Hello friends and travelers. Thanks for listening. You are riding along on the Hostile Road Trip podcast. Our mission is to spread awareness of the true hostile experience in the Americas and share stories from the fascinating hosts who create those unique facilities.
I'm your host Jimmy Black, joined alongside co-founder of International Travelers House, Bobby Dyer, and Eric Ferria, co-founder of World Packers.
Each session we sit down with hostile operators or travel influencers to hear about their road success, discuss trending hostile topics, and close with tips for travelers who are seeking to have the ultimate experience when visiting each destination.
You can't afford to miss this trip. Now fasten your seat belts and let's hit the road.
Alright, hello friends and fellow travelers. Welcome to another episode of Hostile Road Trip. My name is James Black and I'm here alongside with Bobby Dyer. We are the co-founders of ICH Hostiles and Ecologen.
Also here with us hosting is Eric Ferria, co-founder from World Packers. Our good friend from episode one, Byron, is joining us from American Hostiles.
And then we have Joe and Alaina, the co-founders of Providence Hostel and Guest House, which is the first ever hostel, if I'm not mistaken, in Providence, right?
As far as we know.
As far as we know, I believe so. As a resident of Rhode Island who was born and raised here, it's very proud of me to be here doing this as I always was dreaming and saying that there should be a hostel in Providence or Newport.
And so happy to finally see that come to fruition. But we have got a great panel here for tonight and we're looking forward to diving into your experience personally, but also what your facility has to offer.
What the underlying mission and plans of your facility are. And then these exciting, this exciting news about this Providence to Boston jump and expansion.
This is, you know, as we just came from Boston a couple of nights ago and so the hostels were up there and had to offer. So I think that an operation like this is very much needed up there.
So thank you.
Some behind the scenes.
Yeah, we got a little bit of a scoop on what's going on.
Sure.
So as we jump into it, I said we really just want to start to hear first about your story and your journey as it's such an issue in America with awareness and that's the reasoning of our podcast here is to bring about awareness within the industry.
And we think it's great that we can have other Americans participate in this podcast series to represent this demographic and to give them more insight into it. So Joe, I'll start with you. How what was your first hostile experience.
So, like a typical American, I had no idea what a hostile was until I went to college. And after I graduated from college, my friend that was in college at the time, he's like, let's go take a trip around America. And I was like, I don't know if I have a budget for that.
It's like, no, but we'll like camp out sometimes we'll stay in hostels and stuff like hostels. What's that? He kind of explained to me I didn't get the idea until much later when I joined Couch Church in Atlanta for the Lena.
About 12 years ago.
Yes.
I was living in New York, he was in Boston, and I always liked to stay with locals, so we connected. Little did we know we'd become business partners.
That's so cool. Couchsurfing is a type of accommodations that I think is a good bridge into hostels in a lot of ways. I don't know if that it's phased out a little bit in the past years, I feel like, but I feel the same. Maybe because I'm in the hostels. That's true. That's true.
Couchsurfing was the beginning of my hostels. I was living in New York, I had a tiny, my first experience couchsurfing was as a guest in Denmark and Copenhagen. And I loved it. My host was amazing just gave me the key, trusted me fully. I was blown away. I've never received that amount of trust.
Yes. I even earned it. I was like, wow, I want to do that. And I kind of tend to throw myself all out into something I love. Came back to New York and in my tiny studio I would host like five people who would all meet at my house. So I was a kind of mini free hostel.
Oh, all right. He was a little bit. He was a little bit. Yoga mats on the floor. The fancy might be an arrow bed. And then little by little from there I started selling the spots on Craigslist. 20 bucks a night. I was much cheaper than a hostel. It was all kind of not quite legal, shall we say.
Yes. Yeah, a lot of gray area in the hostels. Especially years ago. Ask for forgiveness, not for permission.
I was loving it. And I was a fine my daytime job with as a financial planner. It was an office job was very boring. I learned a lot. I'm using those skills now.
That's great. So this story obviously you'll learn provenance now. It feels like we've got to cover New York before we get here. So we're in New York and this is you know it's great because we're not planning to go through New York City on this current trip. So it will be great to kind of talk about the problem that New York City's had with their house.
So this is indicative of the bigger problem that we have where you have municipalities that do not recognize hostels for zoning reasons for various reasons for permitting reasons and it creates an instant roadblock and an already difficult process of opening a small business.
So with you being there during this turbulent time, fill us in. So all of a sudden one day in New York City says no more hostels. What happened there?
Okay, so I feel like often when political things happen, there's a moral reason that needs to justify and then there's the real reason. So the moral reason they use to justify is, oh, this is this is taking away housing stock for from those who can't afford it, which if that were the only reason that make a category create a zoning category where you will allow it.
But in fact, the real reason behind it is that the hotel lobbyists is very powerful. Yes, and they were losing a lot of money at a time when hostels were raising their rates. So we were really following this very closely because we saw it developing in advance.
Okay. Yeah. So hotels got together and basically paid huge sums of money to politicians and then a law was passed that explicitly made hostels illegal in all but name. They didn't say hostels are illegal, but they said if X, Y, and Z basically a hostile, you're not allowed.
Well, then, but you might be allowed, but no more than three beds in a room. Unless you're nonprofit because really, so protect the big boy. So as of right now, they're only really two, like, legal hostel. Yeah, the rest are like hotels, do it kind of like hostile. Yeah, because to be fully legal, you have to be nonprofit, but also they will not allow any more nonprofit.
You've got to be this, but we're not heading out anymore. Yeah. Yeah. So that catch 22. It's like the bar permit because at one point we were looking to open a bar. Pretty much impossible to get a bar permit in New York because everyone wants it. Yeah.
Here's a phenomenal thing that we observed when they shut down. There was a massive sweep all happened on a Sunday morning at seven a.m. by the department of buildings DOB. Yeah, we were we had we had we had a good friend who was helping us out for us to not be effective. That's all I'm going to say on that.
But at that time, that massive sweep happened. All of the hostels, even one that was legal because it was nonprofit for the new definition, even that one, they all got shut down except H.I. except all across the board.
What a phenomenal thing we observed the very next day. So if the day before we would get one Airbnb request, all of a sudden we were getting 20 Airbnb. We managed to say a float floating on that one. Yes. Yeah.
I feel like we saw the big turning point in what made Airbnb really kick off because they were already good with SEO. So if you're looking at hostile, we're calling all the hostels because all the guests got shut out. We wish we had more beds.
Yeah, you could have done well. Yeah.
Overnight, our request for Airbnb went through the roof. That's fascinating. You know, and I think in the prior episode, we covered a lot with Byron here on the advantages that would have if we had our own association like the hotels do because we don't have strength in numbers.
So something like that happens. We're fragmented and we can't stand up against the big guy. But now there are a lot of hostels out there that if we did collectively stand together, we could have a voice that's powerful enough to have that type of influence, hopefully in the future.
I believe it. All right, so you stay afloat and you decide we're going to exit New York because this is hostile grounds for our industry. No pun intended other words. But now, so what made you choose Providence? Did you have prior connections or did you do a research and to see that there wasn't one in Providence and it needed one?
It was a series of coincidental events. Okay. So during the same time where we're looking to exit New York, my friend or ex friend now had business proposition in Providence with some properties and stuff. Anyway, that's a side story.
Okay, but because I was still kind of properties in Providence, I found a good property that was able to do a hostile zone. Right here where we're sitting. Beautiful. So you got the right zoning. You surrounded by a lot of commercial stuff. Exactly. So you got that proper zone. Great. Yeah. All right.
But there's a little bit more to it. We were actively scouting something outside of New York City because we recognize New York City was unfriendly and we thought so we were looking at Detroit. We were looking at Burlington, Vermont. Oh, these are cool cities.
We wanted to buy it because there's a hostile for sale there. And then and then Providence was just it was a godsend because it really tick marked everything. Ideally, we wanted a city that had no hostile. Right. No competition.
Ideally, we wanted a city that would be close to New York City because that's my home. Close to Boston. There we go. And you're on that track. Exactly. Three hours from New York City, one hour from Boston. I needed it to be a progressive city because I can't be surrounded.
Very progressive city. Not close minded here. That's for sure. Yeah. By Trumpers. Yes. You could. Am I allowed to be political? We try not to be, but we're in Providence. So you can slay Donald. I don't think we're going to find anyone outside that's going to be upset about that.
And then the other really important thing we wanted it to be a university town and there's five universities. I was telling them on the way in they were like what is there just one college like this is a college. Brown University, which is an IBU, wrote out a school of design. Top art school. Every B guy paid for them.
Yeah. Yeah. And then Johnson and Wales, which doesn't get as much publicity, but it's culinary. And that actually brings the other big draw for us. Providence has an amazing food scene. Unbelievable. Federal Hill and then a lot of the little neighborhoods that are broken out.
As we were saying before, it reminds me of a little New York City because you have all these culture bastions and neighborhoods. And then with that comes those type of neighborhood restaurants to mom and pop shops. And a lot of their grads end up opening shop here because it's affordable.
Yes, which I forgot the other main draw Providence was it's so affordable compared to Boston, New York, Boston, but it's just affordable compared to other cities. Very true. Yeah. So I've already thought that for the longest time that it needed one and then I could always say, why isn't there one, you know, because you start to go through the check marks as we say.
Usually like, well, it has this, but it doesn't have that. Does it work that and I'd always tick those off and be like, yeah, I don't know why someone isn't doing that. So I was very excited to meet you last year at the hospital conference. I open up. I was like, that's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
It was just so, so great to hear that someone had done that. So now this project that you're working on now, would you say that it has a similar mission than your New York project that's carried through or has that changed in any way due to the new city or surrounding?
I think it has a different mission due to the fact that I've changed. Please tell me. I think the one in New York, the mission was to get as many people into the door and provide a clean, fun place.
I think as I've grown and become a little bit more spiritual and I'm working on my own self development and kind of my, my mission for being alive, for being here. And I've more come to ask myself, what kind of person do I want to be? And I've done all kinds of growth.
I want it to become more of a spiritual hospital.
Like the yoga and the meditation downstairs. We do the same with yoga and meditation at our hostels. Yeah. And we like to have that experience. You know, people, a lot of times they think you're getting drunk and you're trying to get laid and that's the only thing you're here for.
But we really try to make it an educational experience with the culture and also to offer those other types of activities that don't revolve around drinking or partying.
Exactly. Wellness is definitely a big thing now for travelers. Yeah. Okay. So we're going to take a quick break and we'll return next to talk about some trending topics and stay tuned for more.
Reservations, distributing room availabilities, saving inventories and collecting payments.
Now, a big part of our objective with this podcast is hostile awareness within the industry because we feel through our experience, I'm sure you could share it in the same way that the perception is quite bad in this country from dealing with municipality people to dealing with guests or potential guests.
They think of hostels as shacks for homeless people, places where you get bed bugs, places where you get murdered by some stranger. It's very unfortunate, but a big part of our objective here in this podcast is to break down those barriers and to educate the people a little bit more and make them more willing to try it that one time.
Just like we have our friends out in Bunk and Brew in Oregon having that type of awareness campaign of come inside and try this so that it can break down those barriers and educate the people so that they're more willing to try it because I think we could also all agree once they try it, nine out of 10 love it.
In there, I'm never staying in a hotel again. So what are your thoughts about the current perception of the industry in the US? Well, not good. Yeah, so we belong to this tourism chamber of commerce.
In province. And when we introduce ourselves, you know, and people come up to ask us about our business, we always ask them, have you stayed in a hostel before? And their answer back is somewhere along the lines of, well, I can afford it to not stay in a hostel.
Yeah, so that's very true. The only reason you stay in a hostel is because it's cheap. Yes, it can be cheaper, but there's the community. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. There's the ability to cook. There's the ability to meet other people. Forged connections. You can't get that in a hotel. You can't afford to miss it. That's what I tell them when they tell me that.
You shared that you actually, you guys met and you started a business and shared experience. Yeah. So we could have just as easily met in a hostel. Yeah. I mean, we happen to have met through couch surfing, but we would probably not have met if we were both staying at the same hotel.
Because the nature of the hotel is that you go to your own room and then the other person goes to their own room. There's, you're not really encouraged to socialize by the way you are in a hostel setting. Yeah. Now, I also, with your name, it's very interesting as we've discussed this in other topics, other episodes.
Generator hostels, for example, in America, they've recently dropped hostel from their name because they had such a hard time getting the American millennial demographic to get on board with this. And that's intimidating because imagine the budget they have at Generator Hostel to have overcome that and they still couldn't do it.
So we were talking about it and it's interesting how a lot of other places have just started to drop the name. And in our opinion, that's so very unfortunate because it's a quick way out to say like, well, I'm going to run a hostel, but I'm not going to call it a hostel because I'm afraid of being called a hostel.
And a big part of our mission here is to make people empowered to say, no, I run a hostel. That's what I do. You know, and not to shy away from my hostel. So you made an interesting combination in yours where you called it a hostel and a guest house.
I like that because you're not running away from the hostel. But you're also letting some other people know that this doesn't have to be completely perceived as this. It's because we also offer private rooms in the second location. Yes. That a hostel offers private room and in this day and age, almost every hostel offers a private room. Yes, it's so true.
And you can capture more of an agent. All the numbers always say like we're trying to capture everyone 18 to 30 or 18 to 35. I just turned 35. So I was asking them, what do I do next year? Jump off the bridge? Do you take me up to pasture?
I still feel as vibrant as ever in the industry and I have more to give and I want to learn more and I feel like I can still become a better hostel manager and owner day by day. Like I feel better at 35 as a hostel manager than I did at 25. You know, I looked better at 25, but you know, this is podcasting.
So here we are. And that private room is that element. So now when we travel, I still want to go to the activity. I still want to socialize, but sure, I'll get a private room. I'm a cheapskate. I still do the door. And then they start yelling at my snoring.
Oh, I'm in a different room. Okay. But there are options. And then I always do like to highlight that. And I'm sure you've had the same experience. I've seen 70 and 80 year olds hop in a top bunk, you know, like with not even a moment's hesitation. And I always like to highlight that those older travelers, they've been everywhere. Those younger travelers want to go. And a lot of times they'll find the circle around by the end of the night because they're sharing all their wisdom. You know, so there could be a lot of cool elements to that.
But with that generator element, with your name choice, was that ever an obstacle for you with this, you know, provenance project of, you know, being called a hostile? Did you ever think of not using the word hostile?
No, we never thought about how to use it. We wanted to add the word guest house to allude to the fact that there's private rooms and that we're some kind of hybrid. And also to allude to the fact that we're smaller. I feel that guest house implies a smaller home here.
I do like that. Yeah.
But in terms of trends, I do want to talk about something that I'm very excited to notice. So back in the day, I'm 39, I started hostels about 20 years ago, traveling at them. And when I started, it was a lot of people who were my age at that time, early 20s, college graduates.
I'm very excited to notice an increasing trend of an expanding demographics. We've had grandparents come with their grandkids. They wanted to introduce them to the hospital. And I'm very excited to see a lot of people having professional corporate jobs, asking themselves, what am I doing with my life?
Yeah, quitting their job. And where are they going to stay when they're traveling for a year? In a hostel. Yes, find yourself. Yeah. So I'm seeing a lot more people who are leaving the rat race and asking themselves what their real mission is. Yeah.
And also, interestingly enough, through sites like World Packers, which we are a user and we love using World Packers, those are the sites that connect us to those people who quit their job. Because World Packers, I don't know if you're listeners know, they allow someone who is in another country to say, where do I want to go?
Paris. And then look up Paris and see what kind of free accommodation they can find in exchange for some hours. And we're getting people who are looking for doing that in the US. And we've had an architect from Germany with his girlfriend who was a teacher. His job said to him, Nicky, you're a great architect, but you'd be even better if you took a year off, traveled around the world.
Got inspired as to how people do architecture in the rest of the world. And we encourage you to do it. And by the way, if you don't do it, we're going to fire you.
I can't do it.
To the rest of America.
And we'll keep your job for you.
Yeah. Oh, you have to go.
This was a while ago. We're still friends with Nicky and Maya. They're actually back in Germany. Maya herself was questioning if she still wanted to be a teacher. She's now started her own business. And I feel like staying at hospitals, you meet so many people who are not the demographic that they were 20 years ago. Not just a 20 year old or a 25 year old. 35 year olds, 50 year olds, you've had 70 year olds, we had a professor on sabbatical travel every year. I'm excited to see that develop.
I think that's great. We touched on that in Byron's episode, the gap year and how much more credible that is outside of the US. But how it would be great if it was promoted more in the US. And I think you're so right in the way that, you know, it was very much a common trend that if you had a job, you kept it for 30, 40 years and you got your pension. And that doesn't happen anymore. And you change jobs a lot more. You have to find yourself to reinvent yourself. And I think that even at this table right here, you have everyone here in that same way. You saw a KPMG. You worked at Morgan Stanley. You know, like this is the way it works.
You have people that just disconnect from top elements of that different culture and find themselves in this different forum, which I really do think can help you find yourself because you find so many different outlets, you know, right? It's like dating multiple different people when you're young to find out who you like, you know, you can find out a lot about yourself by hanging around different people.
Yeah, it's exciting that there's websites that enable you to find, you know, find a gig where you could stay for free in exchange for working some helps you prolong that gap year. Yeah, it would. Yeah, I think that's fantastic. Yeah.
And so with the sharing economy, we've been seeing a lot of growth in that with Uber and Lyft and Airbnb and for you guys here in Providence, how have you seen or competed with or been a part of Airbnb?
Oh, sure. So Airbnb is both our competition and our supplier. Like us.
Like us. Yeah, I do feel that we're in a lucky situation that we are the only hostile. So we're not, you know, we're it. And actually that that created a very interesting phenomenon. We got very tired of hostile world.
The website. And I like to say that. Yeah, absolutely. If we didn't have a dashing session on them, I don't think we could. So, you know, as a lot of travelers, the front end user do not know that the booking engines charge a huge commission.
And they impose these horrible restrictions on us as the hostile owner. And we're like, you know what, we're just going to unlist ourselves from being on your site. And we're not hostile world. And we can. And we've been just fine.
We get so many so many bookings through our own site. A lot of hostels offer you cheaper rate when you book on their own site. And yeah, so that's that's the fortunate position. Have you seen a different kind of traveler that uses Airbnb versus maybe like an Airbnb traveler versus a traveler that say books direct or books on a different book?
Yeah, I would say generally the people who are booking direct, they're looking specifically for a hostile. Whereas the Airbnb or they might just be they're more prone to book our private rooms. Right. Right.
Now that's interesting with hostile world because Byron had a very interesting experience in Australia. In Australia, I think was like the first revolution against hostile world and they're increasing booking fees and they they really revolted against them. What happened? Strengthened numbers. Please tell more.
So there was a Sydney declaration where 60 operators banded together and said, you want to increase the commission, then find we're going to take all of our 60 hostels combined off of your platform.
And that's what happens when you can create an association. Yes, yes. Strengthened numbers, which is why we're so supportive of his movement and think that it's great that someone's finally grabbing the bull by the horns to say, well, I'll do this because I know all of you don't have the time to do this. But now you collectively give the time you do have and we can have that strength and numbers.
So we'll be promoting and plugging Byron all along our way to help you get that grass movements campaign because that's what we need to in this country to have a voice and to have strength and numbers and to make a difference in those areas.
We are still in Providence, Rhode Island at the Providence Hostel and Guest House. And now we're going to dive into some operational strategies and what makes your hostel great. And I think this is a fantastic opportunity for you to to highlight the struggles of expansion.
You've got one existing hostels running well, the shops doing good. What are some operational insights that you could give to maybe another hostel owner that's thinking of making that jump to an expansion in the city or even expansion and jump to another city? What are some operational backbones that would be there for you?
So ask your find out from your guests. We always ask our guests where are they coming from? Where are they going to? And in doing so, we found out that Boston popped up a lot. They're either coming from Boston going to Boston and they would ask us if we could recommend a good hostel.
And there's there's well, HI is of course the big and we said HI but there was and we tried to visit a few. There was none that we really felt that we would love as guests. And we thought, okay, often a problem is also a business opportunity.
Sure.
Bless you. Let's maybe open up one ourselves. So find out from your guests where where else are they going to? Ideally, I like it when your secondary location could be close to you. It makes managing the secondary location easier.
Running back and forth if you have to easier. But I should also say that Joe and I and we're also very close friends. We started as friends and people say, Oh, you shouldn't go into business with your best friend. Not necessarily true for us. Our friendship has grown because we're business partners.
It helps if you have a partner. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. We are in a similar situation. I think our relationship has grown stronger over the trials and tribulations and struggles. You gain more trust in each other. You're the foxhole with each other.
I often hear that saying, Oh, you shouldn't go and visit your friends. But isn't that that classic? Well, you know, in a relationship that's intimate, shouldn't you try to find your best friend? So I think that a lot of times you can you can find someone who's a friend and if they have complimenting skillsets.
Bobby studied marketing and sales in college and I studied accounting and real estate. So very much useful for us to we not each other in those areas. And it makes it a lot more feasible to make that right. But the other thing I want to say an expansion is we're both both Joe and I are on the same page. We don't want to have a hostile empire.
You know, we don't. I think Boston may well be the last point that we expand to. We're comfortable. What we value is having more balance and being able to travel for months every year.
Yourself, which keeps you in tune with your clientele. Yeah. And enjoying life. It never ends. The hostels never close. That's a very good point, though, because I think as Americans, we're bred to be capitalists. Yeah. Right. And if you have a business that's going well, it's going to get bigger. It's going to get bigger. And I want more and I want more and I want more. And it's kind of counterintuitive to the actual vibe of the hostel.
You know, so I think that's a very valid point to make and one that every hostile owner in America who wants to grow and be ambitious. And if you start to find yourself reading hotel books by like Conrad Hilton and things like this, you'll send you like, wow, why am I doing this? I'm trying to take over everything.
But that's, I think, a very valid point to make that that doesn't need to happen. And would be better off going the route of a movement like Byron has where getting the collective independent operators together to get that same type of strength that Hilton would, but without losing your identity.
What I'm more excited than building a hostile empire is to introduce young people to the concept of hostile and have them love hostels, start hostels and spread a movement because I think this sounds a little bit far fetched, but I truly believe it. I think hostels can change the world.
I agree. And I definitely personally get a self-fulfillment from that. Why do you love what you're doing? You feel like you're not working. You feel motivated to do it. It is that element that I've had so many people over the years that contact you. Staying with you changed my life. I met this person or I found this out of myself. I started my own hostel.
You hear all those things and it fills you up. It keeps you going. So I think that's definitely a very organic motivation. It's also very interesting the way that our industry has this duality between people who pursue it as a lifestyle business.
And also it's still a business model that's interesting to venture capitalists. We wouldn't have generator and freehand if there wasn't also the possibility to make good returns on your investment.
I think that it's good that we have these different sizes of hostels because these kind of homing ones, there's definitely a lot to be said for this experience, but there's also something that's really fun about being in Europe at a 500-bed hostel and there's 50 people on the pub crawl.
It's just a totally different vibe and experience. It has its time and its place. The range is important. So many people will say, oh, freehand's coming or Hilton's making moxie or flux or these different chain brands.
And I've always had a duality to that as well. That's a little concerning that they might be coming to the neighborhood. I'm also inspired by the fact that if they are coming, that means we're onto something because they wouldn't be if there were. So I think that's where Byron's right that the timing is right and it is necessary because pretty soon the timing is going to be gone.
And the opportunity to be gone to band together and make this collective community of genuine authentic hostile operators so that we don't get eaten up and smothered by the big operators to the point where the American demographic may never even get to see really what the hostile was because it was just eaten up by the capitalistic ways of the monsters.
Actually, it's part of our goals to actually reach out to Americans to kind of educate them about hostels and host the way of traveling because we have students as a resource in Providence.
Yes, there's a lot of universities and we want to work with some of these students that are American that may have not had an opportunity to stay in a hostel to come and stay in our hostel for a free night just so they can experience that.
That's awesome. Kind of spread the word. Yeah. I think that's such a cool idea in that awareness movement.
You know, and if more people like yourselves and the bumping brew guys, you know, could do something like that and just us hearing like, I know we'll have a conversation away.
I'm like, we're going to do that too. You know, and getting with that student level, they're very much in that incubator process.
I'm learning, I'm developing, I'm finding out what I like. I'm willing to try things. I'm still risky. You know, I think that you got to capture the advantage of that age demographic.
What is the biggest challenge you guys find for you guys a great place here for keeping the standard up and.
What is your day to day owner challenge? What would you say?
You know what? Sometimes we take on volunteers. We are looking actively looking for a manager and sometimes it's tricky to find volunteers.
That's why we are very grateful for sites like World Packers. Yes, they help with that. If there were even more volunteers coming. Yes.
That it's amazing. It provides a really nice dynamic to the whole home experience. We have a few nice travelers living here.
And it's great for them because they get a free place to live. You know, just coming here with their backpack. The bed is ready for them.
Yeah, I've always said that, you know, for my own experience and what we were told at USA Hostels, and I think they were very much spot on with this.
Your work exchange volunteer staff can be worth its weight in gold or your worst liability if they're not trained well.
You know, it's a nightmare. You sometimes find yourself saying I could do this better myself. You're in my way.
But if you do train them well and you have a good environment and culture and vibe, it can really be a game changer that sets aside the whole experience.
We've gotten very good at our filter. We do a video interview with everyone. We have our questions answered. We're systematic.
We don't hire anyone without a video or phone interview. Yes, because it's so hard once they're in. That's a whole different story.
And I think World Packers has done a fantastic job on their platform for really focusing in on hostels.
You know, as you have Work Away and you have Help Rx and you have these other forums that are very broad based for everything.
We've even had people from woofing.com working on Dant farms. And we've had good people come through.
But this platform that World Packers created in its way that's very connected to the hostel owners and managers and receptive to our suggestions for change.
Our platform is great too.
Yes, it helps find the good people and filter out ones that you might not need or people that may be good, but maybe you need a different skill set and things like that.
So I think that's a very valid challenge that we face.
But if you use the proper channels and have the proper systems, it can work out fine.
OK, so we're going to take a quick break and stay tuned for more.
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OK, so now we're going to jump into our last sector of the episode, which is more highlighting the guest experience in your city.
And what would be some great times or events? You mentioned the water fires and things like that.
And then also diving into just things like the perfect day for the guests in the hostel.
So what, in your opinion, would you suggest to someone looking to come here, like you've got to come here for this event or this time of season?
Well, I think they definitely need to visit College Hill area, the area where the universities are.
Brown University and RISD, very fun to walk around there. The architecture of the houses is beautiful and the student vibe.
Is that all year round?
I would say all year round. Winter, of course, like in all cities, you're a little more bundled up.
There's not as much happening outside on the streets.
But hundreds, maybe 100,000 students still in Wintertown.
Right, they're active.
You're not slowing down as much as some Wintertowns do, that's for sure.
Right. And then Federal Hill is another little gem. It's a historic little part of Providence.
It's the little Italy, lots of bars and restaurants and lots of...they even have painted the Italian flag on the street.
It's that Italian, the red, white and green.
I love also the nearby. There's sailing opportunities close to Providence.
The beach is not that far. It's not right here, but it's not that far.
And I love Roger Williams Park.
Oh, that's a gem, too.
Yeah, a lot of lakes. I go there for walking and biking.
And I'm a foodie, so I call it a food truck option.
It's great, yeah.
Restaurants in the city.
And one of the advantages of staying in a hostel is that you can afford that expensive restaurant if you've saved a little bit of money on the accommodations.
Exactly.
And we see that a lot in our hostels as well.
Exactly.
So what about Providence as a community, just to kind of come back around on that, as we have talked about the issues and the barriers of the awareness and dealing with the municipalities and the communities and the neighbors even?
Sometimes it might not be the city that's your problem, but the neighbors are just horrified about what you're doing next door because they don't understand.
It seems like you've had a nice neighborhood reaction.
We're blessed. Our neighbor across the street is super friendly. He even lets us park.
Oh, lovely.
He's a collector. I think that's a nice term for hoarders.
Sometimes we buy some of the stuff that he sells.
Sure.
We kind of maintain that good relationship and encourage him in his endeavor.
So, yeah, our neighbors have been very friendly.
We've also looked to make connections with some of the local businesses like New York System where your buddy over there grabbed food.
Oh, the hot dogs. Yeah, that was great.
Yeah, the owner is very active in his business, so we often try to support him. And his food is good, likely.
Yes. And affordable.
Yeah.
That's a great thing.
It's important to forge connections with people in your neighborhood.
How about the kid who comes in late night, he checks in and then he gets up the next morning and he says,
I've got one day here in this city before I go to Boston, New York, which is so commonly on this trail that we've talked about.
What would you say to him that you've got to knock this out to make sure you see these?
There's a diner like half a block from us for breakfast.
We really recommend it because it's a quintessential New York diner.
There's not a tourist in sight, unless it's one of ours because there's no hotels really near here.
So it's a lot of blue collar workers. It's that diner that you would see in the movies.
And then walking down to the State House. The State House is one of the most beautiful buildings in America.
It's gorgeous. Yeah.
It's the third largest dome building in the world. Marvel Dome. Marvel Dome building in the world.
And the tour, they give free tours inside. Really, really interesting history.
I didn't know this. I actually have lived most of my life in New York, so I'm a transplant here.
But the freedom of religion that's in our Constitution, the explicit freedom of religion,
came because Rhode Island said, well, we're not joining unless you explicitly write it in there.
Yes. Broke off from Massachusetts. Yes.
So the history of Rhode Island is very interesting and they can get a taste of it by visiting the State House for the free tour.
Then from there, it's just a five minute walk to College Hill, walking around Brown University and RISD.
From there, walk through downtown Providence, make it a quick walk because Federal Hill is the real highlight.
And is public transport readily available?
Yes, public transport is. I'm a walker, so I just walk everywhere.
Everything is within, you know, we're 15 minutes from downtown. Everything is maybe 40 minutes.
Yeah. The bus is like $2. Very cheap.
You can run until 10 p.m. and you can go all the way to Newport for $2.
Yeah, that is great. Yeah.
I go for Buddhist meditation. It's like a 30 minute walk, but I drive sometimes.
30 minutes sometimes.
After you've had 10 minutes, relax.
I want to get there relaxed.
Well, thank you so much for joining us here in Providence, Rhode Island.
Thank you for having us on the show.
The first ever Providence Hostel, the Providence Hostel and Guest House with the co-founders, Ms. Gabriella and Joseph.
And thank you so much for participating. And also Byron from American Hostels. Thank you so much for joining us.
Thank you for having me.
Well, thank you so much to all of our listeners and we hope that you follow us on HostelRoadTrip.com to see past episodes and information on our upcoming episodes.
If all schedules well, we will be heading up to Boston to interview a staff member of the Hostel Pirate Ship, the Liberty Clipper,
which we had the experience of staying on a few nights ago and it was really fun.
And we hope to have a good scene up there and then we head westward.
Alright, thank you everyone.
Alright.