Family dynamics. They say you can’t choose your family. At the Ocean Crest Resort in Moclips, blood is thicker than the seawater that laps the shore more than 141 stair steps below.
Most of us spend time with our families for a few days during the holidays and possibly at a family reunion every five years but owning a family business presents more challenging dynamics than complaints about Aunt Bertha’s fruit cake.
The family that owns the Ocean Crest tested its family bonds under the bright lights of the Travel Channel television show, “Hotel Impossible,” in which an expert in running hotels comes in and assesses your operation — taking no prisoners. The show aired last week.
The show’s high-energy host, Anthony Melchiorri, jumps on one of the mattresses and dishes out some tough love to three generations of Curtright family. “I think we knew what we needed to do. We just needed to hear it,” says Barb Topete who said she works 100 hours a week doing the accounting, bookkeeping, budgeting, payroll and overseeing housekeeping.
The three generations of the Curtright family were struggling to find a way to pass the 61-year family legacy to one member of the third generation, Jess Owen.There are three other grandchildren who do not have interest in the resort.
Owen is proclaimed on the resort’s “About Us” page of the website page as the “Culinary Madman” of the restaurant.
On the show, when Owen was quoted as saying he arrives to work at noon, it made it seem like he lacked the drive to do what it takes to run the entire family business.
Family invites Hotel Impossible
Owen says the entire family invited “Hotel Impossible,” to the property.
When a mass email arrived from “Hotel Impossible,” Barb passed the info along to her son and said he should respond.
“My mom had seen the show and said she wished he would come,” said Owen. He said they did some video conferencing which (the television show) evaluated, “and they picked our property.”
As with all great stories, conflict and resolution is essential. With a matriarch (who turns 95 today. Happy Birthday Grandma Barbara), four close-to-retirement age siblings and one grandson who was focused solely on the gem of the business: the restaurant, the property was a perfect choice.
In the show, Melchiorri, a former Air Force protocol officer, takes a militaristic approach to turning around hotels that seek his services. He tears them down, then gives them pointers and tools to build them back up. “That is the recipe,” agrees Owen.
Passing the torch
But at the end of the episode, Jess Owen was given the nod by his family, on national television to take over the reins of the property. The 45-room hotel, restaurant and spa, which includes an indoor pool, hot tub, massage facilities and exercise room began with four cabins purchased by his grandmother Barbara and her then-husband Norm Cornish. She and Cornish divorced and she later married Jess Curtright. In 1963, together with Barbara’s four children, they turned the establishment into a dinner house.
The restaurant burned June 20 in 2011 and reopened July 11, 2014. The restaurant features a spectacular view of the ocean and is the pride of the establishment.
Owen said that two weeks in advance of the show, a crew came to scout the property, then the entire crew was there for five days, with Anthony being there for four days.
Owen has grown up in the Ocean Crest Resort business, but other than attending a nine-month business school in Eugene — which closed before Owen could graduate — he has no formal training in the restaurant and hospitality business. One of the perks of the show is that he was given a course in Hospitality and Foodservice Management from eCornell, an online branch of Cornell University. Owens says he is in the fourth block of the six-block course.
Moving Forward
When asked what has changed since the show, Owen said his family took a vacation to Mexico but he stayed at the hotel and worked. His Uncle Rob and grandmother were still there at the time of this interview, but his mom had returned. She is still working many, many hours, but the family is looking for ways to change that. “I’ll get it tapered when I get caught up. (Reducing her hours) is certainly the intention,” Topete said. She expects that will happen in a “couple of months,” when she is able to replace a bookkeeper who quit. Owen said he doesn’t work in the restaurant in the evenings anymore but he does still works on advertising, marketing and the website.
The website was another perk that “Hotel Impossible” presented to the family. Anthony was concerned that the website that was in place, did not have a booking engine and hadn’t had one since July 1. Owen said of the Anthony-presented website, “It looked fantastic.” However, the old website, which Owen created in advance of the show, remains because no actual website was given, said Owen. The good news is that the old website now has a booking engine. Three weeks after the show, the company released the booking engine and now you can book online, said Owen and added that online bookings result in about 3 percent of the resorts total sales. “We encourage our guests to call us, we like to build relationships with our guests,” he said. Ocean Crest is also on Expedia.com.
After the show aired, the hotel admitted on its Facebook page that the website had crashed a couple of times and encouraged their “friends” to keep trying to book the newly remodeled, coveted 206 room.
The show typically renovates a part of the hotel and in this case, designer Casey Noble transformed one hotel room from the “Brady Bunch era” to the present day. “It looks nice,” said Owen, “but I don’t think it was smart for them to take a room with a kitchen that sleeps six and turn it into one that doesn’t (have a kitchen) and sleeps four.” The designer replaced the four burner stove and oven with a microwave and replaced the hide-a-bed with a regular couch. “People have been coming here for years and decades and they have their favorite room.” So far none of the “returnees” of room 206 have stayed there to give their opinion, but “people are enjoying it,” said Owen. When asked if the hotel would be using some of the elements to update the remaining 44 rooms, Owen alluded to the idea that there may be some impasse among the family to make changes. He understands that if you purchase a lot at once you can get a price break but it is difficult to build up cash reserves. And if you don’t, “manufacturing lines can change,” he commented. But, “We don’t have cookie cutter rooms.” He’d like to pick one room at a time and make changes.
Barb reiterates fiscal responsibility, “Not until I get caught up on book work. It will take some planning and budgeting. It’s hard enough keeping up on general maintenance.”
Owen is in a bit of a quandary because he has heard comments in the dining room from guests who stayed at other hotels and lament over remodel changes. “(Of other hotels and motels) people say they missed the old place. It may be funky and not modern but they are comfortable with that. Every time you make adjustments, we have to be cognizant of that and not put people off. You can’t please everybody.”
But after posting the pictures on Facebook, he may change his tune, all the reviews of the show and the room were good. One comment said, “We stayed in room 206 in June &loved it despite being a little out of date. Now we can’t wait to come &stay again!!!”
What is he most excited about? “Well,” he said, “I would say the future. “I’m looking forward to increasing sales with the new knowledge and moving forward.” Barbara is, of course, excited about making a plan for her generation to retire.
Owen and his wife Sara have two children, 23 and 13. Will they be the next generation to run the family business? “That’s up to them,” he said.
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