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Lessons for Hospitality From Building Businesses In Other Industries

with Nathan Woods, Head of Marketing and Brand at Bolt Farm Treehouse

Author

Josiah Mackenzie
November 29, 2023

Together with

I love learning best practices from other industries that can be brought into the world of hospitality to grow our businesses and serve the people around us. You’re in for a treat today, learning from someone who created hit after hit in the worlds of sports, live events, and direct-to-consumer (DTC) consumer packaged goods companies.

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Lessons for Hospitality From Building Businesses In Other Industries

with Nathan Woods, Head of Marketing and Brand at Bolt Farm Treehouse

Nathan Woods heads up marketing and brand at Bolt Farm Treehouse, a beautiful mountaintop retreat in Tennessee that creates the space for guests to rest and reconnect with nature, their loved ones, and their purpose.

Credit: Bolt Farm Treehouse

Nathan has an amazing background in consumer packaged goods and direct-to-consumer businesses. Through his work at Run Gum, he mastered the art of building customer connections and driving brand growth through engagement. Today, you'll learn what he's learned from his career in doing this and how he's applying it now in the world of hospitality.

A few highlights from our conversation:

Learning from the worlds of sports and live events

The thing I learned the most was the importance in that moment of welcoming people in and the experience that they have from the moment they walk into the gate.

Sports puts so much emphasis on the guest experience and the entertainment that they provide. They put so much effort and energy into making sure that people are entertained, because that's an entertainment business. As much as they're there to watch their favorite team and it's about the players winning or competing, it's an entertainment business and they have to do the job of entertaining.

I learned the importance of paying attention to the details. We had binders with every guest in the VIP hospitality with their faces and their names. And we had to pay attention to that much detail because they wanted to be greeted by their name. It’s just the details of how much more welcoming it is to know people's name when they're walking in the door or know some of their favorite things or know the food or the drink that they want to have when they sit down in their seats.

Don’t forget you’re serving other humans

In marketing - and any other aspect of providing hospitality at scale - it can be easy to lose touch with the fact we’re serving people, not reservation numbers or IP addresses. This is something that stood out to Nathan when he was working in direct-to-consumer businesses.

I would see every comment and DM as this is a potential customer here that I'm commenting back to. I remember them signing up for an email and now I'm sitting in the warehouse packing up their box and shipping out the door. I think just being part of that entire journey and seeing the impact the entire journey can have like on a very granular level.

It's not just reservation number XYZ. No, this is a human. This is an individual who's gone to the effort, pulled out their pocketbook, and is giving it to you.

I have this sign right above my desk. And I've had it since I started the other company. It says “never forget your customers pay your salary.” They're the ones that allow me to do what I get to do.

I think the thing that I learned most in my 10+ years in direct-to-consumer is just how powerful it is to engage a guest on a one-to-one level.

Social media should be for engagement (not just something that looks good)

Nathan recently built a following of 750,000+ people, and shares the key distinction he makes when planning his social posts:

These are just some of the things he shared in 45+ minutes with us today, drawing from his career of making marketing hit after hit in the worlds of sports, live events, and consumer packaged goods:

  • About Bolt Farm Treehouse (1:33)

  • Nathan's career journey (4:41)

  • Getting into sports and live events (5:37)

  • Creating experiences at events (6:50)

  • DTC experience at Run Gum (10:18)

  • Staying close to customers (11:36)

  • Community building (14:42)

  • Building TikTok to 750,000+ followers (16:52)

  • Social media lessons (18:23)

  • Working for a founder (24:52)

  • Transition to hospitality (28:20)

  • First impressions in hospitality (33:41)

  • Non-hospitality tech (35:58)

  • Using data in hospitality (38:28)

  • Using AI (42:38)

  • The future of hospitality (43:13)

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