Destination Marketing Podcast Episode 5: Lance Syrett
Lance Syrett: Sometimes we might disagree about things, but when the going gets tough, you know, there's a lot of strength in having family where you know, you feel that loyalty that if this business fails, I have failed my family. It makes you work that much harder to keep the business strong and keep things going. Adam Stoker: Okay, everybody. Welcome to the Destination Marketing podcast. I'm your host Adam Stoker, along with my cohost, Jordan Barker. Jordan Barker: Hello. Adam Stoker: We're very, very excited today to have a special guest with us. This is the one-and-only, the Grand Poobah of Ruby's Inn which is at the mouth of Bryce Canyon, Lance Syrett, general manager of Bryce Canyon. Lance, did I say it correctly? Are you the Grand Poobah or are you the general manager? Lance Syrett: Well, I was going to say most people call me the general manager. Depends on who you are. I make my staff call me the Grand Poobah, but I'm just a Grand Poobah of the Ruby's Inn, not of Bryce Canyon, so. Jordan Barker: All right. Adam Stoker: All right, we won't get that confused. Well, Lance, thanks for joining us today. Lance Syrett: Hey, it's a pleasure to be on with you guys. Adam Stoker: To get started, we love to just kind of grab a little bit of background. Who are people listening to, you know, you’re the general manager at Ruby's Inn. Why should they care? Tell me a little bit about who you are and what you do. Lance Syrett: Well, Ruby's Inn, is the most exciting part of my title. Ruby's Inn is a 103-year old family business. We're located right at the doorstep to Bryce Canyon National Park. If you've been to Bryce Canyon, you've been by Ruby's Inn. You know, we started out for a long time just being this little, small stop in the road. Ruby, the founder was actually my great grandfather and we always talk about the fact that Ruby was a man because a lot of people think of Ruby as this little old lady. I can understand that, but we do get people that call the hotel and say, "Hey, Ruby was my aunt. I need a discount." Don't try that, because you get the gender wrong. Anyway, Ruben Syrett was my great grandfather and 103 years ago, he came out here to be a rancher and he just kind of had dumb luck. He got in the tourist business. So my job as general manager of the hotels here and basically means I need to keep the rooms full and the people happy. As for the family business, I'm fourth generation. We have a lot of fifth generation running around here and we've actually got a few sixth generation that poke their heads in every once in a while. It’s a fun job. It's always exciting with something new every day so it’s never boring. Adam Stoker: Tell us a little bit Lance, I mean, it’s great to get the history and the fact that it's a six-generation business and to also to get the gender right if you're going to try to call and scam Ruby's Inn for discounts. But, tell me a little bit about what Ruby's Inn is, because if you've never been there, you have no idea. All of the amazing amenities and stuff like that at Ruby's Inn, so tell me a little bit about that. Lance Syrett: Right, so Ruby's Inn is a resort. There's actually three different hotels. We've got the Best Western Plus Ruby's Inn, the Best Western Plus Bryce Canyon Grand, and the Bryce View Lodge, so between those three properties. We have 700 deluxe hotel rooms. We also have our RV park and campground with about 250 full hookup sites and a lot of tent sites. We've got cabins, camping and teepees — those are kind of a novelty with Europeans. Asians — they love to come in and, you know, say they've slept in a teepee, so those are a lot of fun. Then, we also have several different restaurants. We've got conference space. One of our restaurants is our Ebenezer's Barn and Grill. It's not a bar and grill. We have a barn and grill. Each night during the summer, it's a real-country, Western band and they entertain you and it's a really good time. Adam Stoker: You just revamped the Ebenezer's experience, didn't you? Lance Syrett: Yeah. We just revamped and it's a brand new show this year and holy cow, everybody's having a good time and their early returns are awesome. Adam Stoker: I went down there and we had a blast, you know. I had seen the old show and experienced that and went down just about a month ago and experienced the launch of the new show. I’ll tell you, it's night and day. We had a wonderful time down there. Jordan Barker: It's awesome. Adam Stoker: Yeah. You were down there too, Jordan. Jordan Barker: Yeah, a lot of fun. Lance Syrett: Yeah. It went from just to having a bunch of cowboys around the fire to now feeling like you've been to a concert with a ton of the excitement. Then, yeah, you're excited to go back. Adam Stoker: Some real up and coming stars there too, right? Lance Syrett: Oh yeah. A lot. A lot of up and coming stars. We've got a lot of talent, directly from Nashville. we've got singer-songwriters who maybe you've never heard of, but when they start dropping names and who they've worked with in the songs they've written and stuff, it's a pretty amazing ensemble. The Bryce Canyon Wranglers, that's the title of the band and you know, a lot of moving pieces there. We think of ourselves a little bit like the Grand Ole Opry now where you come to play as part of the Bryce Canyon Wranglers, but not necessarily the same actors. Most of them are the same every night, but sometimes they change out, so that's a lot of fun. That cowboy dinner show, that's definitely a destination thing now that’s bringing people here. Lance Syrett: It's kind of amazing how many people come to Ruby's Inn and want to experience an activity or stay overnight or something, and they never even go to Bryce Canyon, which absolutely blows my mind. In addition to our amenities here at the resort, we've also got activities like horseback rides, ATV tours, and mountain bike rentals. we've got a great bike path that goes right by the property here. You can bike ride from Inspiration Point inside Bryce Canyon National Park to the bottom of Red Canyon. It's for all types of riders and it is phenomenal. That's some of the things we have going on here at Ruby's Inn, so there's something for everybody. Jordan Barker: That's awesome. Thanks for giving us that background, Lance. It’s one of the things that we always like to do when we have guests on this podcast, because we are talking about tourism, we're talking about destinations. Is there someplace that you have always wanted to go but you've never had the opportunity to go? Is there like a dream destination that you've just been salivating to go there but haven't had a chance to get there yet? Adam Stoker: And you're pretty well-traveled? Is there anywhere you haven't been? Jordan Barker: Yeah. Lance Syrett: Oh man, that's a good question. You know, for being in the travel business, for being in the tourism business, I think my elusive destination I'd like to go to is just like two weeks in my backyard and nobody bothering me and just turn my cell phone off. I can work on my raspberry patch in my garden for two weeks. There's a lot of places in the world I'd like to go. You know, my wife, she's high on Europe. I've never been to Europe yet. I've been around it and I feel like I've been there because of the European travelers. Some days there's more Europeans in Bryce Canyon than anyone else, but I don't know. That's a great question. Somewhere that you can't get cell phone service. Where's that? I'd like to go there. Adam Stoker: Isn't that funny though? I mean you, you've been all over the world because of your role in tourism, right? Lance Syrett: It's true. Adam Stoker: Your ideal place is no cell phone service in your backyard and in all reality, it's not far from your backyard that you really don't get cell phone service, because I know from Bryce Canyon to Tropic where you live, there's about seven minutes of no cell service on the way, right? Lance Syrett: Yeah, that used to be true, but they put a new tower in and now that can get you all the way down into the canyon. Adam Stoker: Oh, did they? Lance Syrett: Yeah, you can have uninterrupted cell phone service. Those little elusive spots with no cell phone service, those are becoming fewer and fewer. I was on a cruise ship this spring and that was kind of nice. Although, they offer you cell phone plans, but you know, they're kind of expensive so you can use those excuses and say, "Ah sorry guys, I'm not going to buy the expensive plan so you can't call me." That was nice. Adam Stoker: Sure. Jordan Barker: Yep. Adam Stoker: Well, tell me. So you talked about like to go, which isn't very far it sounds like, but what about your favorite place that you've visited? Lance Syrett: I'm kind of an outdoorsy guy. I've been up to the northwest several times, been to Alaska, you know, Vancouver Island and the Olympic peninsula. Really had a good time out there amongst nature. Again, I'm a small-town kid, so cities, bigger metropolitan areas — been to plenty of those — those don't appeal to me. Places I've gone again and again, places like Alaska, Washington, rural places like that, that's where I like to go. Jordan Barker: Nice. Obviously, you mentioned at the beginning of the podcast that Ruby's is a family-owned, family-run business. So obviously there's tourism in your blood if you will, right? But why are you still in tourism? What is it about tourism that still allows you to maintain that fire, passion and drive, right? I mean, even though it's a family business, you don't have to be in the family business, I assume, right? So why is it that you are still involved in tourism? What is it about the industry that you like so much? Lance Syrett: Well, yeah. That's a good question. Well, first of all, my major in college was free food but then I figured out I couldn't graduate on free food, so I had to pick a real major. I ended up majoring in finance and economics. I took the LSAT, I was going on to law school, I was going to be one of those guys. Then, we moved home to take a break for the summer and pay off a little bit of debt and then, we were taking a year off. My wife and I came home and started a family and it was kind of her idea and she said, "Hey, do we really need to do all that stuff? Why don't we stay here?" Of course, the family kind of made it a good career path for me if I wanted to stay. I took a break from going to law school, and I tell people sometimes I'm still on a break. That was 14 years ago, so I'll tell you that tourism is a fun industry to be in. One thing that my wife mentions sometimes is the fact that even though we live in a small town, sometimes it feels like a bigger place. A lot of it has to do with Ruby's Inn, Bryce Canyon being kind of a crossroads of the world. As I mentioned, most days, there's more international people here in Bryce Canyon National Park than there is any Americans. Especially with Utahans being right here in the state. So you get a lot of diversity. You walk through the lobby and you hear all kinds of languages being spoken, whether it's French, German, Chinese, you name it. There is always something going on as far as that goes. You know, when I committed to come back to the family business, I committed to doing my best. With family businesses, sometimes you get kind of big and there's a lot of people that are just kind of coasting along and kind of feel entitled. That was the last thing I wanted to do and I just wanted to be involved, to make a difference. That's why every time I turn around, I'm getting put into something else. I'm kind of opinionated. I'm kind of a loud mouth and you know, it tends to be in this industry that when you start mouthing off and saying things “ought to be this way,” they say, "Well, why don't you step up and try to make it that way?" That's influenced my career. Again, in tourism there's opportunities to travel, to see things, to do things that you wouldn't normally do. Every day is different. Here at the hotel, you think sometimes things can get monotonous, but man, there's a curve ball thrown at you every day and it's fun, and you know, I'm kind of sick and twisted. I'm kind of a masochist that way where, you know, if I had just a job where every day was the same, I think I'd be bored out of my mind, so I like the change. I like meeting new people. It's a lot of fun. Adam Stoker: Cool. Good answer. Lance Syrett: Thank you. Adam Stoker: I think we probably should have let the listeners know a little earlier on. Lance and I have known each other for years and have worked together for years. If this podcast seems a little more comfortable or a little more casual than some of the other episodes, you know, Lance and I have had some interesting experiences together, which kind of brings down the guards a little bit. We're both avid BYU fans and have gone to several away BYU football games together. We've been to New Orleans for that and we've been to Texas and anyway, yeah, we go way back. It's kind of fun to have this conversational podcast episode, but one of the reasons that I wanted to have you on, Lance, is because you work very, very closely with your county tourism office, Garfield County Tourism in Utah. You guys have developed a relationship that, at least from what I've seen, is very unique because there's a lot of DMOs who have a difficult dynamic between them and their partners and getting everyone on the same page, working toward the same goal to generate success for both the individual business and for the county. Tell me how you've been able to do that and what makes your relationship with the destination so important? Lance Syrett: Well, that's a great question. You know, as far as our relationship here at Ruby's Inn with our DMO goes, I go back to my uncle Bob again, we're a family business and he was the general manager before me. When we first started in hotels, when I was growing up in the family business, for the most part, I spent my time in the food service and western activities. My uncle Bob was always this mystery to me, he was my inspiration, my mentor. Again, after I decided to take a break from going to law school and as I came into the hotel and started working in here, I looked up to him and how he did things. He always said, you know, "You can't complain about how things are going unless you get in there and try to change them." That was something that always inspired me. Then, how that applies to our relationship with our DMO, with our local officers of tourism. Bob, for a long time, was involved in the area Travel Council or the Tourism Advisory Board in the State of Utah. As in most states, they take a portion of the hotel tax and that goes into a kind of pay-it-forward-type fund. Whoever is staying here at the time, part of their taxes go to promote the guy that's coming the next time. With that structure here and seeing how Bob interacted on that board. Then, another thing I was told, he said, "Ultimately the DMO, the Area Office of Tourism is funded by our hotel taxes. The things you have to do at the hotel, you're cleaning toilets, you're changing sheets, you're dealing with difficult guests, you're making that money, so you think about that.” “That money is going into a big pot and you're the one that earned it.” It's like, why would a hotel person not try to get involved in how that money has spent and try to create our own destiny, so-to-speak. Why not? Why not get involved? Why not stick your nose in there? As I said before, I tend to be pretty opinionated — I learned that from uncle Bob — and if you get really opinionated, eventually you get a seat at the table. That’s going to benefit your business and it's going to benefit the businesses around you. If you're not there to help make the decision, then somebody else makes that decision and those directions for you. Adam Stoker: It sounds, Lance, like that bridge was built a long time ago. I mean you started out watching your uncle Bob and then you moved into that role. How can somebody who maybe either hasn't been built or isn't completely done with that bride improve that, whether they're on the hotel side or on the destination side? Lance Syrett: You know, just showing up. The life of the general manager's a very busy one, but you have to make it a priority to show up to meetings. Just because you are not necessarily on a tourism board, or maybe it's a chamber board or something like that, doesn’t mean you can’t just show up and see what's going on and give your two cents and make contacts with those leaders that are driving the conversation — the director of the DMO or the chamber. I mean, most of it's just showing up. You know, I’m always in my job, part of my job, we do a lot of traditional advertising, things like that. We also do a lot of trade events. In a lot of these trade events, we go to market directly to tour operators and we'll go to these trade shows and things like that. Me, I speak no foreign languages. I barely speak English. I don't even speak that very well, but one of the trade shows I go to is mostly with Asians and I don’t know any Asian languages. I'm sure I slaughtered the customs and things like that. Because I'll show up at these trade shows and I'm handing out brochures, I get the question, "Do you think you really did a lot of good?" One thing that I've learned over the years is just showing up. Just showing up. Even though that person speaks Chinese and I speak English, I smile, give him a business card, maybe give them a treat, a little tchotchke or something like that, and a brochure. They can go back and kind of look it up in their own language in the end, look at the destinations, things like that, and you get business from those relationships. Again, was it a great spiel I gave it to that person? Was it a great marketing message or something like that? No, it wasn't. It was just showing up. It's the same thing with being involved in your local DMO, your Office of Tourism, Chamber of Commerce, whatever it is. Showing up's half the game. Adam Stoker: You mentioned as a GM of a hotel or one of the hotel partners, that makes sense to try to build that bridge. What advice would you give to the tourism office? You know, a lot of the folks that we talk to, the relationships that they have, they're not as fortunate in some cases as you in Garfield County. Sometimes there's bad blood, there's issues, or politics always makes things really interesting, right? Like lots of different voices that have competing interests and things that are important to them. What advice would you give to a tourism office that doesn't have the support of their local partners? Whether those are hotels or local businesses, what advice would you have for them to get more involved? Lance Syrett: If a DMO person wants to get that buy-in from their partners, go see face-to-face. Go visit with them face-to-face and see what matters to them and then act like you care. Start out not asking them about the business relationship or going all-in on the business relationship, but find out who they are, what their family is like and what their family situation is and what they like to do in their spare time. Then, at the very end say, "Oh yeah, I guess we got to talk business," and then you can segue into that. It's the same thing with these DMO partners. If you don't act like you care about your partners, people aren't dumb. People pick up on that. Again, go see them, go visit with them, get to know them. I think that the buy-in, just one face-to-face meeting like that happens really quickly. It doesn't matter how many emails you send out from your database, they're not going to buy-in to what you're saying unless they think you care. Adam Stoker: Yeah. Building relationships is a manual process, right? It's not going to happen from an email. I think that's a really good point. You mentioned that as far as the tourism revenue for the county goes, you as a hotel earned a lot of that. You have a major contribution to the county destination and the marketing that they do, but I wanted to ask you a little bit about how you earn that money and how you generate success. What are you guys doing? Obviously, as your ad agency, we know some of the answer, right, but would like to have our listeners understand as a major resort, what have you seen work well for you to generate the success that pushes not only your organization forward but also the county as well? Lance Syrett: One of the things that I think has been Ruby's strength over the years is the ability to play the long game as far as where our business is going to be five years or 10 years from now. Sometimes some people say, “If you look in Moab or you look at Springdale and they're selling their rooms for three or 400 bucks, why haven't you done that at Ruby's?” “Why haven't you done that at Bryce?” “Why don't you drive your rates that high?" It's like, okay, we understand where the business is now and we understand the demand of how things are going, but it's like, where's the business going to be five years from now? Where's it going to be 10 years from now? The fact that we're a family business and we're 103 years old, we can look 10 years down the road and say, "Where's our business going to be in 10 years?" Not to bag on some other hotels and stuff that have come into the market, but some of those are owned by hedge funds or by management companies and stuff and they're not worried about where they're going to be in five years. They're worried about, "Where is our quarterly mark going to be so we can get our bonus?" You know, things like that. Whereas, if when you're a family business and you think long-term it's decisions that are more long-term. It's not, "Where are we going to be this quarter? Where we're going to be this year?" It's going to be, "Where are we going to be in five years, where we're going to be in 10 years?" Did that answer your question? Adam Stoker: Absolutely. Jordan Barker: Yeah, it did. It definitely did. I wanted to double click on something you said because you said you have the ability to play the long game. You mentioned that Ruby's is a family-owned business. I'm sure that there's pros and cons to being involved in a family-owned business and you and I have had some conversations off the air about, you know, some of the dynamics that are at play there and it's always fascinating to me. I think about, you know, my siblings and as much as I love them, I think it would be interesting to see them every day and work with them every day. I'm always fascinated whenever I see family-owned businesses that, especially one like Ruby's Inn, where you've been able to be so successful over such a long period of time. Can you talk a little bit about that dynamic of having a family-owned business and maybe what that looks like and maybe even how that gives you guys in some cases a competitive advantage? Lance Syrett: Absolutely, yes. With any family dynamic, there's always going to be some issues. You can't agree all the time. I can tell you that my wife and I, we have a rule that we don't talk about the business at home. You need some boundaries. For the most part, my siblings and I have the same rule. It's like, all right, let's wait till Monday and let's wait until we're in the building before we start talking about that. Because it can be consuming. You come to work and you see your siblings, your cousins, your uncles or whatever, and then you go home and you get the same thing and maybe you go to a school activity – it's the same thing –and maybe you go to church – it's the same thing. So you definitely have to compartmentalize and say, "Okay, am I mad at them personally? Am I disagreeing professionally or is this a personal issue?" If it's a family issue- Adam Stoker: What a hard thing to have to figure out. Jordan Barker: Yeah. Lance Syrett: It's tough. I'm not going to lie to you, it's tough, and we go to these families business seminars sometimes and they always mention that most family businesses fail by the third generation. There's all kinds of, I mean ... We could go all day about the reasons why- Adam Stoker: You guys are well-passed that, right? Lance Syrett: I was going to say we're fourth generation going on the fifth. One of the neat things about that statistic about the family businesses is that most fail by the third generation, but once you get past the third generation, it actually starts reversing the trend and they start becoming more successful and less family businesses fail. I think the idea being, if you haven't folded by the third generation, you've probably kind of figured something out and you maybe you're going to be okay. Yeah, you have to compartmentalize. You have to say, "Okay, this is family, this is business." Otherwise, it can just drives you nuts. Sometimes I think maybe that's why I'm losing my hair lately. Lots of strengths in a family business. Sometimes we might disagree about things, but when the going gets tough, there's a lot of strength in having family where you feel that loyalty that if this business fails, I have failed my family. It makes you work that much harder to keep the business strong and keep things going where- Adam Stoker: Nobody wants to be the break in the chain, right? Lance Syrett: Yeah. You don't want to be the break in the chain and when you think about it, it's like, yeah, you don't want to fail your family, and if it's more of a corporate environment, it's kind of like, "Well, I never liked that guy over there anyway." So yeah, there's definitely more pressure and I think it’s the strength where you feel that loyalty and feel that you gotta keep bread on the table. Adam Stoker: Cool. Well, I think I'm going to switch gears a little bit, Lance. One of the things that I think Ruby's Inn does an incredible job of, I've taken my family down there a few times and stayed, is the visitor experience, and you talked about a lot about the different amenities that are available from when you check in to when you go on an excursion or to when you go to the dinner theater at Ebenezer's. The customer experience has got to be a major focus for you guys because you've done such a good job of it. How do you make sure that that is a good customer experience and how do you handle it when a customer perceives that it's not? Lance Syrett: Well, we definitely try to train, retrain, reiterate and focus to try to get our staff on board. As a kid around here, again, when the business was fairly small, I can remember being a kid and knowing absolutely everybody on the property. Now even as a full-time manager, man, that's hard to do. We've got a lot of good people, a lot of managers, a lot of pieces, tools, things like that that help us to get training out to our frontline staff. Here at Ruby's Inn, one of the issues we have is, again, in 1978 we had a hundred hotel rooms and now here in 2019, about 40 years later, we have a 700, so we've grown seven times in that time period. Then, the smaller towns around here like Tropic where I live, and Panguitch which is close by, they virtually had zero growth over that same 40-year time frame. We have to recruit employees from all over the world. That's brings some unique dynamics to our property. We'll have work campers who are retired school teachers and retired military people who live in an RV. They travel through and come in to scoop ice cream all summer. Then, we'll have kids from the Philippines who come in and clean hotel rooms. Then, we'll have kids from Montenegro who might come and wait tables in the restaurants and things like that. Constantly retraining. We've got a full-time HR staff, I've got to give them a shout out. They're great. They do customer service training and yeah, it's a moving target. It's hard to hit, but we try to do the best we can to deliver on that customer experience and try to as much as possible to go back to those values that Ruby and his wife Minnie and, you know, my grandpa and grandma had. Adam Stoker: It sounds like the training and focus on that is never done. Lance Syrett: It's never done. I was going to say, we've got some employees that come in and we have staff that come on a visa, and the maximum they can stay is four months. You know, the seasons, shorter season's almost eight months, so you cannot only have those employees throughout the entire season, so you have to retrain right in the middle of the season. Again, I'm losing my hair. When I started talking out loud, I can figure out why. Jordan Barker: That makes sense. You touched on a little bit about where Ruby's started. You've talked a little bit about where Ruby's is today. What does the future look like for you guys and what does that long game look like for you? Lance Syrett: Right, as I said, here at Ruby's Inn, we've been here for 103 years and we hope to be here for 103 more. We are definitely going to have to change a little bit as far as the family transition, you know, from my generation they were basically able to welcome everybody back with open arms and pays a good wage and have a good career path for us. We have cold winters down here, so we've got a lot of kids on the next generation. We have to kind of plan what Ruby's Inn is going to look like to the next generation where maybe not necessarily everybody can come back and be part of the family business like we did. We're constantly changing things here. Bryce Canyon City came in 2007 so that's kind of opened up some development opportunities here as far as you know, more housing. We just built a big housing project last year. In the new share economy, that's not escaped us. We are a very traditional resort, mostly hotel rooms, but we've got some vacation rental offerings because you just can't ignore that space. AirBnB and BRBO, are such a big players in the travel market now, so I see us in the next few years probably building more inventory, more family-type cabins, and homes, things like that that, so we can rent things that will pull in those types of travelers. Then just keep on doing what we're doing. We always like to think we're providing kind of a western experience as far as our cowboy dinner shows, the horseback riding and the nightly rodeos during the summertime which is trying to preserve that western experience. Again, our customers love it because they're coming from western Europe or Asia and they want to come in and want to see cowboys, the wild west and they want to see open spaces. We're trying to preserve that as much as we can. Jordan Barker: Well, good deal. Well Lance, I think it's that time. I really appreciate it. We appreciate you taking the time to come and join our podcast today. Once again, Lance Syrett, the Grand Poobah of Ruby's Inn. Thanks a lot for taking the time, my friend. We really appreciate everything you've shared with us today on the show. Adam Stoker: This has been the Destination Marketing podcast. I Want to invite everybody to join our LinkedIn group as well. It's Destination Marketers on LinkedIn. If you search that, you can apply to join the group and we'd love to have you in the community that is sharing experiences and expertise that is helping people continue to get better in tourism marketing, where we can all grow as a whole. Thanks for joining us, everybody, and we look forward to talking to you soon.
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