved into another division that we were planning to try to improve and turn around. The resignation letter of someone who was on the team—I had been there like a couple of weeks—I think I was trying to put my mark on things, and he came to me and said, "I don't think this is for me. I think I'm going to resign." Very creative guy. And I kind of said, "Oh, well, okay. I'm building a new team, so okay." Later that evening, I had a call with a woman who was the head of the division at the time, who counseled me and said, "Just sleep on it. Breathe through it. Don't accept his resignation so fast. You need this team and you need this person, maybe even just for a phase." I did, and I slept on it. I came back to him the next day, and he ended up staying with me for five years, and he was amazing. Right, so the moral of the story is managing reaction, not overreacting, and recognizing as a leader that you can stop and breathe and not necessarily make a decision at that very second in a reactive way. So I use that a lot. I say, "Let me think about it. I'll get back to you."
David Millili: If you could trade places with someone for a day, who would it be?
Sarah Eustis: Ah, that's interesting... you know, I might trade places with Danny Meyer for a day. I know him. He's a friend. I feel privileged to call him a friend, but I'd like to know what it feels like when you've built your company through a strong philosophy and ethos, but when you've built it to that scale—what it feels like at that scale and how you feel as a leader. So I'd love to step into his shoes for a day if I could.
David Millili: What's a secret talent that you have that nobody knows?
Sarah Eustis: Oh my goodness... let's see. Well, no, I don't want to... I'm not that talented, I just... I guess sometimes it's not like something practical like making a great soufflé or something, which I wish I could. Maybe just because of growing up in this interesting family, I have a little bit of a sixth sense about reading the room, and that helps me. Maybe I shouldn't give it away, but...
David Millili: Yeah, it's not really a secret, but it is something that sometimes is painful because I can see a car crash before it's going to happen.
Steve Carran: Oh no...
Sarah Eustis: Between two people in the room, looking at each other. And I'm like, "Oh no, stop, stop talking. Stop talking."
David Millili: Our first guest was Anthony Valkyrie, who's a good friend of mine, and he can read the room and then read a person in two minutes. If he walks away, he'll tell me something. He's actually predicted things—people he's met and I've worked with, and then he's told me what was going to happen just by meeting them in like an elevator by random. He's like, "Oh, I met so-and-so who works at your company," then I'll be like, "What was going to happen?" And then like six months later, I'm like, "Hey Anthony, guess what? Yeah, those things happened."
Sarah Eustis: Well, I don't know how good my predictive skills are. I've certainly made plenty of great hires and not great hires in my career, but more in the moment trying to help people find consensus and get us to a good place. I use my special secret sauce.
David Millili: What scares you?
Sarah Eustis: Ah, let's see... well, I thought going out of business might've scared me before COVID, but now I'm not even scared of that. I don't want it to happen, but I don't live in fear. I feel grateful that, for whatever my makeup, I don't spend a lot of time in fear—healthy pragmatism and certainly understanding the risks of what it is that we do. I guess what scares me most is the safety and wellbeing of our people, right? Hotels are open, living, breathing places—the door, literally the door, has never been locked on the front of The Red Lion Inn. Anything could happen at any time, and I think we have a healthy fear about that and the safety of our people. And that's what keeps me up, just making sure that we have measures in place to prevent bad things from happening. And they haven't, thank God. Knock on wood.
Steve Carran: That's good.
Sarah Eustis: One way to prevent them is to have like eight cats in the lobby or...
Steve Carran: Well, I know, like guard cats.
Sarah Eustis: Yeah, exactly.
David Millili: If you could pick one superpower, what would it be?
Sarah Eustis: If I could pick one superpower... a lot of people say predicting the future, but I don't want that. I don't want to know. I think doing all my email correspondence in my sleep would be a superpower, so that while I'm sleeping, it all gets done. And then in the morning, I wake up, and I can think again.
David Millili: That's pretty good.
Sarah Eustis: I'm not trying to be cheeky. Wouldn't that be a good one?
David Millili: Yeah.
Steve Carran: It's one of the best ones I think we've heard. That was great. I would love that, dude.
David Millili: Yeah, we've had invisibility and other things like that. So, that's the most unique we've gotten so far.
Sarah Eustis: Okay, I just made that up. I don't know where that came from.
Steve Carran: Well, I like it. I like it. Well, now I, you know, now it's there. I appreciate you answering those quick questions. We want to learn a little bit more about you. At this part of the podcast, where did you grow up?
Sarah Eustis: I grew up just outside of Philadelphia. But because my father moved up here to the Berkshires when I was quite young, really sort of half of my life was spent up here in the summer and any vacation that we had. So it was really Philadelphia and the Berkshires.
David Millili: Which area? I'm sorry. I'm from Doylestown, Pennsylvania.
Sarah Eustis: So, yeah, I grew up in Gladwin, kind of on the border of Gladwin and Haverford, right in the beautiful Main Line.
Steve Carran: Awesome. How did that shape you, kind of growing up outside of Philadelphia, and obviously you spent a lot of time where you currently are now? Obviously, that played a role in maybe falling in love with the area, but how did that shape you as who you are?
Sarah Eustis: Well, you know, I got myself to the city as soon as I could. I do love the energy and the inspiration that comes from living in a city, which I did for many years in New York, San Francisco, Paris, and so forth. But growing up, it was somewhat rural in Gladwin where we lived, definitely a country setting where we are now. I think it's a great place to start your life and maybe a great place to come later in life with a heavy-duty, intense city chapter in the middle. So I feel it happened that way. Philadelphia is a place that I love. I wasn't drawn back to live there full-time because I was so connected to life in New York. But it was a remarkable place to grow up. David, I think you can relate to that. A lot of traditions, a lot of history, a way of life that is very kind of a little more structured. The Berkshires, when I was growing up, were hippie seventies. So it provided a nice balance.
David Millili: I always look at it as there's really something about growing up somewhere where there are seasons, where it changes. I'm in Phoenix now, but I could never imagine having grown up here. I just, you know, I think there's just something about growing up and going through the anticipation of, you know, the fall coming up or spring going into summer and those things. So I always thought that the seasons always had something to do with it.
Sarah Eustis: Totally. I lived in San Francisco for a couple of years, which I loved, but I knew I could not live there my whole life. Great people, amazing place, but there just wasn't enough... you're right, there wasn't enough evolution for kind of a change of season and point of view.
Steve Carran: Absolutely. So you mentioned your first job in hospitality was as a housekeeper at The Red Lion Inn, right? Did you guys have a nickname for the housekeepers there or was there a nickname people called you?
Sarah Eustis: Yes, we were called the candy stripers because we had to wear ridiculous uniforms, which at the time, now looking back, they were kind of cute, but they were pinafores with red and white stripes. My best friend—still my best friend—and I started on the third floor, and we were candy stripers, kind of like volunteers at the hospital used to be called that. But we were candy stripers, and it was, again, it was a privilege, and it was fun, and it was sort of the summer scene at the Red Lion.
Steve Carran: Absolutely. And you worked there with your best friend, right? How did that kind of establish a base for your hospitality career? I feel like that's a great position to just get thrown into and learn how hotels run in general. Can you explain a little bit about how that set the groundwork for your career moving forward?
Sarah Eustis: Well, it's interesting because I think, you know, so much of what happens to you early in life—in adolescence and teenagehood—is happening to you. It's sort of more subconscious. It's not strategic, per se. Understanding, first of all, the fundamentals of showing up to work, beyond hospitality even—kind of showing up on time, being part of a team, managing priorities, understanding how your work impacts other people, right? It was just a great fundamental building block for being a professional. From a hospitality-specific standpoint, I could see very up close and personal how our place and the way that we treated people and the choices that we made—even physically within the rooms and the public spaces—how they made people feel. And we got that feedback right away, even as young kids. So this notion that what I do impacts the way people feel, what I do impacts how people feel about the value of what they got, the way that I greet them impacts their experience—that was embedded in us from a very, very young age. It's been there the whole time, and I took it to retail and then got a lot from retail and brought it back to hospitality because the two are very connected.
Steve Carran: Absolutely.
David Millili: So, you went to Smith College, you played field hockey and lacrosse. Do you have a favorite moment?
Sarah Eustis: Well, let's see. At Smith, I found myself in a leadership position. I don't know why or how, but I ended up being captain. One year, I remember it was the first year—I think it was my sophomore year—you know, we were good, but we were always, you know, Wellesley and Williams, and we just, we couldn't keep up with those teams. But I remember specifically in our sophomore year, we beat both of them. I think it was just because... I don't know, somehow we had unlocked something—not to be corny with sports metaphors—but we had unlocked something as a team that was really exciting. I just remember that was a particularly thrilling victory. Those Wellesley girls, you know how they can be.
Steve Carran: Oh yeah, I know.
Sarah Eustis: And the Williams people, you know, they just think they're always unbeatable. So it was great.
David Millili: So, as you can see, we're trying to dive deep into you. So you majored in fine art and history. Any connections there in going back to hospitality and kind of what you're doing?
Sarah Eustis: Sure. Well, listen, I grew up—both my parents are, my mother passed away a few years ago, but she was a concert pianist. My father is 87 and going strong, and he's an architect. Both highly tuned, creative. So, art and music were a big part of my life. I guess I thought I was always going to be a fashion designer. I thought I would go to design school, and I ended up at Smith with a more liberal arts approach, which I'm glad I did. But in doing so, I focused on fine art—so active studio work and art history, which I use all the time, actually, because it had everything to do with light and spaces and colors and texture and all the things that I'm still doing all the time when we're creating hotel rooms or a beautiful lobby. I think my father worked in Philadelphia for Louis Kahn, who was an incredibly famous architect and icon of his time. He's a lot of my inspiration still. I revert back to him about how the concept is developed for a building, how it moves through the sort of measurable period, and then back into the immeasurable, because it takes on kind of a soul. So, you know, architecture and all of that just felt like a natural. I'm just, I happen to be the most practical person in my family—the only one who's ever worked for anyone else and wasn't a practicing artist. So I'm very conventional that way. I like to have a paycheck, but I'm not as talented as they are.
Steve Carran: Oh, so after college, did you use that inspiration? Your family's very into art and music, and then you went into retail, right? Is that kind of what helped you make that decision, or what was the reasoning for going into the retail side of things?
Sarah Eustis: You know, again, I just... I don't know when it was, but I had decided that fashion design was going to be my thing, independent of anybody kind of suggesting it to me. I tried to take sort of practical fashion classes at Smith, and it didn't quite fly for my advisor, but I dove in right after college and tried to get all the practical training I could. Again, I think it's an extension of the artistic blood running in the family. But again, I guess throughout these different chapters in my career, and I think also having very creative but also very practical people in my family gave me a bit of a balance. Maybe that's my secret sauce, David, that I mentioned earlier, which is being able to translate between creative people and business people because oftentimes they do not understand each other.
David Millili: It's difficult.
Sarah Eustis: We waste a lot of time and money sometimes on the lack of understanding. In this crazy family and then also in my fashion career, I found myself often at a table translating the creative vision to the business people in a way that would enable them to get on board, and vice versa. Does that make sense? Kind of a bilingual role.
Steve Carran: 100 percent. That's great. That's awesome. And then after retail, in 2012, you came back to The Red Lion Inn, and in 2013 started Main Street Hospitality. How did that come to be? That had to be pretty exciting, coming back to your roots where you first started in hospitality. How did that happen?
Sarah Eustis: Well, it was, I think, a combination of the universe sort of telling you what should happen if you're listening, and a sequence of events. We were living in Paris at the time. I actually—you guys are going to think... Anyway, I don't know. I'll throw it out there. There was an epiphany at one point when I was driving up to the Berkshires from New York City, and I said, "I think by the time I'm 50, I probably will be up here doing something with the family." It just hit me. I don't remember exactly how old I was at that time—in my forties—and I just thought, "I don't know why." It just hit me. So then we went about our business. We moved to Paris, and my grandfather passed away in 2010. We came back for the service with our two boys, and I remember sitting at the service honoring him. There were a lot of people, and looking around at my family and looking around at what had been created by the first and second generations, I was listening to small pond guys—really small—but nonetheless, we created some good things that deserved to be stewarded into the future. I looked around; I have amazing brothers—one is in Colorado, one is in the Dominican, one was doing his own thing. I said, "Gosh, not sure if anybody's going to step up in the third generation." The second generation was sort of getting ready to maybe think about relaxing and doing other things. It just hit me like maybe it's time for us to think about this because there was a lot of good material to work with, and Main Street is what I hope is this reconstitution of a lot of that good material. So, I convinced my husband to leave Paris after my contract there was coming to a close. We thought about going back to New York and kind of scrambling up the fashion ladder again, and we just thought, "You know what? It might be time to take our collective energy professionally and give this a shot." So we did.
David Millili: I think that's a great story. So, going from retail to hospitality, and you look at the executives, are there any similarities in the type of people? Do you feel, other than yourself, obviously you've made the smooth transition, but are there similarities in that world?
Sarah Eustis: Yeah, I think there are a lot of similarities, David. I guess what was interesting specifically to my journey—which is what it is, is what it was—what I realized reflecting, not until I came back to this business, did I realize that each of the brands and the big companies that I worked for—Ralph Lauren, Gap Inc., Limited Brands, and Etam in France—they were all family businesses. I didn't even realize it while it was going on, which meant to me that the founder of each of those companies showed up every day at the office and would talk about it, right? Ralph was there, Les Wexner showed up every day. Not that that's so unusual, maybe, but they would talk about why, where the business started, and why it was important. That I found very grounding. Working in a culture in terms of retail, I worked with some amazing people. At the time when I was at Gap Inc., it was becoming more academic—there were Harvard Business School people everywhere, there were BCG consultants everywhere at Limited—but I liked that. I thought it was becoming a bit more academic, balancing the creative, right? I think that, honestly, the translation of what we were there to do, which is to create a great product in line with a coherent story, price it correctly, create a good value, create an environment that people can enjoy your product, smile at them when they come in the door, and all those things that are the same in hospitality, right? To your question about the leaders in those businesses, I think they had the same mission and they had a lot of the same characteristics, I think, because we were welcoming people into our stores and into the life of the brand, and we were doing it a thousand times over. We had huge retail programs. I think there's a huge translation, and there are a lot of great people who I learned from and brought that back to hospitality.
Steve Carran: It seems like, just kind of with Main Street's—I don't know if it's their mission statement or what you want to call it—but it says that Main Street's driving purpose is to create places that enable people to connect in meaningful ways. How do you do that?
Sarah Eustis: Hmm. Well, it's a very good question, and we talk about it all the time. Connection is a very broad word, right? I think maybe even more pertinent given what we've all been through the last few years—human connection—something we used to take for granted, right? We're connected on a lot of devices and we're over-connected, but we're also very disconnected as people in a lot of ways. Hotels and the kinds of hotels that we love to create and steward foster connection in a number of ways. One, the warmth and genuineness that you get from our people, whether it's the first call on the phone or arriving—a feeling of "I see you, you belong here, and I value you," right? Which we train for, and we send that message in a lot of different ways. Then, the actual environment—you can walk into a room, think about it, and it can feel very over-lit, and the spacing of the furniture can be all wrong, and it can make you not feel drawn to stay there and sit next to someone, have a drink, talk, converse, and maybe meet someone new. So when we think about lobby design and the way dining spaces are, we really think about how we are building connections. Why do people want to stay? Another very practical way is, throughout the experience of being with us, how we build connections to the place for any guest—through really personalizing their stay, through letting them know that we can find things that make sense for them as opposed to just fitting a bill. People can connect in unmeaningful ways too, but we like to drive meaningful connections, not only because it feels good but because it makes people come back, and it helps with our sustainability, right? If you have a transactional experience somewhere, you know it and you feel it, and it doesn't really make you say, "Oh my God, that guy behind the front desk connected with me so deeply that I can't wait to go back." Does that make sense?
Steve Carran: Absolutely, it does. My next question was going to be, "What can I expect when I come to one of your properties?" but you just answered it, so I don't need to ask it. David, I'll let you go.
David Millili: That was a good explanation. So when you're looking for a location, is there a particular type of location you're looking for as you expand? And also, if you are, do you have any new properties coming up?
Sarah Eustis: We do. We are not, and I just was at a conference and I was sitting with my friend Romy, who founded Life House, and it was fun to exchange with him about how he's building his business and what their strategy is and how it's unique from ours. What I love to do is collaborate with people in the industry. I think there's room for everybody; I really do. We're trying to do something a bit unique. So we do not have a brand rollout plan, at least not today. We're looking for unique locations where the kinds of hotels that we do would really make sense, whether they already exist and they deserve to be transformed, or whether there's a market that is yearning for something like this. The exciting thing, what I feel very proud of, is the evolution of our portfolio, which I'd love to say has been really strategic and fun, but it hasn't—it's been about relationships. It's been about finding great markets like Rhode Island, which came about because we formed a relationship with Peregrine, who are incredible development partners, and they invited us to Newport. Then our friends in Providence saw that we were involved in Newport, and they said, "What about coming up here?" So, the growth has been organic. I guess I would say that what's nice now is that we have a fairly diversified portfolio considering we still have a relatively small portfolio. We've got entry-point affordable design hotels, we've got a great group in the iconic boutique, kind of upscale—I hate that word, but you know what I mean—space, and then our newest property, which I'm excited to tell you about, will open in July. It's called The Canoe Place Inn, and it's in Hampton Bays, New York. It's going to be a remarkable property, and without a doubt, a luxury property. Again, that word is overused, but it will be in that price point and quality level. This allows us now to play in all these different spaces. Are we looking for interesting coastal locations because we can use the tuition that we paid in Newport? Sure. Are we looking for cool emerging secondary tertiary cities in downtowns because we've paid the tuition and we know how to do that? Are we looking for relationships with institutions, academic or art institutions, because we believe hospitality can really be meaningful when it's done in harmony with those kinds of institutions? So, we are looking at all of those kinds of pockets, but the projects have to pass through a pretty rigorous filter now to make it to the slate. So, yeah, that's how I would answer that question.
Steve Carran: Awesome. As CEO right now, what's the biggest problem you're tackling?
Sarah Eustis: Well, it's not going to sound... well, you know what? I was going to answer it one way, and now I've changed my mind midstream. Right now, I would say it is the journey to scale and the definition of scale and what that looks like. I mentioned Danny Meyer, who, again, I have the privilege of knowing and getting to chat with every once in a while. In the book he wrote called "Setting the Table," a lot of it was about—he had one incredible restaurant that everybody just loved deeply, and then he decided to open up another. As soon as you take what it is you're trying to do and you take it more horizontal, less vertical, you face the issues of scale—meaning how can I be sure that our identity and our value system translate correctly to a bigger portfolio? How can I be sure that the systems and the infrastructure and the people we have in place can take on 2, 3, 4 more hotels? How do I ensure that the bottom line of the company actually makes sense so that we—I mean, you know, basics. So these are the things that I find exciting, Steve, and they're ongoing, but they are the things that occupy most of my time right now, and trying to do them in some kind of balanced way, which is very difficult, but we're getting there. We're actually getting to lift-off, which is pretty exciting. I know I always say that like it's right around the corner, but I think we might actually be getting there.
Steve Carran: And you mentioned earlier that you're the only one in your family that has worked for somebody. Everybody else kind of has done their own entrepreneurial thing. Was there a moment that kind of clicked for you, like, "I'm good at this. I am good at being a CEO. This is what I'm meant to do"? Was there a moment?
Sarah Eustis: That's a really nice question. I should be fair to my family—one of my brothers was in the Peace Corps for a bunch of years. If they hear this, they're going to be mad at me. All I would say is that they haven't had traditional corporate jobs. Let's put it that way. That being said, that's a really great question, and I really appreciate it because there are many years in the entrepreneurial phase, coming out of corporate, where I thought I'd gotten to a point where I was pretty good at that—navigating big companies, understanding how to lead teams, moving units. When I was at Express, I mean, it was a billion-dollar company, and I was able to affect change inside a billion-dollar company, and I was pretty proud of that. Then it was like a humbling entrepreneurial smackdown of literally just trying to figure out how to create something and make sure the bills got paid, right? So, very different. It took a huge lifestyle change to pivot. I had to really have a feeling that I could be successful at this. Probably the thing that I knew early on, and I wasted no time in surrounding myself with people who were much smarter than I was, or at least had more hospitality experience than I did, because being a housekeeper, as great as it is, it's not 20 years of Starwood. It doesn't get you that strategic side. So, I started building, slowly but surely, people around me who could help. I guess I could see the vision. I could see where it was going, and I needed people to help me row the boat to get there. I've made so many mistakes and just unknown errors until you know that it's an error, right? But I would say coming into the pandemic, shutting down the business for three months, holding the team together, figuring out how people got paid or not paid, getting down to the studs on what was important to us and what is our mission really, and who really are our partners—you see the best and the worst in people during that time. I would say halfway through, maybe a couple of months into COVID, I thought, "You know what? I think I'm actually pretty good at this," because we didn't fall down. I was terrified every day, and there were lots of cocktails happening every night just to take the edge off. But now, many of the people are still with me, and we had to make some changes, and that was actually healthy. But I think the last few years have made me realize, like, this is what I want to do, and I think I'm actually pretty good at it.
Steve Carran: Thanks for sharing that. That's great. So, have you ever had a mentor that you've had throughout your career?
Sarah Eustis: Oh, certainly, I've had quite a few, but one in particular who I would always kind of revert to him. It was during my time at Gap Inc. and Banana Republic specifically, and he had been part of the creative team and then came out to San Francisco to be part of the buying team or the business team. I was a young professional coming up in my career, and he invited me to come back to Limited Brands, which is why I did that, and then I was there for 10 years, mostly with him—not always arm-in-arm, sometimes in different divisions. He just kind of taught me about prioritizing and about urgency—figuring out what's important in that moment, which I think is such a sometimes lacking skill. One thing I remember he did with us, being promoted and going to different divisions in the company, was he made us go through presentation skills class. He got us a coach for like six months. Oh, it was painful.
Steve Carran: Wow.
Sarah Eustis: It was practicing and videoing yourself and listening to your presentation. I mean, but I will tell you, and I'm not great at it necessarily today, but it was the best training I've ever had about how to simply express your ideas and how to be convincing and how to get people on board with them. He was just a great mentor. He went on to run Burberry in London, and he's just an incredible professional. So, yeah.
David Millili: With all the industries you've been in, do you believe there's one common trait that the successful people you've worked with have?
Sarah Eustis: That's a really good question, and I'm giving it due thought because I don't want to answer too hastily. Success is so subjective, but I think a healthy degree of humility is a trait, and that can come along with a big ego too. What I've really learned is that you can have a really strong ego because you're a confident person and you have a vision, but I think a fundamental humility around knowing you're not always the smartest person in the room and that you want to surround yourself with talented people and get the best out of them. I've seen that now. Ralph Lauren is like that—one of the most successful guys on the planet. I think there's a fundamental humility that enables people to build great cultures and great companies. It's not about pure power. I've seen that, and I've seen it crash and burn, really.
David Millili: Me too. I wish I could name names, but I...
Sarah Eustis: Nope, nope, nope. But we know who they are.
David Millili: Yeah.
Steve Carran: All right, so now the last section—you're almost outta here.
Sarah Eustis: Fine.
Steve Carran: So, one thing for you here—what would you, you know, if I'm just starting out in hospitality right now, I'm applying for my first job, just getting in, what's some advice you would give?
Sarah Eustis: Well, it's sort of nuanced because, you know, there are my husband—my son, for example, is at UMass Isenberg as we speak, and he's interested in going into the management school, and he's in the management school for hospitality. He works in the business, and he's trained on the floor, and he's done all the things that I've done. I might give him different advice than someone who's coming in to a different role, but I think the advice would be whether you're coming out of Cornell or a big fancy school or whatever is really cross-training yourself, you know, whether it's through a program or as part of your first job, or just asking for it. I think the most successful people in this business have stood in everybody's shoes, or at least most, right? Like we just, we... I'm pleased to announce, and I think I can say, you know, we have a new vice president of operations who's coming on in about a month.
Steve Carran: Wow. You heard it here first—Modern Hotelier breaking news.
Sarah Eustis: Joe Crimmins is joining our team, and he's an incredible professional. We talked about this a lot during the interview process—that his, you know, the success in hospitality, no matter what avenue you take—because there are so many great avenues—the more in your early career, I would say, don't get stuck in one lane, even if you want to do hospitality marketing or you think you want to be a food and beverage director. Push yourself to try at least—even for short periods of time—everything else, because then you understand the synergy of the operation, and you'll just be better at your job, and you'll have more credibility with people.
David Millili: Yeah, my one company, I used to have interdepartmental lunches. I used to make the developers and the support people and salespeople, like different random people, have lunch together because they never talked to each other. The funniest story is when a developer and I asked her, I said, "So we're at lunch. Irena, what's your favorite food?" And she said, "Potato."
Sarah Eustis: Yeah.
David Millili: Potato. But it was just interesting, and people now—they start to get—they know each other when they're walking past each other to go to the restroom or go somewhere. It's communication. So right now, when you're on LinkedIn, we're all on LinkedIn, but there's so much about COVID and labor shortage. What is something we should be talking about that we're not, outside of those two topics? Because it seems like they kind of dominate from what I'm seeing.
Sarah Eustis: I know, and I don't know if I have anything original to say on that particular note, but COVID is—again, it is something that just—we should—we made the playbook. We understand more than ever about these kinds of things, and especially in a hospitality environment, how they can be managed. So all I would say about COVID is thank God we've been through it mostly now, and so we can be even more effective if we have to deal with different versions of things. That's all I'm going to say on that. I mean, we are so much smarter, so much stronger, and not afraid, as we might have been, of the unknown. I think that we're finding that people are really ready to get back to just normal hospitality kinds of operations. You know, we still have QR codes around from place to place, and we still have some hand sanitizer in the rooms, and we're still very respectful and understanding. Nothing is taken lightly, shall I say, but the desire to get back to real human connection and real hospitality has been overwhelming. On the labor side, I can't—I don't know what I can add that is so original except to say that all of us—Danny and I talked about this on a conference panel at ILC in Miami a couple of months ago—that it is now, if this has taught us anything, especially in hospitality, the focus on our culture, on really putting our money where our mouth is in terms of having people feel heard and held when they work for us, whether they're washing dishes or running accounting. As nice as that sounds, I'm actually seeing it in practice because people are sticking. I don't have stats for us in terms of our retention, but we're doing okay. We have a remarkable number of people who are joining us, staying with us, growing with us. Last week, we had three promotions within the company. It was amazing. So to watch people move and build their careers. The other thing I was so proud of is that the Boston Celtics came after my front desk manager and offered her an incredible job, and she really thought hard and long about it. Someday, who knows, she may end up with the NBA, but you know what? She stayed because she sees the opportunity for her. I thought that was a big win. No pressure—I mean, listen, people got to fly if they got to fly. But I don't—and it's not like we're doing anything magic except showing people how... Yes, we have great benefits. Yes, we're paying people correctly. But there's something about this family of properties and the family of people that people are enjoying, and they're seeing it as a viable, really great chapter in their careers. We've got some people right in the sweet spots of their careers. So I think the only thing we can do to respond to that, David, is to be better. There is no excuse, literally. Make sure HR is really functioning well. Make sure everybody is in recruiting. Everyone's in recruiting, right? Throw out the old traditional assumptions about why people want to work and what will attract them to you. Continuing to say, "Oh, we can't get people. We can't get people." I'm not sure I buy it anymore. It's true—I mean, there is a vast shortage of people versus how many jobs are open, the statistics tell you. But if you're really having a hard time, then you need to look in the mirror and figure out what's going on with our organization that we can't keep anybody or get anybody.
David Millili: That ILC was a great event, too. Steve and I were there, so we missed you. I'll be at the one coming up in Brooklyn in June. Andrew was our guest last week. His episode hasn't aired yet. He's next week. But yeah, great organization. Great people, great events.
Sarah Eustis: It's amazing. We had a board meeting at the Sound View, and I've been on the advisory board now for five years, maybe. It's just an incredible group of people. I got to say, just thinking sort of a little bit differently about hospitality and creatively... So I feel privileged to be a part of it.
Steve Carran: It's a great group. So, one last question here. How do you see the future of hospitality with this upcoming rise of technology, with Web 3, NFTs, the metaverse, all that? How is that going to affect hospitality?
Sarah Eustis: Well, again, these are million-dollar questions, but I think if you know the answer, please let me know. It was really cool sitting there with Romy and talking about technology. Greta, who is really... Our VP of finance is great too; he's always looking at systems that will just make people's jobs easier. From an operation standpoint, we are a human company, kind of enabled by tech. We're not leading with tech per se—not yet. That's just us. Everything's running underneath. From a guest experience standpoint, I really do—having just... I was in Vegas at the HD conference, and being able to communicate with the concierge at any moment and just kind of chat with her and make arrangements, it was fantastic. I think that there are these experience pieces of technology that are making people's lives better and the experience a bit more fluid. Although I never think that we're taking people out of the experience of hospitality, at least not in our world at Main Street. In terms of next level, right? And the whole meta aspect of this... I don't know. Maybe people will start staying in virtual hotels. Probably. Maybe we should create one.
David Millili: Yes, they've already started. There are metaverse hotels.
Sarah Eustis: Oh, I know. I find that interesting, and I want to not be ignorant about it. We have some members of our advisory board—we have an amazing advisory board for Main Street, one of whom is very much on the forefront of all that. I ask him to keep us on it. I guess in my lifetime, the kind of company that I'm building with my team is tactile. It's real. It just is. As long as I'm on this earth, it probably will be. Maybe somebody will take it somewhere else, but, you know, we're kind of low-tech on the surface, high-tech running underneath is kind of the Main Street position.
Steve Carran: I like that. David, anything to wrap up?
David Millili: Do you think anything—anything that we missed that you want to talk about?
Sarah Eustis: Oh, my soapbox? Yeah, you can plug away. You can talk about your properties coming up and all that good stuff.
Sarah Eustis: Thank you. Well, I guess I might... The two properties that are coming online this year are very Main Street properties, and I would highlight them because they both reinforce what it is that we're about. Canoe Place Inn, which is opening in Hampton Bays, New York, is the revival of an iconic place that people have loved for centuries. We're privileged to work with this amazing team to breathe new life into it—like how cool is that? We have to know about it, understand what people expect, and how Hampton Bays as a community can feel good about this and not feel stepped on by some big, fancy hotel that plopped into their village. We're spending a lot of time working on that. We're also opening—it's currently open, but we're repositioning a hotel down the street in North Adams, Massachusetts. That is also a community that has had an amazing 20 years of evolution with MASS MoCA, which has this incredible contemporary art museum, as well as another property that we opened 20 years ago called Porches, that really changed the dynamic in North Adams. But there's still more to do. So we've purchased an old Holiday Inn that is the center of the city, and it was being underserved—it was just kind of sitting there. It was okay, but it was not adding any connection or value for the city. We took the IHG flag off, rebranded it Hotel Downstreet. We start renovations soon, probably. They'll go on for about six months, and then we'll represent this hotel to the community that says, "This is a North Adams hotel." It's still affordable, it's got more style, it's got a connection to the art world, a connection to the community, and something that the locals can be proud of and also understand. These two properties, as different as they are, are very Main Street. We just get such satisfaction out of doing this kind of work, and we hope to make some money along the way, but we get such satisfaction out of doing hotels like this.
David Millili: No, and it's great talking to people like you because when I was managing hotels, they were all independent. I'm really an independent guy. I always feel weird when I stay in a branded property.
Sarah Eustis: Me too. I'm a little weird.
David Millili: But thank you so much, Sarah. It was great talking to you. That wraps up the episode of The Modern Hotelier presented by StayFlexi, and we appreciate your time and we appreciate you.
Sarah Eustis: Thank you so much. It was a pleasure.
David Millili: Thank you.
Steve Carran: Thanks, Sarah.