Hello everyone and welcome back to the Hostel Road Trip Podcast.
The podcast that literally takes its show on the road.
Listen in as James Black and Bobby Dyer, owners of International Travelers House Hostels,
travel around the country to learn about these great locations and incredible people
that come together to provide a unique and exciting experience for travelers from all over the world.
Welcome back to the Hostel Road Trip Podcast Special Edition American Hostel Conference,
Second Annual in Charleston, South Carolina.
We have the absolute pleasure to be sitting with one of the Hostel Original Gangsters,
OG Darren Overby, from the Pacific Trade Winds Hostel in San Francisco.
Thanks for having me.
And Robert Dyer from ITH Hostel, still with us.
Great to be here.
Eric Feria from World Packers, where are you? We don't know.
Somewhere in Guatemala surfing.
But we are here in this badass studio that Vicki from the Not So Hostel let us borrow.
And we just wanted to do a quick little touching base and prelude to our Latin America recording
with Darren that we'll be doing some time later on.
Wherever, wherever. I haven't been to Africa yet.
Some exotic recording will be in place.
So that's one continent I haven't been to.
Yeah, I like that. But we're here to talk a little bit about your history in the industry.
And you've been in it and started Pacific Trade Winds in what year?
This May 9th, it will be 27 years.
Wow, congratulations.
And the thing that I like to say is that I was 26 when I started it.
And I would be having a beer with my guests.
And all of a sudden they would realize that I was the owner and they would say,
wait, you're the owner? I had no idea you were the owner.
I figured the owner was some old guy.
And I'm sorry to say that I go into my hostel now and I overhear my guests saying,
that must be the owner.
That must be the owner. I love it.
I feel like the same young guy that I was then.
But they don't see me that way.
That's great. So we had the absolute privilege of recording with your new manager, Shelby.
Yes, Shelby's awesome.
And that episode will be releasing soon from the Season 2 California.
And you've got this really cool boutique style hostel with 34 beds.
34 beds.
34 beds. We visited it. Awesome place. Downtown San Francisco. Bankers district? Financial district?
Technically we're in Chinatown. Two doors down we're actually in the financial district.
We're right on that fringe zone.
And the hostel is interesting to me. It's always been interesting because
we actually don't have the most sleek facilities and amenities that you start to see in a lot of hostels.
Postels.
Yeah, postels. Exactly.
But we really, really, I have basically started the hostel that people who come to hostels want to be social.
But most people are inherently shy.
Yes.
And so it's up to the staff at the hostel to really stir that social pot.
Make sure that, get to know all of the guests there.
Make them feel like valuable members of the community.
Introduce them to the other guests. Find out what, like who are you on this planet? What do you do?
And then introduce them to other guests and make that all work.
Yes.
And that's the thing we have. And we have so many guests every week who they're literally leaving with tears in their eyes
because they've made these amazing friendships.
And that's what I do it for, man. That's totally, it's totally that.
And I think you have got a great example as we were talking about earlier today in the conference about that sweet spot of, you know, not being too big.
And we were in San Francisco recording and we went to a couple of the hostels, in the larger hostels, and you could kind of get lost in there.
In the bigger hostels, we very much hung out with each other.
You know, it was the podcast crew having a drink in the social room and then there was a bunch of clicks there.
But at your hostel, just hanging out there, waiting for Shelby to like get herself organized and ready to record, we met everyone.
Just because it's small enough where people are more social.
It's very interesting how the volume can drown people out and make them more intimate.
People start to feel a little isolated. I have to say the worst feeling that we've all experienced is you go to a party and you feel like a stranger.
Right, yeah.
And there's, everyone's having conversations and there's social circles and stuff. And you just can't jive with the people that are there.
It's the worst feeling.
Can't break it.
And we actually train our staff. Look for those people who are on the fringe.
Get them.
Grab them, bring them in. They may be actually in a dormitory reading a book.
And they'll pretend like that's what they want to be doing.
But they really want to be included in the social circle.
And you're so right in that because in these larger hostels, especially in the digital age, you'll often find them hooked in their phones.
In the corner.
And they're at the party, but they're not really at the party.
And I think it's so much easier to pinpoint those people when you're in that smaller setting and more intimate setting.
And that's definitely one of the cool things you've got going on with the trade wins.
And it shows in your ratings.
Yeah.
And it shows in your operation.
And it doesn't have to be the sexiest layout and the nicest building or the poshest elements.
You know, I love the people.
I think you get peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, right?
Yeah, we have free peanut butter and jelly sandwiches all day long.
I had two when I was there.
And we have free ramen noodles now. Free ramen noodles.
Oh, I love it.
All we get. Ramen noodles to the people.
But little touches like that.
So, yeah, and you know, I actually when I was backpacking in Europe, I studied like, you know, what makes a great hostel?
And I actually worked in a lot of hostels in Europe.
And I actually found at that time, it's gone down since then, I could remember about 60 names at any one time.
It's just a little superpower that I have.
I can remember for a day.
And then when they check out, I don't remember them anymore.
But part of the reason that I wanted to start a hostel that was small is because I wanted to remember all of my guests' names.
And because people's names are really important to them.
And you call people by their names and they that's the way they feel included in the party.
Like that wall.
Yeah, exactly.
They feel so included.
And, you know, there's all of that that piece of like small people.
They let their guard down.
They feel like they're in a safe community.
And, you know, when you start to get high numbers in hostels, it's like, well, I don't know everyone here.
Maybe I need to be more protective of my belongings.
And in fact, I actually venture to say that theft in hostels goes down when they're smaller hostels.
Because thieves do not want to steal from someone they don't know.
They want to steal from an anonymous person.
That's just an anonymous backpack there.
And when everyone knows everyone in the hostel, it makes it really hard for, you know, the bad apples to do their misdeeds.
It's so true.
Those elements and fears and concerns of security and cleanliness become extremely more difficult as you jack those numbers up.
And you really just change the experience.
We talked a lot about that today.
But another, you know, and you've had so many different ventures within your long story career within the hostel business.
But, you know, just as Vicki wrote the book on hostels, you created the website for hostel industry people.
And when Bob and I were getting into the hostel industry, we got the book and then we signed up for your hostel management dot com account.
And I would encourage all listeners out there that are looking to enhance their knowledge and contacts and network through that portal.
It is an amazing resource that continues to grow and is a fantastic forum.
And we know that you are always working on new and exciting things.
But how did hostel management dot com?
How did that idea come about?
So actually, hostel management was originally created by Josh Cohen.
He's a friend of mine.
He lives in Berkeley, California, and he actually does not own a hostel.
He's never owned a hostel, but he loves hostels.
And he was he was a tech guy like myself.
He you know, he did kind of programming and stuff.
And he got to a point where he was like, you know, he wanted to actually go on to other things he wanted to.
He does actually memory memory techniques.
He's very, very interesting man.
But he said he wanted to pass the flag.
And I was really honored.
He said, you know, I want to pass the flag to you, Darren.
You know, I think that you actually have the the philosophy that I share in hostels.
And it's you know, it was daunting because it's a community of like 20,000 people.
Yes. And you know, they all got their own mindset and trying to actually be a leader for 20,000 people.
Now, we also have Brian Gresh, who's the community manager.
He does a great job of like, you know, doing on conferences and bringing in.
But most of the time, I actually wind up behind the scenes just dealing with the technology.
You know, like when you get a community of 20,000 people like spammers want to get on there.
Courtney was telling us that you just get loaded up with that.
Shout out to Courtney, former editor of the hostel manager dot com.
But that you just get bogged down with some of those technical technical things that can be.
Now, what year did you take it over? 2012. OK, so you took over 2012.
Any new and exciting things? So, yes.
Well, we were not really launched yet, but we we were just here at the American Hostel Conference.
We were talking about our hostels dot com. Very exciting.
Which is aspires to be the world's largest directory of directly bookable hostels.
So one of the things you find when you go out on the net, you'll find lots of places where you can find information about hostels.
But generally, you have to reserve the hostel through that platform and you can't find the website of the hostel.
And as I was illustrating today, it's like you go to do Google hostels in San Francisco.
They show you hotel results. Everything. And they show you double occupancy results.
And the hostel industry, the hostel community, I would say, of travelers needs a resource where that we can actually go find hostels, book them direct, help each other with travel information, tips, reviews of hostels.
That's what we're creating now. That's the Hostel Management's project right now.
I think that's so exciting because as you were talking about earlier today, it's catered to that smaller hostel as well and recognizes the challenges and struggles that
when you are a boutique hostel, which we think is the genuine, authentic hostel experience, you can kind of get played out by a lot of these larger OTAs because you don't have the volume.
You don't have the ability to pay for a sponsored position and different things of that nature.
So I think for all of you smaller boutique operations out there, really keep an eye on this as it develops because I know we're going to be on board and very excited to use it.
And it's set up by an original hostel owner and someone who is that boutique style operator.
So you'll have us in mind when you're creating.
And it's really going to require because we're not doing it with big budgets. We're not charging.
Every hostel can be listed for free.
And so in order for it to be successful, it's really going to require hostels to actually promote it to their guests and say, you know, hey, you can direct book hostels on our hostels dot com.
You know, and getting, you know, changing the behavior of guests to actually say, oh, I can direct book.
That's a good idea. Maybe I'll do that.
That's awesome.
So that's that's the plan.
I think that's that's a great move.
Now, from your perspective, which is very unique, is a lot of us don't have this tenure that you have a lot of big corporations, big money capital players jumping into the game.
We're talking about over the week here at the conference.
Do you see that as a big difference significantly in your time in the industry?
Or has there always been these fluctuations of like people are going to jump in or do you feel like, no, this is really a time is happening now where you have this.
So what happened, I believe my theory about it is, is that when we saw the world economic recession of 2009, 2010, I think that there was big venture capital, investment capital in hospitality projects, hotels who saw hostels actually weathered that storm pretty well.
Yeah, budget accommodations.
And so you started to see big players start to get into hostels.
And on the one hand, you know, their product is very different than the traditional, what maybe we'd say small, authentic, costal, social, hostile.
And sometimes they can really outpace us in terms of facilities and amenities, they can have a really nice fit and finish is really nice.
And I would say to their credit, they usually have huge marketing departments and they are bringing in new people to hostels, awareness to hostels.
And, you know, so I basically I say, you know, any way we can get people together, particularly people across international borders, have a conversation over a beer.
That's going to be a good thing overall. And I think that, like you said, rising tide lifts up lifts all boats.
Yeah, I think it'll actually help small hostels too.
Okay, so I'm on I'm a little bit guarded.
But I also see that like in many cases, they actually help the whole advantage.
Yeah, what would be in closing, what would be some advice you would give a smaller hostile operator in this moment where you have all these big venture capital companies and big hotel companies coming in?
What would you have some advice for the survival of their.
So I would just say, first of all, you know, keep doing what you're doing.
Focus on the customer experience.
Focus on the personal touch.
You know, the things that big hostels can't replicate, you know, baking the fresh cookies for your guests.
One of the things we do is, you know, you get at our hostel, you'll get the generic reservation email when you make a reservation.
But then a member of our staff will actually send a personal email to you from the front desk email and say, hey, I just noticed that your email came in.
Just want to let you know the sort of things that are going to be happening in the hostel and in San Francisco when you're here.
And I'd love to meet up with you and have a beer with you when you come here.
So they already have a friend.
That's the kind of high touch stuff that big hostels can't match.
Yeah. So for small hostels, I wouldn't be too worried.
Yeah. You know, just keep doing what you're doing and really focus on customer service.
I think that is some sage advice from a Jedi of the industry and keep that focus on your guests and don't lose your focus in the fear of this encroachment from the larger players.
Yes. Because you're trying to match amenity for amenity and you'll go bankrupt.
Yes. You'll go bankrupt trying to do that because you don't have the economies of scale.
And you'll lose your genuine authentic feel in the process of doing so.
So that's great advice. Stick to what you're doing. Stay focused on your guests.
Stay focused on your model and don't worry about what they're doing.
Worry about what you're doing. That's great advice.
Well, thank you so much, Darren, for coming on with us.
Thank you. And thanks for doing what you guys are doing.
You guys are doing a great job raising awareness about hostels.
Thank you so much. And we look forward to a full episode in an exotic country in the near future.
Yes. Perfect.
Darren Overby. Thank you. Rock on. That was great, man. Thank you.