The Highs and Lows of The Hospitality Industry
How Bed and Breakfasts in South Carolina have adapted to the Pandemic and What They Say About The Future of Travel
By Emily Alexander
“Carol Grant, the owner of the Flowertown Bed and Breakfast in Summerville, South Carolina expected 2020 to be a successful year for her business; in March, COVID changed everything. “I was having a super busy winter and spring and had great bookings, everything from family reunions to long term stays and it was just going to be such a banner year and then mid March, everything just stopped. For about two months, nothing. I can probably count on one hand the number of rooms that I had,” Grant said.
While many industries have been impacted by COVID-19, the hospitality industry has been hit with immense hardships. According to the American Hotel and Lodging Association’s State of The Hotel Industry Report, “…nearly 4 million jobs in the broader hospitality industry were lost due to the pandemic.” While the COVID outbreak has affected the American economy, bed and breakfasts seem particularly susceptible to the influence of this pandemic. In order to stay in business, Bed and Breakfast owners have had to reevaluate the way they ran their business in the past. From cleaning procedures to breakfast services, every element of running a B&B has required inspection to guarantee that guests and staff are safe. Outside of the financial uncertainty and change that the pandemic has caused, B&Bs in South Carolina have an additional hurdle. While many individual cities and counties in the state have mask mandates, South Carolina doesn’t have a statewide requirement.”
About This Project
I first began to create this project by reaching out to as many B&B owners in Arizona, South Carolina, Florida and Georgia over email, as I could. I specifically chose those states as they all lacked formalized statewide mask mandates. I looked for Bed and Breakfasts that, generally speaking, had good reviews and were all over each state. I additionally reached out to two people who visited B&Bs within the last few months. One of the two people responded and I interviewed them. While I didn’t end up including the customer’s voice in the article, the interview gave me an interesting alternative perspective to the B&B owners.
Interview wise, I asked all of the B&B owners if they preferred to talk over Zoom or on the phone. Except for one B&B owner who insisted on being emailed the questions and responding via email, I conducted all of the interviews over the phone. Outside of interviews, I looked at some hotel and hospitality reports (like the American Hotel and Lodging Association’s State of The Hotel Industry Report) to get a sense of how the industry is doing statistically. Reports like this additionally helped to confirm some of the patterns that the owners mentioned.
As I began to structure my article with time, I tried to continuously refine and focus it. This was a bit of a struggle for me as I tried to include a range of surprising quotes and detail while making sure that the article didn’t come off as vague or too broad. When I finished interviewing my sources, I was left with 23 pages of transcriptions. While this originally felt daunting, the process of pairing down what I wanted to include in the piece was a great learning experience. As I slowly whittled down the quotes, I found that my piece felt more organized and put together.
Through the process of creating this piece, I have not only learned a lot about the hospitality industry, but I’ve learned a lot about the process of creating good journalism. As I practiced follow up interviews, transcribing and organizing long transcripts and figuring out how to structure (and then restructure) a long form piece, I gained new knowledge and skills.
