Behind the Stays

Zach Busekrus
  • 5.0 (124)
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Updated Weekly

Welcome to Behind the Stays — a podcast that shares the stories behind your favorite boutique hotels, short-term rentals, and hospitality brands and the hosts, operators, and entrepreneurs who’ve brought them to life. Every Tuesday and Friday you’ll meet the military veterans, retired flight attendants, tech entrepreneurs, school teachers, single moms, hoteliers, and real estate investors who are all, in their unique ways, shaping the future of travel and hospitality. Discover how these visionaries — from all over the world — have built stunning landscape hotels in the mountains, designed bohemian bungalows on the beach, erected eclectic off-grid and nature-immersed escapes, and so much more. Behind the Stays is brought to you by Journey — a first-of-its-kind loyalty program that brings together an alliance of the world’s top independently owned and operated stays and allows travelers to earn points and perks on boutique hotels, vacation rentals, treehouses, ski chalets, glamping experiences and so much more. Behind the States is hosted by Zach Busekrus, Head of the Journey Alliance.

  1. 2d ago

    This Week in Hospitality: Skift Editor-in-Chief Sarah Kopit on The Great Hotel Owner Squeeze, Aman's YouTuber Fiasco, & Marriott's Owner Concession

    Subscribe to This Week in Hospitality wherever you get you podcasts: Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/5oPExA0txHMjEI5Ye13IUy Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/this-week-in-hospitality/id1849637233 Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@ThisWeekinHospitality   This week we're joined by Sarah Kopit, Editor-in-Chief of Skift — the publication that fuels basically every episode of this show — and she came ready. We open on the story all of hospitality shared this week: Aman's brand-new, $6,000-a-night Amanvari turning away independent reviewer Ryan Walker at the gate on night two, then calling the cops on his driver. Scott and Sarah are inclined to give Aman the benefit of the doubt. Ben isn't — he thinks it might be the canary in the coal mine for a brand scaling faster than it ever has. From there we get into The Squeeze, Sarah's reporting on the crisis crushing America's small and mid-scale hotel owners. Record brand profits, owners barely cash-flowing, and a franchise model showing real cracks. We dig into why owners are revolting, what deflagging really costs, the financing fears keeping them locked to their flags, and the gut-punch of learning the Google reviews you spent eighteen years building don't belong to you — they belong to the brand. Then Marriott's new rebate: a real concession, or breadcrumbs tossed to the good boys who hit their guest-satisfaction scores? Sarah makes the case that the credit card companies are now the biggest force in travel, and that Amex and Capital One are building their own soft brands in plain sight. We close with a game — the hotel accounts winning on social, and the 99% still getting it wrong. This one's loaded. Come hang. — This Week in Hospitality is presented to you by Journey. Journey is a loyalty platform built specifically for independent boutique hotels and high-touch hospitality brands. Our mission is to give operators the same powerful rewards engine, data intelligence, and guest insights that major chains rely on — without asking them to give up the individuality, soul, or story that makes their property extraordinary. If you’re an owner or operator of an extraordinary, independently owned and operated hotel or residence — and you want to see whether your property is a fit for the Journey Alliance — you can learn more and apply at https://www.journey.com/alliance — Key Topics & Timestamps 00:00 — Intro 09:49 — Story #1: The Great Hotel Owner Squeeze 33:05 — Story #2: Aman’s YouTuber Fiasco 44:41 — Story #3: Marriott’s Owner Concession 55:01 — Hotel Social Media Game 01:06:23 — Spice of the Week — Special Guest: Sarah Kopit — Editor-in-Chief of Skift LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarahkopit   Your Hosts: Zach Busekrus — Journey LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zachbusekrus/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/behindthestays/   Scott Eddy — Global Travel & Hospitality Expert @MrScottEddy LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrscotteddy/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mrscotteddy/   Ben Wolff — Founder of Onera & Oasi LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ben-wolff/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iambenwolff/   Edwin Kramer — Luxury Hotelier Consultant & Former GM LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edwinckramer/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/edwinkramer/

  2. 5d ago

    Sponsored Listings Are Coming to Vrbo — Plus What 2,000 Guests Actually Want from Vacation Rentals (and It's Not a Hot Tub)

    Connect with Tim: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tim-rosolio-434b2a98/ Connect with Zach: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zacharybusekrus/ Apply to join the Journey Alliance: http://journey.com/alliance/ — Vrbo just did three things most operators haven't connected yet: it purged 100,000 homes, surveyed 2,000 guests across seven countries, and started rolling out sponsored listings. Put them together and you get the clearest signal yet on where vacation rentals are headed. Tim Rosolio is VP of Vacation Rental Partnerships at Expedia Group, where he leads the supply and host side of Vrbo. He's also a Vrbo host himself. In his return to Behind the Stays, Tim and Zach get into what that survey actually revealed — and it wasn't what the industry has been selling. Quality isn't luxury. It isn't the private chef or the infinity pool. It's accurate photos, verified reviews, a fully stocked shelf, and linens and silverware worth touching. 81% of guests said they'd pay more for a stay they can trust to be consistent. Then there are the sponsored listings landing this summer — a pay-only-if-you-book model that lets hosts buy visibility without gaming the algorithm. Tim explains how it works, why bad operators won't be allowed in, and where it goes across Expedia next. The conversation also covers the "coach up or coach out" program behind the purge, why the future of discovery is personalization instead of a star-rating system nobody trusts, expanded distribution across Expedia's 70,000-business B2B network, and the one fear keeping every VRM up at night: owner retention in a market where 2022 numbers aren't coming back. Reach out to Tim on LinkedIn — he's an open book. —   Behind the Stays is brought to you by Journey — a first-of-its-kind loyalty program that brings together an alliance of the world’s top independently owned and operated stays and allows travelers to earn points and perks on boutique hotels, vacation rentals, treehouses, ski chalets, glamping experiences and so much more.   Your host is Zach Busekrus, Head of Growth at Journey. If you are a hospitality entrepreneur who has a stay, or a collection of stays with soul, we’d love for you to apply to join our Alliance at journey.com/alliance.

  3. Jul 31

    This Week in Hospitality: Sonder is back, Fora hits a $1B valuation, The Odyssey drives travel & Google’s AI booking grab

    Sonder is back — sort of. Eight months after going bankrupt and stranding guests mid-stay, the brand name has been bought by a Vancouver affiliate firm that paid for one thing: search equity. The buildings are gone. The trademarks and 70+ domains remain. And because large language models still route travelers to Sonder’s optimized pages, that name is now targeting $100M in gross booking value over the next year. We get into what it means when a dead brand outlives the company that built it. Then: Fora’s $1B valuation. The travel advisor platform keeps scaling the human-agent model — but the team digs into the product it hasn’t built yet, and why the “ShopMy for travel” affiliate layer is still wide open for creators who aren’t full-time advisors. We also break down Google’s AI travel play. Fresh off its Q2 earnings call, Google is using travel to sell Wall Street its AI ad story — Direct Offers, IHG partnerships, AI Mode crossing a billion users, and checkout infrastructure that could let travelers book without ever leaving the search box. The question for operators: is Google becoming rented land, and a direct-booking competitor, at the same time? Plus, The Odyssey effect. From Petra to the “White Lotus Four Seasons” to Bangkok’s Hangover Hotel, we get into how films turn destinations into demand — and what hoteliers should actually do about it. Hosted by Zach Busekrus with Ben Wolff, Scott Eddy, and Edwin Kramer. Like, subscribe, and let us know which story you’d unpack further. — This Week in Hospitality is presented to you by Journey. Journey is a loyalty platform built specifically for independent boutique hotels and high-touch hospitality brands. Our mission is to give operators the same powerful rewards engine, data intelligence, and guest insights that major chains rely on — without asking them to give up the individuality, soul, or story that makes their property extraordinary. If you’re an owner or operator of an extraordinary, independently owned and operated hotel or residence — and you want to see whether your property is a fit for the Journey Alliance — you can learn more and apply at https://www.journey.com/alliance — Key Topics & Timestamps 00:00 — Intro 06:02 — Story #1: Sonder's Brand Gets a Second Life Through AI Search 17:51 — Story #2: Google Wants to Own the Entire Hotel Booking Journey 32:16 — Story #3: The Odyssey Is Creating the Next Travel Boom 45:11 — Story #4: Is Fora Really Worth $1 Billion? 59:22 — Spice of the Week — Your Hosts: Zach Busekrus — Journey LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zachbusekrus/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/behindthestays/   Scott Eddy — Global Travel & Hospitality Expert @MrScottEddy LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrscotteddy/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mrscotteddy/   Ben Wolff — Founder of Onera & Oasi LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ben-wolff/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iambenwolff/   Edwin Kramer — Luxury Hotelier Consultant & Former GM LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edwinckramer/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/edwinkramer/

  4. Jul 28

    The Godfather of Hospitality Podcasting Has Notes: Disney, Virgin, and the Quest to Be Original with Glenn Haussman

    Connect with Glenn: linkedin.com/in/glennhaussman Explore "No Vacancy": https://novacancynews.com/ Connect with Zach: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zacharybusekrus/ Apply to join the Journey Alliance: http://journey.com/alliance/ — Meet Glenn Haussman — thirty years in hospitality media, a decade helming No Vacancy News, and one of the most recognized voices this industry has ever produced. He's been in the rooms, on the stages, and behind the microphone longer than most people in this industry have known what a podcast was. He's not just a journalist. He's a mirror for this industry, and he's seen enough cycles to call out the patterns most people are still too caught up in to notice. We sat down together with no real agenda and covered a lot of ground. How to make Virgin Hotels cool again. Why Disney wins at hospitality but can't seem to crack the hotel business. The biggest opportunities sitting right in front of independent hoteliers today. Why the casino industry and the hotel industry keep operating in separate silos when they have everything to learn from each other. The future of creator-led businesses in hospitality. And why Glenn Haussman has seen Phish perform hundreds of times — which, once he explains it, makes complete sense. We also got into the craft. What it actually means to listen in an interview. Why the magic lives in the moment you didn't plan for. And what it took to go independent in 2016, when convincing a hospitality executive to sit in front of a microphone without a notepad was still a genuinely hard sell. Thirty years in and Glenn is still going places this industry isn't ready for yet. This one hit different. Stay with us. —   Behind the Stays is brought to you by Journey — a first-of-its-kind loyalty program that brings together an alliance of the world’s top independently owned and operated stays and allows travelers to earn points and perks on boutique hotels, vacation rentals, treehouses, ski chalets, glamping experiences and so much more.   Your host is Zach Busekrus, Head of Growth at Journey. If you are a hospitality entrepreneur who has a stay, or a collection of stays with soul, we’d love for you to apply to join our Alliance at journey.com/alliance.

  5. Jul 24

    This Week in Hospitality: Hot Takes on Hilton, What Hotels Should Learn from the World Cup, and Shark Tank for Route 66's Last Surviving Motels

    Subscribe to This Week in Hospitality wherever you get you podcasts: Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/5oPExA0txHMjEI5Ye13IUy Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/this-week-in-hospitality/id1849637233 Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@ThisWeekinHospitality Hilton CEO Chris Nassetta went on record defending the brand's 28-property portfolio — and the panel has thoughts. Is the multi-brand arms race really about guests, or is it just an elaborate play for developers and distribution?  Edwin makes the case that independent hotels have a competitive advantage no loyalty algorithm can replicate. Scott drops the hottest take of the episode: loyalty points have become hush money for operational failures. And Ben shares a story about a boutique hotel that turned a jackhammer nightmare into a lifelong brand loyalist — no points required. Then the World Cup post-mortem. Bank of America's final numbers are in — $20 billion pumped into the U.S. economy, RevPAR up 90% in Kansas City, 55% in San Francisco. Miami crushed it. But three separate properties reached out to Scott after the final whistle with the same question: now what? No social strategy. No post-event plan. No follow-through. The panel unpacks what hotels actually got right, what they blew, and why this should be a wake-up call for independent operators ahead of the 2028 Olympics. And to close it out — a game. It's Route 66's 100th anniversary, and CoStar toured the surviving motels still operating along the highway. The panel plays Keep, Kill, or Reimagine across six properties. Clark Gable's old room, a freshly rehabbed motor court with a paint can still in the bathtub, and a pink-walled Santa Monica hotel sitting on land worth more than the building. Scott wants to build a diner on everything. Edwin wants to preserve the soul. Ben's doing the math. — This Week in Hospitality is presented to you by Journey. Journey is a loyalty platform built specifically for independent boutique hotels and high-touch hospitality brands. Our mission is to give operators the same powerful rewards engine, data intelligence, and guest insights that major chains rely on — without asking them to give up the individuality, soul, or story that makes their property extraordinary. If you’re an owner or operator of an extraordinary, independently owned and operated hotel or residence — and you want to see whether your property is a fit for the Journey Alliance — you can learn more and apply at https://www.journey.com/alliance — Key Topics & Timestamps 00:00 — Intro 12:07 — Story #1: Hilton’s 28-Brand Defense and AI’s Loyalty Shift 33:15 — Story #2: Did the 2026 World Cup Actually Deliver for Hotels? 43:23 — 100 Years of Route 66: Motel Draft (Keep, Reimagine, Kill) — Your Hosts: Zach Busekrus — Journey LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zachbusekrus/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/behindthestays/   Scott Eddy — Global Travel & Hospitality Expert @MrScottEddy LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrscotteddy/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mrscotteddy/   Ben Wolff — Founder of Onera & Oasi LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ben-wolff/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iambenwolff/   Edwin Kramer — Luxury Hotelier Consultant & Former GM LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edwinckramer/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/edwinkramer/

  6. Jul 24

    This Week in Hospitality: How Norwegian Air Went Viral for Losing, Should Airbnb and Ennismore Hook Up? and the Slow Death of Organic Discovery on Vrbo

    This week, the squad breaks down Norwegian Air's World Cup Instagram stunt that cost next to nothing and generated more brand equity than campaigns with budgets a hundred times the size. Eivind Hammer Myhre, who leads comms and marketing at Norwegian, joins us live to walk through exactly how it happened — the 25-minute brainstorm, the one phone call to get sign-off, and what came after when the whole thing blew up overnight. Then we get into the Ennismore story. Skift's Rafat Ali floated a thought experiment this week that reads less like an op-ed and more like a deal memo left on the wrong desk — a potential distribution and loyalty partnership between Airbnb and Accor's lifestyle hotel subsidiary ahead of a $3.7 billion IPO. Ben, Edwin, and Scott dig into whether the math actually works for owners, who benefits more, and why Wall Street keeps struggling to put a number on cool. And finally — Vrbo is launching sponsored listings. The beta is live. The full rollout is coming. And if you've been around long enough to remember what happened when organic reach died on Meta, you already know where this is going. Scott's spice of the week ties it all together: four stories that seem unrelated until you realize they're all asking the same question. How do you earn trust at scale? And what happens to the brands — and the platforms — that can't figure that out? — This Week in Hospitality is presented to you by Journey. Journey is a loyalty platform built specifically for independent boutique hotels and high-touch hospitality brands. Our mission is to give operators the same powerful rewards engine, data intelligence, and guest insights that major chains rely on — without asking them to give up the individuality, soul, or story that makes their property extraordinary. If you’re an owner or operator of an extraordinary, independently owned and operated hotel or residence — and you want to see whether your property is a fit for the Journey Alliance — you can learn more and apply at https://www.journey.com/alliance — Key Topics & Timestamps 00:00 — Intro 03:18 — Interview: Norwegian Air's Viral Women's Euro Campaign 26:53 — Story #1: Airbnb and Ennismore Hook Up 33:47 — Story #2: The Slow Death of Organic Discovery on Vrbo 39:52 — Story #3: South Korea Could Strip Hotels of Stars for Price Gouging 1:04:47 — Spice of the Week — Your Hosts: Zach Busekrus — Journey LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zachbusekrus/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/behindthestays/   Scott Eddy — Global Travel & Hospitality Expert @MrScottEddy LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrscotteddy/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mrscotteddy/   Ben Wolff — Founder of Onera & Oasi LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ben-wolff/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iambenwolff/   Edwin Kramer — Luxury Hotelier Consultant & Former GM LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edwinckramer/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/edwinkramer/

  7. Jul 24

    This Week in Hospitality: Ideas, Stories, and Hot Takes with James McBride, Co-Founder & CEO of NIHI Hotels

    Subscribe to This Week in Hospitality wherever you get you podcasts: Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/5oPExA0txHMjEI5Ye13IUy Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/this-week-in-hospitality/id1849637233 Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@ThisWeekinHospitality   James McBride, Co-Founder & CEO of NIHI Hotels, joins the core four for a wide-ranging conversation on what it actually takes to build a legendary independent hospitality brand — from the jungles of Sumba to the halls of the Ritz-Carlton. James traces his career across some of the most storied names in luxury hospitality — Ritz-Carlton, Rosewood, the Carlisle, YTL — before partnering with Chris Burch to build NIHI Sumba, now widely regarded as one of the world's most exceptional and emotionally resonant hotel experiences. He breaks down the difference between operating inside a behemoth brand versus building something from scratch, and what it really costs — personally and professionally — to go independent. The conversation covers demand creation in the pre-algorithm era (think hot cookies at Malaysian airports and a chef moonlighting as a "technology butler"), how a yoga teacher ran NIHI's Instagram for its first five years, and why NIHI's most viral post — horses casting shadows on a beach at sunset — gets mistaken for AI-generated content daily. James also shares his philosophy on guerrilla marketing, the power of generosity as a brand strategy, and why scarcity may be the most underutilized asset in luxury hospitality today. On the business side, James gets candid about partner selection, equity, the emotional toll of betting on yourself, and what independent operators consistently get wrong: great product, poor storytelling. He argues that the GM running a flagged property matters more than the flag itself — that soul can't be systemized, only lived. A masterclass in brand building, emotional hospitality, and the courage it takes to build something the world hasn't seen yet.   Your Hosts: Zach Busekrus — Journey LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zachbusekrus/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/behindthestays/   Scott Eddy — Global Travel & Hospitality Expert @MrScottEddy LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrscotteddy/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mrscotteddy/   Ben Wolff — Founder of Onera & Oasi LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ben-wolff/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iambenwolff/   Edwin Kramer — Luxury Hotelier Consultant & Former GM LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edwinckramer/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/edwinkramer/

  8. Jul 21

    Why Luxury Hospitality Is Optimizing Itself Into Irrelevance — And What To Do About It (with Colin Nagy)

    Connect with Colin: linkedin.com/in/colinjamesnagy/ Connect with Zach: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zacharybusekrus/ Apply to join the Journey Alliance: http://journey.com/alliance/ — The luxury hotel boom of the last decade produced more five-star rooms, more high-end brands, and more capital chasing premium travelers than any period in modern hospitality history. It also produced a lot of hotels that feel exactly the same. Colin Nagy has spent nearly a decade covering the business of luxury travel for Skift while leading global brand strategy for Instagram and Threads at Meta. He sits at a rare intersection — deeply inside the world of brand, culture, and consumer behavior, and deeply inside an industry he genuinely loves. That combination makes him one of the most clear-eyed observers working in hospitality today. In this episode, Colin and I dig into why luxury has optimized itself into sameness — and more importantly, what the brands getting it right are actually doing differently. We get into the role hospitality plays in a world where AI is accelerating isolation and people are hungry for real human connection. We talk members' clubs — the ones worth betting on and the ones burning through capital without a clue. We get into the macro disruption question most operators aren't asking loudly enough. And we talk about what world building actually requires — and why so few brands are willing to do the work. Colin isn't cynical about any of this. He's demanding. There's a difference. And if you care about where this industry is headed, this conversation will sharpen how you see it. —   Behind the Stays is brought to you by Journey — a first-of-its-kind loyalty program that brings together an alliance of the world’s top independently owned and operated stays and allows travelers to earn points and perks on boutique hotels, vacation rentals, treehouses, ski chalets, glamping experiences and so much more.   Your host is Zach Busekrus, Head of Growth at Journey. If you are a hospitality entrepreneur who has a stay, or a collection of stays with soul, we’d love for you to apply to join our Alliance at journey.com/alliance.

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5
out of 5
124 Ratings

About

Welcome to Behind the Stays — a podcast that shares the stories behind your favorite boutique hotels, short-term rentals, and hospitality brands and the hosts, operators, and entrepreneurs who’ve brought them to life. Every Tuesday and Friday you’ll meet the military veterans, retired flight attendants, tech entrepreneurs, school teachers, single moms, hoteliers, and real estate investors who are all, in their unique ways, shaping the future of travel and hospitality. Discover how these visionaries — from all over the world — have built stunning landscape hotels in the mountains, designed bohemian bungalows on the beach, erected eclectic off-grid and nature-immersed escapes, and so much more. Behind the Stays is brought to you by Journey — a first-of-its-kind loyalty program that brings together an alliance of the world’s top independently owned and operated stays and allows travelers to earn points and perks on boutique hotels, vacation rentals, treehouses, ski chalets, glamping experiences and so much more. Behind the States is hosted by Zach Busekrus, Head of the Journey Alliance.

Information

  • Creator
    Zach Busekrus
  • Years Active
    2021 - 2026
  • Episodes
    373
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Copyright 2021 All rights reserved.
  • Show Website
    Behind the Stays

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