If you do that, you up the scales and you do a couple different consonants and vowels. See for me I'm just like. Oh, I have chock full of them, but we should probably. Dive in the episode. What about I had no idea you were a singer. Yes, sir. May have done a thing on American Idol. Really? See, I couldn't carry a tune in a bucket. No way. It was a musical theater. That I believe. Oh, theater, darling. That's why I said I believe that. It should have been like, yeah, well, I was in theater.
No, you weren't. No, I was in a theater. Yes, I believe that. By the way, I was recording everything. I was kind of hoping. Oh, God. Sneaky with the button. Oh, that little red button, guys. That means we're recording. Okay, well, welcome, guys, to the Tales from the Service Industry podcast. Thank you for joining in. You're hired. Yeah, I love it. Do you have an intro song for us, Miss B? No, other B. Phil, don't you do the boop boop? It's already recording.
All right, so welcome back to Tales from the Service Industry. I'm your host. I'm Bill. Joined again this evening by Miss B and Liz. Hey, team. Hey. Welcome back, ladies. So we're sitting here getting our giggle on. For this evening, I'm actually going to turn over some of the hosting to Liz. Oh, my goodness. So as an aspiring podcaster herself. Maybe. Now you'll do it. You're totally going to do it. You're going to make me do it. Yeah, I am. Well, can we go 50-50 on the hosting? All right.
Let's do it. All right. Do you have any good stories for the week? Oh, guys. A-hole of the week, maybe? Ooh, A-hole of the week, always. Jumping right in. You know, that is my favorite topic. I could literally go on about A-hole of the week because, you know, managing front office, pretty much all I do with is A-holes. But I did save a particularly fun story for you guys this past week. To preface this story, I do work at a hotel that does cater to a particular type of clientele.
They usually have money. They usually are politically affiliated. Whether, you know, which way it swings, I'll let you decipher what you think, which way they swing politically. But regardless, we do have lots of political candidates and political hopefuls that do come to our property and speak sometimes or just make appearances or just sometimes stay. So I've seen a lot of political figures.
And most recently, we were supposed to hold a function that was a fundraiser for a political candidate in actually another state than where we live. And they were running for secretary of state or I'm even getting that wrong, something in some other state. And they were holding a fundraiser at our property, which is not anything out of the normal. I don't know if I'm being bad an eye about.
But maybe a few days before their event, they put out a tweet because, you know, people love to fork and tweet. OK, so I know. Is Twitter still that much a thing or is it just for politicians? Honestly, I've never used fork and Twitter. But is it? You know, I actually years and years ago signed up for a Twitter account, never used it. It was all the rage for me and like my age demographic. But I could never get into it. I don't get it.
You just have to say in a short sentence like, oh, this is what I'm doing. Like, who gives a shit? Like, this is for famous people in political candidates. Essentially, you just follow their life, I guess. I was more like retweeting like motivational quotes. Oh, my God. That's what my Twitter feed was. Liz's Twitter feed was yellow snow is not lemon flavored. OK, maybe retweet it. Would you retweet that?
OK, so anyways, this political candidate tweeted, you know, that this function was going to be going on. They tweeted the date it was happening. They tweeted the location. They tweeted the time. And then they proceeded to tweet their guest speakers who would be appearing, other politicians, I'm assuming, which we did not know about. They were not disclosed to us until days prior to the event. And these political figures do happen to be extremely controversial, very controversial. So it was bad.
A little side note. Besides this kind of causing a halt storm, the fact that whoever was organizing this event was, by the way, the most disorganized, have no idea what they were doing. Like, I don't think they've ever put together a function before. If you're at all familiar with the hospitality industry, when you're putting on a function or like not even like, OK, you're a meeting planner or anyone in a company and you put on a function, you have to do these things called event orders.
OK, you in these event orders, you tell the venue how you how many tables you want, how many chairs you want, what kind of food you want. It just down to the basics, like just details like what when you reserve the space, you're just reserving a room. But you have to tell us what you want. Yeah, that the BEO, the banquet event order is your blueprint to how the event's going to go. Yes. Everything from the number like to your point, number of tables and chairs to what the centerpieces look like.
What color linens are there? Are you having chairs? Like, do you need a podium? Do you need a screen? Like, do you need speakers? Do you need a microphone? Yeah, they didn't provide any of it. Oh, no. So it's three days before the event. A BEO still hasn't been filled out, which means no food has been ordered for this event. No, nothing. Nothing. Your window of providing that is closing at three days. Oh, yeah. It's gone.
So three days prior to the event, they released this thing on Twitter that this event is going on. Who all these guest speakers are. And they also start saying things like, oh, there's going to be an open bar. There's going to be a three course dinner saying all this stuff. And by the way, I screenshot it. Wait, wait. Played it and served? Yeah. So I screenshot it and sent it to the event planner. She's like, what? They haven't submitted their BEOs. We have nothing on order.
But did they do due diligence and like try and contact these people? No. Oh, our team? Yeah. Yeah. The event planner was reaching out to them a ton, being like, hey, we still don't have anything for you. Hey, like they don't just sit back. Like they drive you nuts for months. Be like, hey, we need a seating plan. We need this. We need your BEO. That's insane that like months or weeks of meetings of like planning for these events went by and like this wasn't a red flag.
No, they literally just put a deposit down in the room basically and then just didn't do anything after that. Oh my gosh. So anyway, so fast forward three days before the event, we still have no idea what's going on in this room. They've just paid for the room essentially. And they're just tweeting all this stuff.
So then they tweet this stuff, but then the people whom they were bringing in to speak at the event where they were very controversial figures and we get wind of this because we started getting threats. So the calls start pouring in. Oh no. And I work in front office. So my team is getting crazy hit with people in the community who are outraged that we are allowing these individuals to come and speak and do this and that. And we're just like, uh, no, like we can't see that.
And we were absolutely caught off guard and it went nuts all day long. So we held an emergency meeting like what the hell did we do? What do we say to these people? Like, it was insane. Tell your team to tell these people. It was game time. I'm back there with them. I'm on the phones. I'm like, okay, this is what you say. And basically when it started coming, we just, we played dumb. This was in the beginning. We played dumb. Like, I'm sorry. We don't know what you're talking about.
Like, is there anything else I can assist with? You need to get a front office. I'm not in events. We're like, uh, we don't have that information. Cause they would call me like, is blah, blah, blah, speaking at your hotel in the state. And we're like, I'm sorry. I don't have that name anywhere on my event orders or anything like that. Would you like to make a hotel reservation? I can assist. Pretty much. Like, can I help you with anything? And so what it stayed bad.
So we had to reach out to our marketing team and they had to actually draft a script that we were supposed to say. And then, so the front office just got beat to shit. I'm part of my language, but we just got beat, man. And it was all hands on deck, answering phones halfway through the day. I told the team like, you know what? Just transfer people to me. If they start to get upset, transfer them to me. And they're like, are you sure? I'm like, yeah, just say, you know what? I see you're upset.
Let me go ahead and connect with my manager connecting my phone. They're like, well, what are you going to do? I'm like, I'm not going to answer. Leave a message. Leave a message. So I was like, yep, just connect it to me. And then when we don't get yelled at, we have other people on the lines who need to be served. So they just connect connecting to me. And so I'm driving my GM nuts. I'm like, what are we going to do about this?
We cannot have this besides the fact, OK, I'm not a super political person, but I don't. I don't care what your political ideologies are. But honestly, if you're working at a place and you start getting threats, I think that should be shut down. I don't care what side of the spectrum it's on, but it's my team safety. And this is going on a weekend. I wasn't supposed to be here this weekend. And so I'm like, I have to come in. I'm worried about my team safety. And you should be.
Yeah. I think that's a testament of like what kind of manager you are. You want to you'll be the bad guy. Let me be the bad guy. Yeah, no, I'm not going to have my poor kids. And when I say kids, they're not that young, but I'm not going to have my people get screamed out like, yeah, it's something that's beyond their control. We don't decide what events we're going to host here. We answer the phones like and then we're at the standing at the desk.
But so I talked to my general manager and I'm like, what are we going to do? What are we going to do? Like I kept on my general manager like we need to do something. And she kept saying we have to meet with legal. So they met with legal and they were able to get out of the contract of hosting this event on the basis of the fact that we could not successfully put on the event because they had not submitted any orders. So no food was on order. They didn't tell us they wanted an open bar.
Like they ordered nothing. We wouldn't. You wouldn't have had banquet staff. No, it's three days before. So we were able to cancel the event on the basis of that. You guys did not provide us with the necessary information for us to be able to execute this properly. So we canceled it. Did they ask for their deposit back? Oh, my general manager said she was the one who handled it because she knew it was a very delicate situation.
And she contacted them and said, look, this is the reason why we're not able to put on your event. You know, it's not at all political. It's the fact that we cannot successfully pull off this event. Normally we do not refund deposits because this is technically on you. You never provided us with this information. But out of goodwill, we are going to give you your deposit back in full and just hopes that, you know, you move on to a different location that's able to host you better.
And you, you know, basically leave on good terms. So they came, they picked up the check, all that. So do you guys think they left on good terms? Oh, I think that's a host question. Well, I took screenshots. Well, Liz, take it away. You have receipts. I have receipts, guys. So OK, wait, wait, wait. Bill, what's your hunch? What do you think they did? My gut instinct is that they played this as the venue screwing them over. That's what I think. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.
So they then post on their website, their Twitter, all of it that basically said, you know, X Hotel decided they not wanted to host us after the addition of blank insert politician. They decided to cancel the event three days prior. We will now have a patriot friendly location in an effort to protect the venue. We will provide location after purchase. So they protected that venue. So they were selling tickets to this thing. Yeah, for a lot of money.
So can I go out on a limb and presume the patriot friendly comment puts them on the right wing of things? What? No. Gotcha. No, but were they selling tickets to your property previously for this event? Yeah, I mean, it's like what did they do with those people who are just out of their money? Honestly, I have no idea because they paid a lot. Like I went on their website and saw how much it was to purchase tickets. It was crazy. Where was the comma? Oh, I know, right?
It was it was in the there was a comma in there. OK, so I'll tell you that much. And then depending on what level package you bought, there was additional numbers in there. Wow. Yeah. So I'm not like a really cool event. Three course dinner, open bar. Holy crap. It didn't happen. It didn't happen.
OK, but you see, that's why I feel like this was a setup from the beginning, because how do you put together an event where you're you're putting out all of the collateral for it, the promotions for it, three course meal, you know, one to two numbers to the left of the comma, so on and so forth, while having the resort blowing you up, asking for your BEOs and you just don't provide anything. It's almost like they wanted to make us a bad guy. Yeah, it has wonder.
Look, not trying to be conspiratorial and all that, but it smells like a setup. It smells like a woe is me. Look at what they did to us. So come to this other venue and buy more tickets. Yeah, where they're more patriot friendly. What the hell? Like, excuse me. But so obviously that one day that it was canceled, we were being blown up by a particular subset of political people, right? Like certain political group. So then the next day, the next day we get killed again after you cancel the event.
Yes. And we get killed not by that group, but by the other side. So we got murdered by both political sides of the spectrum. So the next day it was almost worse. So then that group was giving us hate for canceling the event, threatening us. And it was just all this crazy stuff. Like just again, more threats. And I, your poor team. I know we literally got our butts. I'm sorry. Front office doesn't get enough credit.
Like housekeeping, K, they have the insanely labor intensive job and they get a full week in celebration. You know, they get, I feel like people are now starting to recognize how much housekeepers do, at least in the hospitality industry. We're like, dude, housekeepers are amazing. Like, and they are, I did that job in that industry, but front office gets their butt kicked on a daily. We get yelled at on a daily.
I feel like housekeeping is like a physical endurance and front office is mental and emotional. I can't keep an agent for more than a year because it is so taxing to be yelled at day in day out. Do they go to a different industry? Oh yeah. They leave hotels. Oh yeah. Or they get out of front office. They don't want to answer phones. Answer phones are at the desk. Like it's hard. We just get yelled at like constantly.
But so this second day we just got yelled at and yelled at for canceling the event. And at one point this lady would not let my agent go. And I was like, you know what, connect her to me. And I was getting sick of it. And so I talked to her. I'm like, hi, how can I help you? And she's like, how dare you? And I said, you know what, ma'am, I really want you to think about this. Will you hear me out? And she's like, yeah, okay. I said, all right.
So why do you think an event might be canceled three days prior? Well, okay. Okay. Yeah. Fair enough. Do you think there might be another reason? Well, this is what was said. I'm like, so are you just telling me that whatever information you're being fed, you're not questioning, you're just believing it? She kind of got silent for a minute. Oh boy. And I was like, I'll tell you one thing. I can't tell you why the event was canceled. That is confidential between us and that party.
But I will tell you one thing. They can say whatever they want on their website. It doesn't have to be true or not. And she kind of thought about it. And so are you telling me? And I was like, look, I want you to think about our resort. Are you familiar with our resort? She's like, yeah. I'm like, where are we located? And she tells me where we're located. I'm like, how do you think that area is on the political spectrum? And she said it. I'm like, okay.
Do you think this is the first time we've had political candidates and political people? Well, no. And then I'm like, so why do you think we would pick this one to cancel? Instead of all of them or just not host them? Yeah. I was like, do you know how many political events we hold all the time? Why do you think this one would be special and be canceled? Well, because of no, no, no. I was like, we've hosted a wide variety of people.
So what I think what you should do is you should go back to your organizers and maybe ask some more questions before you just make an assumption and think that it's just us and our political bias. So before you call this number and terrorize my staff, threaten us and call me. You should do your research instead of just taking what your hand said. Well, and I said that. Did she go to the burn unit after that? I was honestly just so peoed and I wasn't supposed to say any of that.
None of that was in the script for marketing. Well, good thing you're not recorded on your life. But she literally was quiet. She's like, oh, okay. I was like, but you know what? If you're in the area, I hope you come and stay at our resort. I was nothing but friendly. Oh, okay. Have a nice day. You know, you're probably one of the few people that's ever actually laid it out like that. And like slapped her with the truth. For sure. Dude, the requisite of most political parties is listen to me.
I'm telling you the truth. The other guy is lying. And people just do that. They don't do any research. It doesn't matter what side of the political spectrum you're on. If somebody tells you how to think and how to feel and what to believe, you should probably think about it. You know, oh, this is the way you know what? Why don't you do your own research? Why don't you think about it? And I made her think about it.
Yeah, but we live in a time where people get their news from the article headline. Yeah. I mean, how much more of that news alert that you get on your smartphone do you actually read? I mean, you'll see like, you know, oh, hurricane such and such hits landfall. And that's all that people do. They don't go any further than that. But then they'll talk about it. Often wrong. They'll fight about it. Again, often wrong.
They'll just get like the conversation going with somebody and they share their opinions. And then you just think that's truth. Are they well founded? Where did you get your information? Well, I mean, 10 people can say the wrong thing and the 11th person is going to be like, oh, well, everybody's saying it. So they must be right. There's a thing on that. Like, what's it called? It's like because a bunch of people believe it's true. It suddenly becomes like a truth.
Do you know what I'm talking about? We're getting. Yes, I don't remember what it's called, though. Forking shirt balls. Well, if anyone can think of it, leave a comment and let us know. Well done, host. No, are you Googling? Everyone believe this is funny. This is our podcast research department. Sorry, I'm phoning a friend. Let me phone another department. Can I get a lifeline, please? Beep beep. Oh, Miss B. The Mandela effect. That's right.
I've heard of Mandela Mandela effect because I mean, yeah, I've heard of it, but I cannot connect the two. So it goes back to when Mandela was in prison and people believe that he had died in prison, but then had actually gone on to be the president of South Africa. But people remembered clearly that he had been in and died in prison. Yeah, it's like a whole thing that everybody has shared memories of a specific thing. So it suddenly becomes true. But yeah, sorry. Quick side note.
Well, no, but it's not just about people and political figures and stuff. It's about other things, too. Like I saw a thing on it the other day that was, you know, which of these two logos is correct? Yes. And like just one little thing is different. And can't see. No, like significant differences. And could you tell the difference? Could you tell which one was right and wrong? There were most of them that I was like, that one's right, that one's wrong.
There was a few though that I straight up had to pause. I was like, mmm. And like made you think about it. Yeah. And one of the ones that was super simple was how do you spell this brand of peanut butter? And the question was Jif. You know what? I think we did look at the same article because I remember this. Well, right. So how do you how do you spell Jif peanut butter? It's J-I-F. Right. But most people would go J-I-F-F. Because I'm thinking, well, like younger people would be like, oh, yeah.
Yeah. Like you find in your phone, like G-I-F instead of Jif the peanut butter, J-I-F. No, most people were putting one, you know, J-I-2-F. In my brain, it was 2Fs. Really? Yeah. That's crazy. I guess I just really liked peanut butter as a kid. Yeah. Now it's it's literally the one I have to buy for my significant other. They prefer that one. They still like, was it 2Fs or one? It's literally in your cupboard and you look at it every day and you have to think about it.
I mean, you don't look at it that closely. I guess that's the thing. These brands are trying to get you to like recognize the font and like the colors, maybe not necessarily every little detail. Yeah. When you showed me two different Taco Bell logos, I'm like, oh my God, they both look right. So you didn't see the same article? We did. Probably. Yeah. Wow. We actually read the article, though. No, it's so weird. We didn't just go off the headline.
Wow. But no, so that was a nightmare and a half for my team. Oh, I'm sure. And I honestly, I was really upset after two days at the end of two days that this was the sales department's F up. I'm sorry, but it was. It was the sales department's F up and front office again has to take the brunt. And I was really frustrated and I sent an email to the leader of the sales team and I was like, hey, I just want to let you know.
You know, the first day I'm like, we've been, you know, being yelled at all the day on the phones for this. Second day I was like, hey, we got yelled at all day again. What are the things I want to bring up to you guys, because I want to get your opinions. I talked to my dad about this both days on the way home and, you know, he was knowing everything because the first day I was like, you know, I have to go into work Sunday. We're getting all these threats.
And he's like, well, he was like, I don't want you there like in the middle of this. I have to. It's for my team. You know, I can't leave you alone. Yeah, like, yeah, they're getting threats, but I have to be there. And then the next day I'm like, it's not going on anymore. So, you know, it was canceled. And my dad, who was on the complete opposite end of the political spectrum to the event that was going on, was like, that's not right. They shouldn't have done that. What do you mean?
And he's like, it doesn't matter who's talking. You are canceling freedom of speech. And he's like, you can't. He's like, they're just canceling an event based upon who's there. So they're not allowing for the process of freedom of speech. OK, I get that. But you said you got threats. Exactly. And that's well, that's the argument I made to my dad.
It was like, look, yes, there's freedom of speech and you should be able to say whatever and whatever, but these particular people who are speaking in this manner, they are threatening the safety of my staff because what they're saying inspires hate in others. Yeah. I mean, not only your staff, but the other guests in the hotel, other teams of the hotel. Like it's the whole property that's really getting threatened, not just people on the phones.
And I said that, but he's like, well, that's huge. And I agree. But to put his argument, he was saying, well, what if it was, you know, the president of the United States, this one or the last one, and they're coming to speak at your resort. Would you cancel them? Because there are certain people that don't like them. And I said, yeah, whether it's this president or the last, our hotel is not equipped to handle that kind of event. Yeah. See, I think that my slant on it is this.
There's freedom of speech, but there's not freedom from repercussions. So those repercussions could be something as basic as, you know, I shout out my political affiliation, my political beliefs, whatever, and, you know, I get flamed on social media or I lose my job or whatever. I have freedom of speech. I can say that. You're not going to be jailed for it. I'm not going to be jailed for it, but there can be a repercussion against me for my beliefs.
I mean, and it doesn't matter whether it is political or not. I mean, do I walk into a vegan restaurant and demand a steak, you know, or something ridiculous like that? No, I'll get I'll get laughed and booed out of the restaurant. Well, that's my right to say that. But there's going to be a repercussion. Like for me, it all starts with the sales department on this one. Personally, I mean, I agree. You need to vet the purpose of travel or the purpose of the function in advance, you know.
And personally, I don't know if I would care per se if it was political or religious or, you know, whatever the topic is. There's a part of me that just wants to steer clear of anything that is controversial. I mean, don't don't chase the dollar. Preserve the reputation of your hotel and the safety of your employees and the integrity of your brand, what have you. Just steer away from some of these controversial meetings. All of that has to be in their contract. Probably not.
They they need to review the contract because they should have had, you know, so many days to get whatever information, let's say layout. And then, OK, the week your event orders. Yeah, do them the next week. Then like, OK, what liquor and like food do you want the next week? Like what linens do you want seven days prior, even 14 days? So if you have none of that information, I feel like you should have wait to fully cancel the event.
Agreed. Agreed. Absolutely. And that's how we were able to get out of the contract. Three days before. I know. I know. Right. But I mean, something that I can guarantee most of the listeners wouldn't know is that the vast majority of your food distribution companies only deliver twice a week. So, you know, if your event and their delivery schedule aren't matching up, you may not have food. Period. No. And what are you going to do? Grab fries from the freezer for this event?
Like, no way. That's not how we want to be represented. No. And, you know, even if this hadn't resulted in a crazy Twitter thing, we probably wouldn't have been able to pull it off successfully. But not a three course dinner and an open bar. I'm sorry. And I get what you're saying, Bill, about, you know, watching what kind of events and this and that. We host political stuff all the time. And the thing is, those they're usually organizations that are putting it on, you know, groups of people.
And they're usually more tactful. They don't just release a statement on the Internet. Exactly a week before, a weekend before that event was supposed to occur, we had a governor at the hotel and he is a very controversial governor. And had people known he was there, we definitely would have gotten some activity. But that group did not go on Twitter and be like, guess who's coming? Guess where they're at? Guess what time?
We have political people all the time. But it's just about the tact and about, you know, you have these people paying for these events. You're not having to go out and seek people to come and they're not like putting on a show to be like, come pay to see those people. You know, well, that previous event might have just put it on their like email list or whatever. Maybe no social media, no Twitter. Yeah. So maybe that's been the contract. But I mean, you know what's interesting?
We're not a big box property, but the property they ended up going to is a big box property. No way. Yeah. And because we were like, what hotel or resort or wherever is going to take these people? And the place it was supposed to be. So they changed location three times. Ours is the first time three times in three days, three times in three days. But those poor people that paid like very good money. Yeah. And by the way, they were confused. They were still calling us.
They have the event. Yeah, it's not here. Do you know where it is? Nope. We don't. They didn't tell us our lawyers went after them when they did the whole statement I read. And because by the way, no one even noticed it till I screenshotted it and sent it to my manager. And I was like, you know, we're getting hate all day for this. Right. And they put their lawyers after them to change that statement. And they did by the end of the day.
I'm like seven, eight p.m. Yeah, but that's a whole business. Oh, yeah. Team just getting inundated with. Oh, yeah. So we got murdered all day long. And then the next day we didn't. But so when they changed the event location, you know, they said, oh, we'll discuss it. You know, we'll release it once you buy tickets. But at the bottom of the website was the address. Was an address for the next location. No way. Yeah. It was a church.
Maybe they figured that most of their followers didn't know how to Google. Well, maybe. But then I guess somebody did because there was a church and then less than five hours later, it then was taken away and then became a third venue to a big box property by the water. Just a little bit up north. And I was like, oh, they didn't blast that they were there on Twitter. Probably didn't want to have to look for a fourth venue. I know.
Then two days, one day before the event. How did they got the staff, the alcohol and the food? Maybe. Well, or maybe their food and liquor drop was just in that lucky time frame that they could accommodate it. Maybe. Or they totally changed like appetizers, beer and wine. Sorry, you spent five grand of this event. Here's your carrot. Here's your. Here's your. Your crude diet.
Oh, man, guys. Or maybe that was a good one. Or maybe they just announced that DoorDash should be there shortly with their fast food orders. We have DoorDash, Uber Eats. Oh my God. Yeah, we got beat, guys. Oh, all right. Did you survive? Did. But are you recovered? Recovered that weekend. Still had to pop in, make sure the team was OK, because even though the event wasn't supposed to happen, we still had to have the police, by the way, come and post up outside of our hotel to redirect.
Well, protesters who didn't get the message, people who were there for the event, like they're still activity. So despite the fact it was canceled. Thanks for protesting the wrong venue. Yeah. Move this on up north. Thank you for coming, but. Wrong spot. Take a U-turn. Go north. Oh, boy. Another patriot friendly city. Oh, must be. I'm sorry. Oh, sorry. This this industry jades you. You don't hate any group of people you kind of learn to hate equally.
Oh, just say that. Everyone. You hate everybody just a little bit or a lot. So did were they able to relocate the event to the what was it? Four Seasons Landscaping Company? Oh, my God. Yeah. It's at the Four Seasons. Oh, God. Well, thank you for sharing. Well, thank you guys for listening to me. Okay. Now, and your team is doing well and hopefully. Okay. Can we look at like the bright spot of this? What? I hope your team just like learned something about this whole experience.
Possible deniability. Yeah. Hopefully. But I'm hoping they learned something out of it. Have they ever been in this situation before? A lot of them? No, nobody. So, yeah, they're going to think of this as a nightmare. Like, it's going to haunt them in their dreams and hopefully cannot confirm or deny. They wake up saying that at night now. I cannot confirm it's not.
But don't you hope that they learn something from it? They might not. They might know how to handle like a tough situation a little bit better next time. I hope so. I really do hope. I think there's opportunity for everybody to have learned something from this. From sales with, you know. Yes, sales. Vetting the client. Right. To, you know, banquets with raising flags about BEOs and maybe making a deadline X amount of days before if you don't have it, you're gone. Yeah.
You know, full payment. That would be nice to have. Yeah. You know, your front desk team, they've learned something. Yeah. Everybody's learned. Yeah. It was a lesson for sure. Well, I mean, at this point, you have to assume that everybody's learned. Yeah. At least hope. Now, when something similar happens again and people lose their minds, then you know that they didn't learn.
It's true. It's funny. Oh, my job, I swear to God, is just disaster after disaster. So we have a problem right now with fire alarms and they won't stop going off inside rooms and public spaces. Oh, this is a good one. This is a good one.
No, I don't even want to go into it too much. But so yesterday, this is yesterday, the fire alarms that's going off in the entire hotel, just in a room. Bill, do you know any of this? No. You have none of it? Okay. So I'm sorry, Ms. B. You have to go. You have to tell him like a little bit of backstory.
Like, I don't even know how to get into this. So the first morning, you essentially walk into fire alarms going off in the lobby. Yeah. So this was yesterday. This was yesterday. No, this was like a week ago, girl.
It happened a week ago too. Good God. Oh, this is a new problem, not an ongoing problem. No, this is different from the ongoing problem. So the ongoing problem is that I'm so sorry. We're talking about two different stories. So all the fire alarms keep going off in all the rooms, by the way.
And it's what do you mean going off? Oh, like in the rooms, like, you know, the individual spoke detectors, they wait just a little beep. No, they go off like there's a fire, but it waits till the middle of the night and is going off in individual rooms. It waits because it knows the guests are sleeping.
So it waits till about 2 a.m. And then they start going berserk. So, oh, yes, he's got his manager brain going like, how is this possible here? So a company who is supposed to be in charge of those keeps coming in to fix it. And they're running all the diagnostics. No one can figure it out. And so it's been happening for what? Two weeks. And we just have to play dumb. Almost. Yeah. Pretend like we don't know that it's, oh, what? Your fire alarm went off in your room?
But it's not every day. It's like every few days and it's random. It's kind of just like a crap shoot. I hope we don't get a fire alarm. And OK, can I add this isn't like a hallway of rooms. They're random, random. And there's nothing like you would think like, oh, it's got to be like one wing of like bad fire alarms or like something. No, it's completely random.
Random floors, random room numbers, like random wings. Oh, it's the worst. There's no consistency. So we've been yelled at for that for a couple of weeks. But so Monday I come into work, I walk in the door and put down my stuff. Happy Monday morning.
Happy Monday. And I throw out my stuff and I go to the front desk and I'm one on one with the team member and all of a sudden the alarm starts going off. And we just look at each other and I'm just annoyed. It's a full fire alarm the entire hotel. And he looks at me and he goes, should I evacuate? I said, do you see smoke?
I was like, no. I'm like, then no. No, but I didn't say it like that. I'm like, well, the job of the front office, which, by the way, folks, when there's a fire alarm going off and the building's on fire, we really don't get to leave until there's an immediate danger.
We have to sit there. We have to man the phones and direct guess where to go to safety. So basically when I told him, like, do you see smoke? He's like, no. Like, and this is your post. Yeah. Our job is to man the phones and tell guess where to go.
Our job is to make sure. You have a firefighter telling you to GTFO? Then it's time to go. Yeah. Until then everybody else has to go to safety. Until then this is your station. And we're here. So we're there. Everyone's evacuating. And you know, I go to the fire control room.
And can I add no one in these properties knows what to do in an emergency. Do you know what's funny? The director of safety and security just sent out literally, I think it was Friday. I could be wrong. A SOP on what to do. So when this is going off, don't you have a big red three ring binder at the front desk that has every natural disaster scenario?
No, not at our property. I know we're not a big box and this may have been a thing at one time, but we've had so much turnover at our property. Pretty much everyone's new. So nobody knows what to do. Nobody has information. I would say a good like 60% of people have been there less than three years. Oh, more than 60. I'm not the best at math. It was quick. I want to say at least 60 have been there less than a year. You think a year? Yeah. Think of all the directors. How long?
Okay, but think of all the directors and managers everywhere. There are some that are outliers that have like 20 plus years of service. And those are a dime, like in a hundred. But for an example, I oversee the pools and we've had a lot of code Browns this year alone.
Don't know why. Can't tell you why. There was no SOP on pool closure of like, who does what? What do we do? What are the steps? Really? No SOP. It's kind of like your pool 101. Yeah. So we just kind of look dumb the first few times. Like, who do I call? What do I do? It's happened in all the pools. I think all the pools on property this year. I actually don't think my jacuzzi. Does that count? Oh, there's one jacuzzi on property that it's happened.
Okay, so mine's untainted. One out of two jacuzzi. Okay. Continue with your fire alarm. Sorry. Oh, yeah. So I got to the fire control panel. I respond like I'm supposed to because I read the SOP before I went out. I just happened to have the SOP. I'm like, what does this say again? Oh, so report to the fire control room. So I run to the fire control room and the GM's up there in their heels on chair trying to read the panel to see where it's coming from.
Talk about a safety issue. Oh, and it's flashing all different locations. So then she's having to dispatch all these people to different locations because the panel's on the fritz. And so every location. Oh, okay. So you go manager one, you go here. Manager two, you go here and like check this room or whatever. Yeah, essentially, except it was mostly engineers, but they didn't find anything. She's trying to silence it. It won't silence. It was a whole mess. But so I go back to the desk. There's no one there. The desk took off. The fire alarm is going off. There's no one at the desk. No one.
Confused. And so I sit at the desk. Maybe they evacuated. I was like, but I specifically told them not to evacuate. Maybe they got scared. Maybe. So I'm at the desk and a guest comes up and talks to me and then they leave and the desk comes back. I'm like, did you evacuate? What the heck?
He's like, there's no one here. So I went and got a soda. They left to the gift shop to go get a soda. And I look at them and I was like, can we stay here during a fire alarm next time? The alarm still hasn't stopped. It's still going on. I'm sorry. You're at the front desk. You need to stay for the one there. Like, did you forget the one thing that you have to do for this job is stand behind this desk. That's it.
I didn't know what I was about. Can you maybe next time just like not leave? You're the only one here. So how many guests have you had to compensate for fire alarms going off? You have no idea. I've lost track. I had a tracker Excel sheet. I've lost track. Was a number too big for the box it was in. Too many commas.
Such a weird issue. Cause you mentioned that it's all around the hotel. It's all in random zones. Not on the first floor though. Everywhere but the first floor. There's only six rooms there though. So you know what? I could be totally wrong. I don't actually know how many rooms are on the first floor. Six rooms on the first floor. I'm probably wrong. Okay. Anyways, regardless. Yeah, it's a random issue. Just random smoke detectors. I think there's 10. You got to keep in mind how the alarm system's set up. So you're smelling the smoke. It's like a smoke detector. And then you're just like, oh, there's a fire alarm. But you're not going to turn it off. You're going to stop. You're just going to stop. You're going to stop. You're going to stop. You're going to stop. You're going to stop. You're going to stop. You're going to stop. You're going to stop. You're going to stop. You
detectors in the rooms should not be tied to your main panel system. I'm not an engineer, I don't know. Not always anyway. Do you know what's funny? I had a guest interrogate me about this because their alarm went off in the middle of the night and he was like, how do you not know what's going
off to my night out there? And he's like, wow, I'm not an engineer. So traditionally the smoke detector that's in the guest room is tied into, I mean it's tied into the fire alarm system, but typically the smoke detector that's in your room is local to just your room. That's what I thought. So especially, I mean like this comes from the select service side of my career where, you know, all the rooms have microwaves and mini kitchens and everything else.
And showers, showers set those things off all the time. They can, but people burning popcorn at 2 a.m. more likely is much more likely. I've definitely done that in my apartment. Well, so that smoke detector is only in your apartment, right? Just like those smoke detectors are only in the guest rooms. It's when they open the door to the hallway to try to vent the room, smoke goes out, hits a public area smoke detector that sets off typically the floor that it's on,
the floor above, floor below. Shit hits the fan. Well, it can, but I mean, there's other systems. Well, but it depends on the size and the type of the property that it could just light up the entire property. So like one hotel that I was at, it was only three stories. So obviously the floor you're on and the floor above or below could be the entire building, but the two buildings were separated on the smoke or on the fire alarms. So one building could go off, the other one would not
because they are separated. But yeah, typically the smoke detectors in the rooms are not hooked into the main panel except for ADA rooms. Oh, traditionally, traditionally ADA rooms will be tied into the central system. So don't put a microwave in that room. Yeah. Well, because you have to assume someone like handicapped can't open the door. Like if correct. Oh, that's really interesting. So people go and help like an ADA room before they go and help standard room. Yeah.
And it's funny too, like when you start talking about SOPs with fires and emergencies and whatnot in a high rise building, actually anything that would require a elevator in a fire, you don't use them, right? Right. They're all to the first floor. Have you ever noticed that there are ADA and wheelchair accessible rooms on upper floors? Oh, huh. They're not always on the first floor. Yikes. So what's the process? I did not know that. So no, that is not the that is not the correct
procedure. If you have someone that is disabled and cannot navigate the stairs or what have you on their own, you're not supposed to carry them. You're supposed to effectively park them in that stairwell and advise the fire department where they are. Oh, are you I mean, look, are you trained to pick someone up and carry someone down the stairs? I can hardly pick up my toddler. OK.
So, I mean, good luck, buddy. Yeah. I mean, this is where I leave you. Well, no. OK, so like we're joking about it and it seems on the surface kind of messed up, but it's the safest place for people to be in the stairwell, in a stairwell. Why is that if it's the ventilation thing, primarily the fact that you're in violation of fire codes if you store anything in there. So basically you should be able to fit a wheelchair in them. Well, no, no, there shouldn't be anything combustible. Yeah.
Yeah. In addition to it, there is different ventilation because it's designed to evacuate smoke and whatnot. So it's like a chimney. That is very true. One thing's like a mess in the stairwell is an easy thing, easy thing to do, like as us in hospitality, like, oh, let me just put this in the stairwell or things that are too close to the ceiling. I used to get in trouble in housekeeping. We used to stack things too high. Someone would be like, take it down a notch.
18 inches. It's a risk. It can fall off the shelf or someone grabbing something from the shelf. No, but for fire safety is sprinkler spread. Oh, yeah. Because the way that the sprinkler heads will spray water, it comes out of an angle. It comes out at an angle. Yeah. And I didn't know this until just a few years ago. The distance between sprinkler heads is actually highly calculated. Oh my gosh. Yeah. Because there can be an overlap where you effectively cancel out and
then very little water actually hits the fire. Oh, interesting. God, fire alarms. I think we wrapped it up. You have just had a week. You know, dude, I've had a couple of weeks. It's been rough. Okay. You know what? In all seriousness about the fire panel issue and all that, that's when your chief engineer has to have a conversation with your vendor and say, look, you guys need to get to the bottom of this by X date or we're going to start billing you for the compensation. Oh,
that's good. I hope they said that. I hope they said that. We're just, front office is just getting so beat. We're so tired. Man, guys, be nice to your front desk agents. I know I always say to your housekeepers, but just be nice. No, no, no. It doesn't matter who it is. Just be nice. Okay. I think I agree with that. And not to be all existential and like hippie, whatever. But people just need to settle the hell down and be nice to people. Agreed. Just be kind. Just be kind.
Try to be understanding. Put yourself in somebody else's shoes. Take a deep breath. Say, is this worth it? Yeah. You know, I mean, just be nice. Agreed. Be kind. Yeah. I mean, especially for people in the customer service industry, like they're just there at work doing a job. Agreed. Okay. Would you like, would you like a good phrase to live by? Do it. So I have a associate that says this before, like we think we're going to be like really busy and like inundated with business and
just like have a rough day. He looks at me and he goes, boss, it's a good day to have a great day. And that literally changes my mood. I like that. So I've, I've started saying it, especially back to this specific associate. I say, Hey, it's a good day to have a great day. And he goes, boss, let's have a good day. Let's go. That's really sweet. I wish I had one of those. Yeah. I love
people like that. And a lot of times in this industry, especially when talking with like fellow coworkers and stuff, I truly believe having a positive attitude and a positive like mindset really rubs off on people. Yeah. Like if you just give them an extra smile or like give them a compliment or just tell them like, Hey, have a great day. Like the director of safety and security was like, are you happy? Like you seem like you're having a good day. And I was like, you know what?
No, I think it just rubs off on people. Like when you're happy and positive, I could be having a horrible day, but you don't know. I'm just trying to like help you have a good day. He was like, you know what? I love that. Oh, I love that too. Come hang out my department more. I need it more. More. So yeah, it's a good day to have a great day folks. I love it. Do you have, do you have any stories from the week though? No, actually I don't. That sounds amazing. I know.
Boring week. It was a lot of boring weeks. It's rare. It's few and far between. Got to just rub a little. Yeah. Okay. Guys, I have a question. I don't know if we're allowed to talk about this. So I'll ask before we do it. If we talk about like celebrities, the best and the worst that we've dealt with, do you think we can name names? I think so. I haven't, honestly, I've, most of the celebrities I've ever come in contact with have actually been really pretty cool.
What? Oh, nice. I haven't had nightmares though. So who's the coolest celebrity you've interacted with? Most of them have been banned or some sort of musical groups. Real Big Fish were really cool. Do you know who that is? Ska Band 90s. No. Red Hot Chili Peppers. Okay. Cool. I know who they are. They were really cool. That's awesome. Did you get to meet all of them? No. It's still pretty cool. Yeah. It's just Anthony. I was dating myself, but 90s rap band. Okay. Digital Underground.
No, I do. That is. Yeah, you do. The Humpty Dance. Oh, yeah. They were really cool and I didn't recognize any of them. It was their voices. And it was one guy in particular. I was like, man, that sounds like Money B. And you kind of did a double take like, who is this? Yeah, I had no idea what they looked like. Because you just listen to the music. Just listen to the music. But his voice is incredibly distinctive. And I was like, that sounds like Money B. And sure enough,
it was. That's cool. Ended up getting autographs from them. Was given comp tickets to their show that night. Oh, that's so cool. I've never gotten that. That was pretty cool. Oh, wow. Oh my god. Any more that you can think of on the spot? Jon Hamm. I didn't meet him. I spoke with him on the phone. Did you know who it was? No, I really say like, hey, I'm no, not initially. He was like, you know, hey, I was a guest at this. That's your hotel on such and such. And he was calling for
himself. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. Totally cordial. Very nice guy. Love that. Unfortunately, I didn't have what he was looking for, but he was great on the phone. He was fine that you didn't have. Yeah. Specifically, if I remember correctly, he was looking for a swimsuit that was left behind. People that leave crap behind. It's constant. Everywhere you would. It's amazing. The stuff I find. Well, you know, it's amazing the stuff that you find left behind. It's amazing the stuff that
people think they bring with them only to find that they never did. Oh, yeah. I had a guy at one hotel that raised hell thinking that that $800 had gone missing out of his room. And he filed a police report. He flamed us in the local newspaper and he had anything, anything he could do. He gets home. He finds that he left it at home. I'm shocked he confessed that I am too. But I mean, you know, hey, kudos to him for having the integrity to follow up with it. But that's happened more than
more than once. Yeah. Same. OK, I have dealt with a lot of celebrities, unfortunately, like, well, not unfortunately, you being in front office, you kind of know who's coming in, even though when no one else does. Correct. So I know. Yeah, see, that's why most of my celebrity meetings are all very old, because 2007. Oh, OK. I switched disciplines. I went from front of house to back house. You don't get to know that much. Yeah, I spent 15 years running housekeeping. So
yeah. Yeah. So I'm still up there. So I've had a lot of celebrity interactions, probably one of my favorite, I would say. I mean, I like music, but I'm super into comedians and I love stand up comedy. Oh, my God. Who? I know. But I don't know if you're going to know him. What you must. Lewis Black. Oh, no. But I'll Google. Oh, my God. He's awesome. I am obsessed. So Lewis Black, he's like one of my
favorite comedians. He was he was anger in Inside Out. He was. But so this was obviously that it is that a cartoon cartoon movie. But this was a long time before that. OK, what's his name? Lewis Black. But he's well known for being a very angry comedian. So that is exactly my I don't know if you guys can tell from my personality. I love angry comics. And Lewis Black was the OG, the original. Like, I am such a huge fan of his. And this was I say he's going to be like kind of close
to what point in time to our location. Oh, my God. Don't even say that. Oh, I love him. So anyways. So, oh, I know. I know who he is. So he's like my favorite all time. This was I want to say like six, seven years ago. And he was performing at a festival on San Diego. And I was working at one of the big box properties and he was staying at my property. And there was all these famous people staying at my property, but he's the only one I care about. And I was like, oh, my God, Lewis Black
is going to be here. So I told my entire team and I said, if you get a call from him or request from anything, I am the only one to handle it. Do you understand? Everybody understood. And so, you know, I'm running my front office operation and then I have a bellman going to take keys up to something. But one of my agents was like, hey, he's taking keys up to room. And I knew that was his room. Like, where are you going? And he's like, I'm taking you up. And I was like, did you not
hear me? Like, I need to do that. Oh, here you go. So then I could run the keys up to his room because the keys weren't working in the club lounge. And I knock on the door and I'm like, so excited and terrified and all the emotions at the same time. And he opens the door. And if you know his persona, it's just angry and yelling and you know, everything sucks. And he opens it. He's the most kind, sweet. He was so grateful. I brought up these keys. Wait, it was almost ridiculous.
His comedy in totality is a bit. Yeah, no, it's a persona. You know, it's his act. He was the kindest, nicest, sweetest man. And I was giving him his keys and I was all like, here's your keys, Mr. Black. And he's like, thank you so much. Oh, you're so sweet. Thank you. I'm like, yeah, I got no problem. OK, so question. Yeah. If you go and see him, because he's going to be fairly close by within the next like two weeks. Are you saying would he remember me? Or like if
if we if we meet him, can we talk, tell him the story? I wonder because I've seen him a second time since then. This was at Oh, God, I forgot about this right now. So this is hilarious. This is in San Diego. And I like nerded out. I gave him his keys. And that was like the greatest moment of my life. So later I'm doing task force for our last company we worked for. And they sent me up to Santa Barbara for some random model to help fix them in their operations.
And so I'm in the lobby doing my thing and he comes in and I'm like, Mr. Black. And he's like, yeah, I'm like, I'm sorry. I just I you said your comedy. I'm a big fan and you're on my hotel in San Diego for the X, you know, whatever festival. And he's like, oh, cool. Good to see you. But I got to see him twice. Did you get a photo? No, because I'm professional. I mean, I mean, they like nerd out and like skip over my words, but I kept my cool. And no, I've never gotten a
photo and autograph. None of that. Oh, my gosh. Rookie move. No, the only photo I've gotten with a celebrity was the game. I didn't even know who he was. I'm not going to lie. That's not really my forte. Can you give us some that game is some kind of like rapper or something? He's a big deal. He's like the 50 cent era. Can you sing a few lines? No, not even one. It's not my thing. I've just been on Google the last like five minutes just Googling these people. But no, the game,
my friend was a really big fan of his and I was front desk at the time. So can I get a photo with you? And they brought me into the photo. I'm in the photo of the game. I still have this, my Lego outfit. I don't know. But at that same property, I met Gwen Stefani, Halle Berry, some dude in Jurassic Park. OK, but do you have photo receipts of like any of these? No, only the game. OK, professionalism. We're not allowed to. But OK, last one I'll share. If I see another person taking
a photo, I literally am like, I'm next. Yeah, I'm not allowed to. I took a picture with the Jackson kids, but that was a request. This was a million years ago. They requested a picture with you. So interesting enough, the family is huge, by the way, the family and their gang. And they went. I opened the Lego property and we got a million celebrities. And that's cool. The Jackson family was there and all the Jackson kids. But they asked for two staffers to be in the photo. And you
happen to be one of them. Yep. And so I'm on one side and my colleague is on the other. And then the Jackson family is in the middle. But do you have a copy? I mean, there's probably one somewhere, but I don't. Do you have any? I didn't. I know who Michael Jackson is, but all these other kids and people, there was a lot of them. Yeah. What about you, Liz? Well, we have a frequent flyer like on property, Dennis Rodman. My team are like a lot of young, like high school and college
athletes. So they always geek out. They're like, oh, my God, it's a Dennis Rodman. So I kind of tell them like, okay, look, we'll go the long way. We'll walk like, so you can like see him. And that's about it. He is a very special character. When he goes to the bar, he makes everyone his best friend. Yeah. And so that's cool, but he is not afraid to say who he is. And so he'll go to the bar and he owns it. No, he does. He does. He owns it. He makes everyone his best friend. And for the next like
two, three days, all the guests in the hotel are talking with him that they saw him. And our old director of safety and security was like his biggest fan. Really? Oh my God. He's been banned from that property. They say at least three or four times and he just shenanigans bringing him back. He just, no, he just keeps coming back. And the older safe and discourtee basically welcomed him with open arms. He was his biggest fan, but not for what you think.
Like what's he well known for basketball? Yeah, that's not why he liked him. He liked him. And he proceeded to then rant to me about how he stopped a nuclear war. I'm sorry. I'm not kidding. When he went to North Korea. Yes. So our old director of safety and security was like, you know, he stopped a nuclear war and then like shows me all these like YouTube videos. This man is a hero. This man's a patriot. And I was like, yeah, people love that word, man. And I'm like, oh, well he trashed the
hotel room and left all this. And there is X amount of dollars of damage. And he was like, well, he saved the country. I'm like, okay. But he's one I've seen a lot. Um, the one really cool when I geeked out on though was Tim McGraw. I wish I would have seen them Tim McGraw and who? Faith Hill. Oh, I wish I would have seen them. They were super incognito. Well, we, we kind of got a heads up that they were going to work out because he's like very into, yeah, he's very into
staying shape, like, especially when he is like on tour. So he does really rigorous workouts. So they said, Hey, like he's going to be on property. Like we're going to give him full access to like anything he wants. Oh yeah. Um, just like he'll come in like playing clothes, baseball hat on, like you won't really tell who it is. Just know he is coming in. I literally sat in the fitness center and like, just sat there and like, watch this man's sweat on the treadmill for literally
two hours. Yeah. Like they weren't kidding when he like stays in shape. So he had a show that night, like an hour away and I watched this man work out for three hours. Oh my God. Yeah. Didn't talk to him. Didn't, didn't have the, you just drooled and sat away. I just thought it'd be cool. Oh my God. That's amazing to say I was within, you know, 30 feet. So, you know, it's funny. I get the, like the heads up to like where they're eating their schedules and you, where they were
going to dinner, all that. And obviously I stay professional. I never tell anyone. I did see, I did see someone today. What? I saw Peewee. Peewee Herman. Or no, Wee Man. Peewee Herman? I saw Wee Man. Geez. I saw Wee Man. I'm overloading the mic. Oh, sorry. I saw. Wait, Pete what? I saw. Wee Man. I saw Wee Man. Who the fuck is that? Excuse my friends, jackass. Is that the small guy? Yeah. Oh, hence the name. Wee Man. Well, what if I got that wrong?
That would be bad. I don't want to make an assumption. Wait, he's was at the resort today? How interesting. I don't necessarily know if he was just visiting for lunch and drinks, whatever, or staying. But it's on. From afar. That's really been my only like really big celebrity interaction in the past. I've gone to plenty of PGA tournaments, but I don't follow golf well enough to really, really know who's who. Nothing super big. Nothing on tour. Oh, yeah. There's a
lot of famous golfers. Yeah. I want to know a single one. Other than. Oh my God. What's his name? Oh my God. Are you thinking of Tiger Woods? Other than the guy you just forgot? Yes. Tiger Woods. That's about it. I think that's all I have for the evening. Miss B, do you have anything else? Always. But I can cut it off here. OK. Just remember, guys. It's a good day to have a great day. It is. I'm not arguing that. She forgot me. I was going to go to you next to like fully,
fully wrap up the episode. Well, that's so kind of you. Thank you for being our guest host tonight. You did a great job. I appreciate it. Miss B, always nice to have you. Great to be here. Liz, you're welcome back at any time. Thank you. Thank you. I will definitely be back. So that's it for tonight. Thank you for listening. You will hear from us again in two weeks. Bye.