What you need to know before starting a hotel business

You will need a consultant

In principle, you yourself can speak for them - if you have an economic education or you studied at the faculty of hotel business. Or you have experience working as a manager in a hotel. This background ensures that you have at least a general idea of how this mechanism works.

And here there are a lot of nuances: from the choice of the organizational and legal form of activity and the taxation system in which you will build a business, to purely economic details - where to buy consumables, how to draw up a cleaning and work schedule for employees, who to contact if you need emergency repairs, and etc.

Again, if you are a neophyte, you need a professional consultant. It will save you a lot of money. No kidding. Without it, you can only try to rent your own apartment or two, in order to personally fill all the bumps and gain, albeit sometimes through financial losses, the necessary experience.

It is worth deciding in advance on the type of hotel

This is the key point on which the next steps depend. There are many hotel formats, for example:

hostel;
mini-hotel in a resort or tourist location;
economy class hotel;
business hotel for paying and demanding clients;
an apart-hotel in which not rooms are rented, but separate apartments (apartments) with all amenities, including a kitchen.

Depending on which format is closer to you, you will select the location of the object, its layout and design, the quality of the materials used, the amount of furniture and much more.

To decide, take a time-out for at least a month or two. Get a notebook, a special folder on your desktop, and save the answers to all questions about “your” hotel business:

Write down the idea. Develop it - describe in detail what chips you would like to implement, what could attract customers to you.
Look for similar projects that have already been implemented. Save photos, videos, customer reviews. This will help you more accurately determine which advantages you could borrow and which disadvantages should be avoided.
Make a detailed plan for the implementation of your idea. Understand and write down what needs your target audience customers have. Sketch the preliminary layout of the hotel. Make a rough estimate. This information will form the backbone of your business plan.

You will need money. Decent

Let's say right away: if your finances are difficult, it is better to postpone the venture with the hotel business. This is a business that requires large-scale costs. And not always predictable.

The most significant line of expenses is the purchase of a suitable property if you do not own it. Renting someone else's objects for a hotel is usually irrational: after all, in addition to the fact that you have to make monthly payments, you will spend a rather large amount on major repairs and design in the building, which you will have to part with after a while. More or less acceptable is perhaps a long-term lease for a period of 10 years with the possibility of subsequent purchase.

When choosing a room for a hotel, be sure to pay attention to the following factors:

Location. It is optimal if the hotel is located in a passable place: near the sea (if we are talking about a resort region), attractions, in the business part of the city.
Transport accessibility. The more convenient it is to get to you, the more clients there will be.
Infrastructure development. Supermarket, pharmacy, parking nearby will make your hotel more attractive.
The presence of a separate entrance.

Accommodation that meets these parameters is rarely cheap. To get a bank loan, you need a ready-made business plan that will prove to the bank that your business is likely to be profitable.

You will need patience to complete all the paperwork

Even if you already have a room (for example, an apartment or a house) in which you can open a mini-hotel, you have to go through the procedure of official registration of the hotel. It includes, but is not limited to:

translation Article 288. Ownership of a dwelling premise from a housing stock to a non-residential one;
obtaining a certificate of registration of an enterprise and registration with the Federal Tax Service;
registration of permits for the construction or redevelopment of premises;
obtaining documents that confirm that your future hotel meets the requirements of fire, sanitary, technical, environmental safety;
obtaining all kinds of licenses - for example, for organizing catering (if you plan to provide guests with an option like "breakfast included") or selling alcoholic products.

This is not a complete list of documents and permits. It can be much wider - it depends on the specific object. In any case, be prepared for the fact that you need to spend a sufficient amount of time and effort to decorate the hotel.

You have to learn to understand people

This skill is useful in any area, but in the hospitality business it is generally vital. You can create an exemplary hotel, fill it with expensive furniture and high-quality fixtures, and amaze customers with your personal charisma. But if you have an unfriendly "" from a business joke at the reception, all your efforts will go to waste.

The same goes for clients.

Svetlana Buzhor, owner of the Chaika mini-hotel (Utyos, Alushta)

Knowledge of human psychology is a prerequisite. Someone needs to make a discount, at least a minimal one. And with someone you need to talk hard and in the format of "no discounts". You need to be able to make decisions for the guests - not everyone is ready for a wealth of choice.

Become tough and uncompromising

The ability to say "no" or to achieve the fulfillment of your conditions is one of the most important traits of a hotelier. If you have no teeth, you will be eaten. Perhaps even at the stage of coordinating the hotel project. And almost certainly when the hotel is up and running.

Clients are different. Builders, repairers, suppliers, employees, too. Each of them will pull the blanket over themselves, squeezing and gnawing personal gain from you. If you give in and let the game go according to the rules imposed by other people, you have lost.

And at the same time educate a subtle psychologist in yourself

Psychological moments are one of the most unexpected discoveries that hoteliers make for themselves.

I did not expect that sleepless nights and guests who urgently need some little things will become a tradition for me, and this is at four or five in the morning. I didn't expect to have to be an expert in all areas: to know, for example, whether there will be a moonlit path on the sea that night when customers arrive, or whether the gasoline is good at a gas station 10 kilometers from the hotel.

Another discovery: if you are the boss or administrator, you need to be an excellent crisis manager. Conflicts often arise between guests, and here it is important that such people overlap with each other as little as possible. It is necessary to ensure communication between the parties exclusively through the staff - only in this case there is a great chance that everything will be settled without scandals.

Clients (we hope you will have a lot of them) are different. In order for them to leave positive reviews about your hotel, you have to find the key to each of them. Yes, sometimes stepping on his throat. And continuing to smile, no matter what.