Experiences

Mark Sandeno: 00:02

Hey. It's Mark Sandeno with experiences, and I'm here with Nathan Woods, a brother from another mother, at least as it pertains to the experience economy, extreme hospitality, and all things bringing people in to create positive memories together. Nathan, thanks for being on the podcast today.

Nathan Woods: 00:18

Mark, I'm excited to connect, and thanks for having me be part of this.

Mark Sandeno: 00:25

Well, we're talking because you serendipitously came across my desk in the course of everyday business. I, of course, am the CEO of the experiences app. You were checking it out, looking for a customer, and as I lurked on this guy, Nathan Woods, who I was, like, well, who's this Nathan Woods guy? Before I met with you, I I saw your website at nathanwoods.me. I you have the ministry of welcome.

Mark Sandeno: 00:50

I was, like, this is intriguing. And then once I talked to him, like, man, this guy is all about experiences in a way quite honestly that I have never heard or seen before. You've read all the books and listen. I don't wanna front load this to make people think that these guys

Nathan Woods: 01:06

got all

Mark Sandeno: 01:07

the Just give me a bio, and

Nathan Woods: 01:08

I'll just sit back and listen. Yeah. It's, like, can you

Mark Sandeno: 01:10

write that out for me and maybe work on my website a little bit? I was impressed. And I thought we gotta have them on the podcast and see where this goes. But let's dive in real quick to your background. And don't be modest.

Mark Sandeno: 01:24

Why experiences what have you done in the past that helps you speak so adroitly to this?

Nathan Woods: 01:29

I think it's just been a I've been in the season where the only way I can really explain it is just a divine collision towards where I'm at and this calling and heart to understand and dive deeper into what this idea of a posture and practice of hospitality looks like. And the beginning, like the origin stories of it was my first job out of college, which was far from anything of the sorts. I was driving truck parts around, Eugene, Oregon area, and I was driving truck parts around because 2,009 coming out of college, there wasn't a lot. And so I was doing that, but it was one of those things where it's like I'm driving around the state every day just driving parts. And so you get to think about, like, alright.

Nathan Woods: 02:10

What do I wanna be doing? I don't wanna be doing this. And the moment I remember, I still have it on this, you know, kind of, like, document that I kinda created at the time, like a vision document of I just wanna get in the business of creating opportunities for others to experience joy. And at the time, I was like, well, that kinda sounds like hospitality. So I went and got a master's in hospitality.

Nathan Woods: 02:32

I quit working and went and got a master's degree in hospitality. Kind of a initial, like, traditional hospitality, like beds and heads resort hotels, but then I put an emphasis on sports, which was an interesting opportunity they had within this school. And so it was more of the sporting events and sports sponsorship and really focused on, like, the hospitality side of the sports of not the event itself, but how you're gonna take care of the people.

Mark Sandeno: 02:58

And were you working as an intern or a fully paid person for a major sports team, or what were you doing?

Nathan Woods: 03:04

I'm in Eugene. You're not too far away, but Eugene hosts really any track and field event that is big in this country. We get them here in Eugene. And so we are gearing up for the 2012 Olympic trials at that time, and I was like, well, that's a good thing to go pursue and go see if they have an opportunity to do something with them. And so I went and kinda just presented myself as, like, hey.

Nathan Woods: 03:24

I'm getting a master in this. I've grown up in this space, or I've grown up around track and field, the University of Oregon. I grew up in taking history heritage even longer in a little town called Coos Bay, which has the heritage of Steve Prefontaine.

Mark Sandeno: 03:38

And some great sand dunes, by the way, if you like to braff on sand dunes.

Nathan Woods: 03:42

I I was a 3 sport athlete. So I was one of those, like, I'd probably get hurt if I was out there too much, so I didn't do too much of it. But I ended up interning slash building my kind of my way up in that I mean, organization, I would say there's an organization at the time. It was like, there's 4 people. Now it's still the organization.

Nathan Woods: 03:59

They have, like, 30 people and they still put on the biggest track and field events. It's called Track Town USA. And I came in with, hey, you're gonna lead and take on all VIP hospitality for us. We have suites at those events and, you know, special guest type events. And I gotta take on that role as an intern while also doing a lot of other things, that helped me for later on in life.

Nathan Woods: 04:21

But I wore a lot of hats, but my focus was, hey. It's quite a great experience for the VIPs that we invite. It was less, like, the purchasing of the experience, but more of, like, these are our very important people, which within track world, there's people that started shoe companies that are part of that VIP people. And so that was kind of my first taste of actually doing hospitality and doing experiences and just getting the taste of what it is to create something for people to feel welcome and feel good at. And sporting events, always one of those things that you help people escape from regardless of what they're going through in life, and you can just provide them an opportunity to enjoy something.

Nathan Woods: 04:59

And that's what I loved about doing that. And there's been a lot to happen between 2012 and now, but I find myself, I'm back there helping out again. In a different not as an employee, but as a role of a consultant just because I've been around it for so long.

Mark Sandeno: 05:21

Okay. So let's talk a little bit about what you did after that before we get into some of your passion about the theory of hospitality and theory of welcoming people. After that, you moved out to Tennessee. Am I right?

Nathan Woods: 05:36

And Not quite. I left the TrackTown Organization, the event company in 2014. And that was actually because there was a former runner. At the time, he was an Olympic runner, and his coach wanted to launch a product line. They had invited me to come join kind of that founding company.

Nathan Woods: 05:53

That company is called Run Gum. It was a caffeinated chewing gum that we started as a teeny little closet Shopify site, in 2014. And while they were running circles, making more Olympic teams and USA teams, I kind of locked myself to a chain, to a desk, try to figure out how to launch a brand in the consumer goods space. We, over the course of a decade, we kind of blew that thing out of the water within the running world, grew our direct to consumer business and all of that in the brand pretty exponentially over the course of a handful of years. And then eventually, we were able to take the what we built from a brand perspective and allow that to present to Target, Walmart.

Nathan Woods: 06:35

And to this day, it's nationwide and Target and Walmart. And that was a decade of learning business, learning customer experience, learning, I mean, all of it, finance, supply chain, and all.

Mark Sandeno: 06:47

Hey. It's not very often you run into someone who started on a what appears to be a 3 person team and now has national distribution. What was a key lesson if you think back to, like, I really learned this at Run Gum. What was that one thing?

Nathan Woods: 07:02

First thing that comes to mind is just the value and importance of engaging with actually your customers, the people that are buying your product. I always I have this poster still to this day, and it was really big for me at the time was, hey, don't forget that your customers pay your salary. And that was, like, in the warehouse of, like, we might grow, but, like, let's not forget. It's like, it was this core group of people that were with us from day 1 that were the catalyst of us building kind of the online digital community. That was the reason why we we didn't get Target or Walmart because of any other reason other than they looked at our brands that we think you could send people to our stores.

Nathan Woods: 07:39

And that just started by, you know, every little email interaction from Facebook groups to ambassador groups to events that we really kind of really focused on cultivating, like, it's cliche to say no, but a community of people that were for the brand because we are for them and they felt it.

Mark Sandeno: 07:58

I wanna pry that open a little bit because we hear that a lot. Hey, community being known, being seen, and retailers are using that or brands are using that. But I do not think that most brands really know what that means to truly create a community where you get the uplift of saying, hey, I am part of something here. And the reason that brands wanna do it ostensibly is because, hey, when people identify with us and they make us a part of their life, they're gonna consume us. Our services are our thing.

Mark Sandeno: 08:28

So it's not a bad thing. It's an amoral thing. It's just this is a smart move. What does it actually take? And this is highly relevant to experiences.

Mark Sandeno: 08:38

We have a lot of like, I've been signing up a lot for experiences, a lot of quilting shops and crocheting shops. They're naturally kind of good at community. People come together. They work on a quilt together. Every brand should be and could be doing this.

Mark Sandeno: 08:52

What does it take? Like, what are the top three things that you think you have to think about when you're trying to actually do this in a meaningful way?

Nathan Woods: 09:01

Yeah. I think of the practice and the posture, the practices of, like, space where in which you can engage those conversations. And so for us, often, it was a Facebook group because, hey, you have a space where you can engage with them in a more intimate way with this specific group, whether it was an ambassador group or our monthly subscribers. We kinda have, like, different tiers of it. But then actually do it.

Nathan Woods: 09:21

Like, actually engage without, like, selling. Like, use that as a space to, like, engage and interact and congratulate. You know, we're in the the running world. It was easy to be, like, come alongside them as, hey, they just finished their race or they're training for a marathon and just be be human in it. Like, hey.

Nathan Woods: 09:36

It wasn't the brand interacting. It was the people within the brand interacting. And we would try to get our employees as well. Not like it's easy when the founders were doing it, but we would we would work really hard to make sure, hey. The shipping manager would also be in that Facebook group interacting.

Nathan Woods: 09:51

And and ultimately and this you know, there's gonna be a lot of themes of, like, how that culture helped everything when there's this basis of hospitality. But as our shipping manager, our team that were shipping boxes, we're interacting with people in the Facebook group, and then they get to go to the warehouse and actually see that person's box come across and pack that box, it just kind of brought everything full circle. So it helped the culture of the team because, okay, they're actually using people and then actually shipping their boxes out. And then so that's one. It's just like the practice is, like, you gotta find a space to do it, not do it as a way to it's always hard in business.

Nathan Woods: 10:26

There's that fine line of, like, being genuine and sincere with you wanna engage with them because they're human, not engage with them because they have their credit card out.

Mark Sandeno: 10:36

My average order value is gonna be higher, and my customer lifetime value is gonna be greater. You know, we got a whale on our hands who's gonna buy a pallet of rungum.

Nathan Woods: 10:44

And, generally, if you do it well, those are all gonna come, but it's that, like, just that little bit of mind shift to be like, I'm gonna do it because and it goes back to the idea. Like, these people are buying our product. Holy smokes. And early on, it's easy to think that, like, oh, I can't believe there's 100 and then 500 and a 1000 people monthly buying this product, like and just having that slight perspective. I think so I think that's that's one little one, finding ways to make them feel, like, special.

Nathan Woods: 11:10

So whether it was, like, we'd occasionally come out with, you know, exclusive stuff for that you know, these little groups, whether it was merger, flavors, or prelaunches, the things that make them feel like because I engage over here, I do get some access to things. During certain events, we would host just another big track event here. We would have, like, warehouse parties that were only for people that were monthly members or ambassadors. And so going that, I think though what makes it successful is actually giving a damn about them to some level. Right?

Nathan Woods: 11:39

Like

Mark Sandeno: 11:49

Do you feel like as someone who was in charge of this or anyone who's listening out there that says, shoot, you know, I I really need to make sure that our customers feel welcome and feel cared for and that it feels authentic, Jeff Pennypacker, who was on the podcast a couple episodes ago, talked about that magic of engaging people in a particular way that makes them feel valued. Do you have to hire a certain type of person to do that, or can you teach anyone to do that?

Nathan Woods: 12:15

It definitely requires a culture of it that has to be built and fostered. I think it's great when you can hire people that are naturally just caring for others. But like I mentioned, like, we had pretty roughneck warehouse people who maybe not naturally their thing, but as you give them like a toolkit or at least opportunities to do it, and then they get to kinda see the full circle. Like, ultimately, I think everybody likes not everybody. Some people are messed up.

Nathan Woods: 12:42

But, generally, I think there's just the innate status of we all enjoy making others feel good. And the more you do it, the more you're like, I wanna do that again. And so there's some things of, like, hey, be in the Facebook group and interacting then. So there would be, like, some, like, hey. We wouldn't demand it and, like, hey.

Nathan Woods: 12:59

You need to get your one post in there, but we would encourage it. Our team would see it because we would the founders would do it. Right? So it's like if we're doing it, then they feel more comfortable doing it, not just us saying, get in there in the Facebook group every week and post. It was they would see us in there.

Nathan Woods: 13:12

And so I think there's some things that you can, like, teach a little bit of hospitality just with people who are willing to some degree. Like, they might not have the natural state of it. The little bit of practices can allow them to get a taste of it. And when they get a taste, they like doing it.

Mark Sandeno: 13:29

So you have the virtual gathering, Facebook, you know, maybe Instagram and any other comparative tool, and then you have the physical gathering. How do you manage the tension? Because, you know, some of your customers are gonna be on the other side of the country. They're never gonna get down, Eugene. They can see as you report on it.

Mark Sandeno: 13:47

Oh, wow. Look, here's a bunch of people like me. They're actually at an event and gathering, and then you're trying to get people to join. Some of our best brands out there today and some of them are experiences customers are really good at getting that 10 to 5 to 10 to 20% of their customers to come to that physical presence kind of activity. How would you advise anyone or yourself to manage the tension between pure digital and physical gatherings?

Mark Sandeno: 14:15

Because it sounds like you did both with Run Gum.

Nathan Woods: 14:17

We were unique in that. We're you know, we were are an epicenter and kind of the mecca for running, so lots of people wanted to come here. And so a lot of people came here because they had a tie with us. They're like, that was the reason why they actually made the trip for a big track event. It wasn't because just the track event, but it's like, hey, I always wanna be the Hayward field.

Nathan Woods: 14:35

Well, now I connect with this group too. So we would just get a lot of people. Our other kind of unique, hey, this is not everybody gets this opportunity is our the founder who was the Olympic runner also became a a YouTuber, and he would travel with that YouTube show. And so as he went and did crazy kind of athletic stunts, he would always invite, hey, if you're a member, come out and maybe come out early before we film. So there's things like that.

Nathan Woods: 14:59

I mean, we all do a little bit of traveling. If you really care about your business, you really care about your customers. So I would if I was traveling and it wasn't like a family specific trip, I would always try to find a customer in that area or an ambassador in that area or someone who's like, hey. I'm in town. Would you want to get and just meeting up with them physically if I was in that area.

Nathan Woods: 15:16

Whenever we do, you know, trade shows and things like that, it'd be kinda similar. Let's, you know, it might not be a a super formal thing, but it'd be like, Hey, I'm gonna be here at this bar if people wanna come and just hang out. It wouldn't be a brand event necessarily.

Mark Sandeno: 15:29

Wouldn't be a brand activation with, ambassadors in special outfits or anything like that. So and it bears noting that there is a very significant athletic wear company in Eugene called Nike. Right? That is their headquarters, and so that's part of the reason it's such a mecca down there. Right?

Mark Sandeno: 15:46

And so it's kind of an interesting thing is if you're building a very affinity focused brand, I mean, maybe you go to the mecca and you build your thing there because it's gonna be easier to get people.

Nathan Woods: 15:58

We are all in the game.

Mark Sandeno: 16:00

Are you a runner?

Nathan Woods: 16:01

No. I mean, a very long story of no, I'm not goes back to a football injury, but, I did pole vault when I was in school. I was involved in the sport that way, but I was not a runner. And to this day, I'm not a runner, but I enjoy the process. I still work, like I mentioned, to help with the events, and I do stuff with the marathon here in Eugene as well.

Nathan Woods: 16:21

So I appreciate it. It's just not something I enjoy doing.

Mark Sandeno: 16:25

Yeah. I'm right there with you. I'll run because it's good for me.

Nathan Woods: 16:28

But Mine more is like, hey. I need to figure out how to run a little bit because my kids are gonna want I need at least chase them down if they run ahead of me or something.

Mark Sandeno: 16:37

What came after that? You had a what's the Tennessee connection? You were involved with a really cool thing out there.

Nathan Woods: 16:43

Yeah. So, you know, through that process of getting in Target and Walmart, just that kind of growth in the business did require us to, you know, seek certain kind of help, which was investment. As you bring in some smart money here and there, there just comes a time where, hey, smart money wants maybe book smarter people, not book, but, like, industry smart people sometimes. And so we eventually brought some people in that were kind of more geared for Target or Walmart type business, not some schmoes that just kind of launched something in the closet, and here we are. As that kind of got built and they kind of started to build kind of different structures and things like that, kind of just my role and what I was needing, which was kind of the role that I had there, we just called myself the chief of staff.

Nathan Woods: 17:26

Like, it was like, hey, just do it all. And as we brought in the experts to do that kind of that role is less needed. And so this is 2021, 2022. Just felt like it was a a nice little season next chapter. You know?

Nathan Woods: 17:40

I was employee number 1 of a company that we did all that growth, and there was a level of 2 just burnout and exhaustion from that kind of grind. And and this is kinda where the more of that divine collision started. Like, I just felt this inkling to start, like, trying to understand the heart of how we had my wife and I had just moved into the our new home that we're in now, and we kinda just put a state of, like, we wanna be a home that leads and provides hospitality with our home and our hearts. Through that kind of decision of what we wanted to be as a home and a family, it was like, well, what is hospitality? What is it beyond just entertainment of, like, having people over?

Nathan Woods: 18:19

And I kinda just went on a journey of just trying to understand what that is and what that looks like. I remember, like, oh, yeah. I also remember I got a master's in this about a decade ago. And through that, got connected with Bolt Farm Treehouse, which is a luxury glamping resort out of Tennessee outside of Chattanooga. And their band or their founder was in the band, Breathe, so I've been following them for a while just from that purposes.

Nathan Woods: 18:43

Like, hey. I'm a really good fan of this band. Hey. This band member is building this treehouse resort. At the time they started, like, my dad and I were building not a resort, but built kind of luxury compared to, like, what we know as treehouses growing up.

Nathan Woods: 18:56

And so I just following along, and as they were growing and building, my dad and his brothers and me doing a little grant work, we built a treehouse, Not for, like, any kind of resort or any but, like, just a personal tree house.

Mark Sandeno: 19:08

So out in the woods somewhere on some shared land? Or

Nathan Woods: 19:11

Yeah. On some land that the family has down on kind of the Oregon coast, not on the coast, up ways from the coast, a little up river on the coast.

Mark Sandeno: 19:18

I mean, that's no small thing, is it? I mean, now I'm kinda curious about that. I wanna hear about Boltree, but is it, like, 3 bedroom, 2 bath, a tree house, or, like, what do we have? One big room?

Nathan Woods: 19:28

I mean, it's a big room, but, I mean, there's plumbing, there's electricity, there's some beds. And so it's not just a my dad was an architect, and so it's like it's not like they put a lot of nice materials into it as well. So it was I mean, it's not a shack type of thing. I mean, you can be comfortable year round in that.

Mark Sandeno: 19:44

And this is something your family still enjoys?

Nathan Woods: 19:48

Yeah. We have a big family reunion every year that it rotates on who gets to sleep in it on that, but I'm also the closest cousin. So we usually go down as a family a couple times a year to go just stay in it as well. So it's but regardless, all of it was kinda happening at the same time. And so I've been following along.

Nathan Woods: 20:04

And then when I was just ready for trying to see something different and mind you, this place is beautiful. Bull Farm Treehouse is beautiful, and it's huge on social media. So my wife was also like, Hey, we should go there sometime just because it's kind of geared for couples. And they had to put a job and my wife is like, you should just apply at the very least they'll talk to you. And then maybe they'll wanna fly you out.

Nathan Woods: 20:26

The role wasn't for the level of skill set that I have. Like, it was more entry level, but I was like, hey. May very well, it was conversation, and I could show them some ideas that I had just on from what they were doing from their website. And but that led to couple months of conversations, and, yeah, it made sense because they were a resort brand that really geared more for a direct consumer setup, but they hadn't done it yet. So most hospitality, most resorts, you know, it's very much driven by what they call OTAs.

Nathan Woods: 20:56

That's the Expedias, the Booking .coms, the Vrbos, the Airbnbs. There's just been a kind of a renaissance for the especially boutique independents to, like, get out of the equivalent of, like, you know, only using Amazon and target.com and Walmart, that kind of sell our products. You don't know anything about your customers. You have control nothing about it.

Mark Sandeno: 21:16

As you've heard in this interview, we're talking to retailers that host people. And how do you do that? Well, there has to be a way for people to book their experience with you. It's our contention that the world needs another booking tool like it needs another hole in its head. That's not what we need.

Mark Sandeno: 21:33

What we need is a platform for bookable retail, and that's what the experience app is all about. In just a few clicks, if you happen to be a Shopify ecommerce user, you can add bookable experiences to your website. They're on brand. It's at your domain. It's done through the Shopify checkout, and you control the data right there in the admin.

Mark Sandeno: 21:58

You can transfer customers. You can create scannable QR codes. They can be reminded of their upcoming experiences, and it integrates really nicely with everything you do as a retailer. So you're selling your products right next to your bookable experiences, and you don't have to use things like Eventbrite or Ticketmaster or one of the other 1,000 bookable tools out there. If you want the tool that works for you as you host people in your retail environment, which quite frankly is pretty much table stakes these days in an era where people don't have to leave their home to buy anything, they're gonna come out to create a memory with you.

Mark Sandeno: 22:34

Go to experiencesapp.com for a free 14 day trial. It doesn't require a credit card to do the 14 day trial. And by the way, if the 14 day trial isn't long enough, just hit us up in the in app chat and we'll extend it for you. So thanks for listening. Experiencesapp.com.

Mark Sandeno: 22:51

Go there today. Add it to your Shopify store. And if you're not already a Shopify entrepreneur, this would be a great time to start. Go to shopify.com, get your store going, and then immediately go over and add the experiences app to your store. Once again, this is Mark Sandino, the CEO of experiences.

Mark Sandeno: 23:11

We hope

Nathan Woods: 23:14

to see you soon.

Mark Sandeno: 23:14

The aggregators obviously are super powerful. You know, Amazon is out there. They're drawing in a lot of traffic. They're really good at their value proposition. Hey.

Mark Sandeno: 23:23

You know, it's paid this year. Here's everything you get. You get quick shipping, easy returns, and, oh, and, also, you get, you know, unlimited amounts of video and all that. But you don't own your customer. You don't own their heart or their affinities.

Mark Sandeno: 23:34

And, furthermore, these aggregators, if you try to get to the customer and own that customer, they'll shut you down. I've heard stories where Amazon, rightfully so, to protect the customer base that they've cultivated, people who were doing 50, $60,000,000 a year on their platform, Amazon realized, hey. You're trying to take this customer away. Yeah. They're buying your product, but we're shutting you down.

Mark Sandeno: 23:56

I have firsthand stories of that. In the experience world, it's the same thing. Experience is experience economy being sports, entertainment, travel, and dining. But I have had numerous conversations where, hey, you know, I was on Airbnb experiences and great traffic there. We're getting great customers.

Mark Sandeno: 24:13

But as I tried to grow my brand, I started talking to some of our customers who had visited because for heaven's sakes, they're coming in. They're coming directly into the business. Maybe it wasn't just Airbnb Experiences, but they got slapped hard by those aggregators. There is that tension. What I'm seeing in the travel space, I some of this I've discovered just on YouTube.

Mark Sandeno: 24:33

There's this dude, you may even know who this guy is, who built these kinda modern looking tiny homes around the lake outside of,

Nathan Woods: 24:40

Isaac. Yeah.

Mark Sandeno: 24:41

Yeah. Isaac, man. And it's, like, it's amazing the business he's built. There's another guy. It's called experiences x or something like that, and it's like it looks like movie sets.

Mark Sandeno: 24:50

It's like he makes these in the middle of Utah in the Salt Lake. It's just there's, like, you can ride a speeder, and he's got booked out for, like, 6, 7 months, and it's all direct. And so it's an interesting thing. So you go to Bolt Farms. You say, hey.

Mark Sandeno: 25:03

You're actually in a good position to do this. What happened then?

Nathan Woods: 25:07

I mean, it was kind of the same page, not just on what was needed for them and their next stage of their business, but also, like, what is hospitality and why do we do it? And so there's just a lot of alignment. They were wanting to lay more foundational marketing practices for what it is to be a direct consumer of that world direct booking. And I'm coming from a decade of direct consumer, and I just saw a lot of correlation of, like, why not to do it in this world? And I imagine it would work well over a year, without being in the space.

Nathan Woods: 25:36

And that's kinda what we did for the time I was there. It's like, hey. Let's build out an email retention funnel through email and SMS. Let's use the system over here that I know how to use, and let's run with it and make it more like, let's be an ecommerce direct consumer business. Yeah.

Nathan Woods: 25:51

Email flows and everything. We kind of copied what I did and did over there. We'd be able to have a lot of success, both that and then social media, and continue to grow. So really just laying a foundation of a direct consumer business and putting systems in place that allowed them to continue to grow. They're already doing amazing great things.

Nathan Woods: 26:11

It was just kind of getting some systems in place to elevate it.

Mark Sandeno: 26:14

So what happened? How did it work? Did it fall on its face? Did it revolutionize their business?

Nathan Woods: 26:19

You know, I I like to think that, you know, I was a catalyst to kind of their next stage and some of the things that we put in place that I know are super effective for that. You know, while I was there, we went from 8 units to we're in the process. They just launched another, I think, at 26 units. So kind of tripled their unit inventory. Revenues grew.

Nathan Woods: 26:38

The amount of revenue that was coming from the practices of doing email and all that, which they weren't getting before, like email was doing 30, 40% of the revenue. We are 99% direct booking, not having to reel it up.

Mark Sandeno: 26:51

You just went from saying, here's a business that did almost a 100% OTA through the aggregators to 99% of the revenue while tripling their size from email. Is that direct booking?

Nathan Woods: 27:03

Not just during my time, like, but yeah.

Mark Sandeno: 27:05

But then being intentional about owning their customer, it's not like OTA went away. I mean, it's still like it dominates any search you do for almost anything. That intentionality is amazing. That's an amazing outcome.

Nathan Woods: 27:20

They're a unicorn. They're kind of revered in the space a ton because of that, because the occupancy rate that comes with it. Yeah. Just the fact that they're not reliant on, you know, having hopefully, they show up in the Airbnb search. And that's where they they launched in Airbnb, and they some of their units are Airbnb's.

Nathan Woods: 27:37

They were number 1 Airbnb in South Carolina before they launched in Tennessee. So, like, that was their basis, and now it's less than a percent comes from it.

Mark Sandeno: 27:47

Yeah. That's amazing. Okay. Let's dig in a little bit more on 2 subjects. Hospitality.

Mark Sandeno: 27:53

Hospitality that word in my opinion has been hijacked it's almost like kleenex when you talk about hospitality in relation to commerce all we think oh yeah yeah hotels and concierges It's not that it doesn't apply, but there's a deeper meaning to the word hospitality in the way that humans are made and how we experience life. Dig into that a little bit. What is your opinion on that, and why does it matter for heaven's sakes? Is it a throwaway word, or is it something deeply meaningful that we all have to pay attention to?

Nathan Woods: 28:21

Well, obviously, raise my hand and stand on the soapbox to say it is something that is a lost art, a lost command even to show and provide hospitality to others. Being a man of faith, that's even heightened and seen that, hey. It's a last part within ministry and church, let alone business and everything else. Yeah. I mean, when we think of hospitality, generally, yeah, we think of 2 things.

Nathan Woods: 28:43

We think hotels, restaurants, and then we think, I love doing hospitality and having people over in my house entertaining people, and that's what it is. And kind of the discovery and journey that I've gone on the last to understand it more, it just revealed to me that there's such a more important posture of what it is. So there's the practice. Those things are the practices. That's how it's practiced.

Nathan Woods: 29:03

It's practiced in hotels. It's practiced in that. The posture of it is this idea of welcoming people to the space that you're at and being present with them. I've heard it as the Ministry of Welcome, which is well, that's kinda what my tone for it, but the Ministry of Presence is another way to think about it. I like to look back to on the Greek word of it.

Nathan Woods: 29:23

The Greek word of it is this word called philo xenia, Filo meaning love of, which is where we get love of full answer to your loving humanity, philosophy, love of wisdom, brotherly love, city of brotherly love. Xena is stranger. So the Greek word for hospitality truly is to love a stranger.

Mark Sandeno: 29:40

Philoxenia, to love a stranger. And let me just give a caveat here. I happen to have in the space of 4 podcasts, 2 Christians on here. I am one too. It hasn't been on purpose, but, you know, don't be shy about when you're talking about something that's very deep and meaningful to you, there is a tradition, ancient tradition of practicing hospitality.

Mark Sandeno: 30:00

It's been lost in the American church. It's you know, the American church, if I'm to be just overtly critical, has become like an entertainment, you know, experience, and it really not to throw it under the bus completely. There's some amazing communities. They don't practice things like hospitality and service and the out laying of their resources to help people as much as they should. We're all challenged by that.

Mark Sandeno: 30:23

But when you talk about the so you have Philozenia, the love of strangers, and you talk about the posture of it, so what? Why do it? Why complicate your life as a business owner or someone in your neighborhood? Why does it even matter? Feel free to speak to it as it relates to your faith, but also just for humans.

Nathan Woods: 30:42

I believe we all have this innate belovedness that the divine God loves all of us, not because of what we do, what we have, what others say about us, but because he does. And that's our belovedness. I think, 1, I struggled to even believe that. But taking that idea, going through everything I can imagine of how do you help someone understand that they're beloved, I just don't think there's a better way other than having a posture and practice of hospitality. Like, there's not a better way to make someone feel loved and welcomed, valued, heard, than letting them in, welcoming them into the space in which you have.

Nathan Woods: 31:14

Whether that is the practice then you're putting a bed in the head, you're making a meal, you're feeding somebody. That process of bringing people into your space and saying you're welcome dear is a glimpse into their opportunity to get a glimpse into their belovedness. So that's kind of my highest view.

Mark Sandeno: 31:31

To secularize that just a little bit, you said it very well from a Christian worldview that God loves his creation, and this is the best way to demonstrate that through another human. But to secularize it a little bit is he's like, listen. People matter, and love is the fabric of meaning and purpose and bringing people together and hope giving. Would you would you say that's also true even if they don't necessarily have that eternal worldview?

Nathan Woods: 31:55

Yeah. I mean, the idea that all people wanna be seen, valued, heard, and welcome, that's like that coreness is, like, we all want to feel that and feel valued. Making people feel that one, there's the selfish reasons. It feels good to make people feel seen value nerd, I think. I enjoy not everybody maybe, but I think there's a lot of people that just generally enjoy that.

Nathan Woods: 32:13

And then what that does for the other person to help them flourish, this is where you can get to like, not everybody has this DNA to want to do that. But so, yeah, that's the the essence of, like, what I think's important from, like, a humanity sense. I just think hospitality is the love of stranger. It's the thing that makes people feel welcome in a space In a time, like, quite frankly, we all need we need a lot more of it regardless of, again, what they do, what they believe, their success or failures. Like, bringing people to the table because of who they are should be enough.

Nathan Woods: 32:44

The next layer of hospitality, when I think of it, like the posture, but I think of more leadership within your own business. You're not going to have a hospitable business. If you don't have a hospitable culture, that's going to carry over to your customers, unless it starts internally and the same idea of as you build and grow a team and you, as the founder have a crazy vision of where you want this company to go, getting people to come on board and go there with you takes them feeling welcomed when they first walk in the door, when they're at the meetings, when they're in that. Like, they have to feel welcomed there before they're like, alright, I'm gonna risk or do all the things I need to do to help this thing get there down this crazy vision. And so I just think the idea of how you welcome your team on a daily, hourly, monthly basis so that they're like constantly feeling that is crucial.

Nathan Woods: 33:34

So the selfish why doesn't matter, I think that's how you create the culture of getting you to where you wanna go as a business and a team.

Mark Sandeno: 33:41

I love that. So what I hear you saying is why complicate our lives is because it's the mission of humans loving each other and demonstrating love, and it's what we all need. And, I mean, one way to look at it is if you're not doing this, then what are you doing, man? I mean, it starts in your home, and then it goes out into your community. To not be too crass here but to say, well, if you wanna flourish in your business, you need to help people flourish, and this is the best way to do it.

Mark Sandeno: 34:11

And if your business sponsors it and you as a leader actually believe it, it's gonna change the culture of your business. It'll allow you to train people to be great hosts. And would you say that there's a direct correlation between authentic hospitality and business success? Is it one of the things that you can directly see attribution?

Nathan Woods: 34:32

Directly? I mean, I would say yes in the course of my time and the things that anecdotally, I guess, it's easy, like, we did this. I didn't have the word for it maybe. Hey. Why we engage our ambassadors in this way?

Nathan Woods: 34:43

Like, I didn't have the word of hospitality at the time, but we put a different level of care to help them feel seen and welcomed that had impact and how we engaged in our meetings with our team. Like, there's always this, like, level of caring more for them than than we need to or that's required maybe. As we go through and maybe talk more about, like, the customer journey, I a 100% think there's practices you can do that will directly increase and have impact on the bottom line or a top line. Again, the soapbox person of hospitality. So it's like, yes, I do think it has an impact on your team and has an impact on this.

Nathan Woods: 35:19

And it's we have other words for it. You know, company culture and staff care and leadership development that we all have done, tried different things to do about it and try to make it successful. And then we have different ways of marketing that we have different words for. It's just this lens of carrying a little bit more of hospitality that I think is yeah. That's a different lens into way how we wanna approach all those things.

Mark Sandeno: 35:52

Nathan, if you had 10 minutes and you wanted to climb up on your soapbox with an impassioned plea knowing I'm gonna interrupt you, what what do you wanna talk about? You can talk about what you're doing or you can drive home one of these points. I will say this. It's uncommon to find someone who has fashioned themselves around support and hospitality and has something called the Ministry of Welcome. You're just not finding many people that are hanging their hat on this.

Mark Sandeno: 36:16

Right? A lot of those other buzzwords, they're talking about experience economy and all this stuff, but there's there's something about you that gives you a little bit more credibility in this moment. So what do you wanna talk about?

Nathan Woods: 36:27

I mean, the ministry of welcome, been talking about this for 3 or 4 years with a little bit of, like, discovery. Not like, hey. I'm the expert, but, like, I think there's more deeper to this. Like, people ask me, like, well, what is hospitality? Like, in the way that you're talking about.

Nathan Woods: 36:42

And the idea of ministry of welcome kinda came out while recently on a trip to Africa and just the idea of, like, the welcome welcoming people is an easy way to explain it. It's like how you welcome people into your doorway, your neighborhood, your business, and everything else. But I just think it's a transformative force that can redefine how we approach businesses in our neighborhoods, in our communities that is is attractive. And when I say attractive, like, people want to join in when they feel that. They want to, like, go with you.

Nathan Woods: 37:11

They want to come into your home if they feel loved. They wanna stay in your business if they feel that they're welcome there. From a practical standpoint, we have so many different interactions that we have with people on a daily basis within our business, outside of our business. And it's pretty easy to begin to lay out that customer journey, those touch points, and think of all the different times that you have a negative touch point, a positive touch point, a reoccurring touch point, and just begin to infuse, like, how can I come into this specific point in the customer journey that is pretty bland, generally, maybe, and just infuse one of the ways that Will Gudera talks about hospitality is

Mark Sandeno: 37:49

He's the guy who wrote the book Unreasonable Hospitality?

Nathan Woods: 37:52

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The way he kind of is, like, what we do when we engage our customers or clients, I've kind of taken more also, like, our employees, like, what we do as far as making sure they have what they need. They're getting what they paid for.

Nathan Woods: 38:05

That service is black and white. What hospitality is is all the things you do that brings color to that interaction and that engagement. And I think that's another easy way to think about it. Like, what you have to do as a business owner for your employees, that's that is service, and that's black and white. What you have the opportunity to do to make them feel something, that is the hospitality aspect of it.

Mark Sandeno: 38:26

And you think about it, you can apply that to really anything. Let's say you have a tire shop. It's like, hey. You paid for tires. I gotta put the tires on the rim and make sure they're balanced.

Mark Sandeno: 38:33

But hospitality, it's a completely different thing, and you really can take almost any interaction and practice some of these amazing moments of welcome and hospitality.

Nathan Woods: 38:45

I think everyone should read unreasonable hospitality, and I don't forget if it's in the book or not, but one of the stories that he talks about is like, Kayla, the point in which there's generally a transactional feel when you're in a restaurant, that is when you give the check. Right? Like, that is a transaction time within a restaurant. And one of the things they would do is they would quietly put the check down, but then they would put a bottle of cognac on the tables. So I was like, hey.

Nathan Woods: 39:07

Whenever you're ready, feel free to enjoy this bottle of cognac.

Mark Sandeno: 39:11

Give a 10 second background on Will Gudera. And and I see you've interacted with him in some way?

Nathan Woods: 39:17

Will Gadera is a restaurateur, now author leading the gospel of hospitality, I would say, to some level at the higher level. But he took a restaurant that he inherited and then kinda be manager of and took it to the number one restaurant in the world. And what he says is at that point, those top 50 restaurants that get honored in that way, like, at that point, there's nothing about the food that is anything short than spectacular. So how do you decipher yourself from 50 to 1? Generally, it's a chef back of house that's doing something unique and innovative.

Nathan Woods: 39:51

And what they decide is let's be innovative front of house, which means that, hey, we're gonna think how we engage our clients or our guests coming in to the restaurant at a different level. And they were able to just infuse different things throughout that restaurant that allowed them to kinda scale it to be the number one restaurant. That is his background. He would be the one the idea of touch points isn't necessarily he's putting words to things that I have, like, yeah, this is kind of what we would do at Run Gum. We would look at how can you find stuff out about your clients and guests that you can serve them in a way that makes them feel wildly seen and welcomed.

Nathan Woods: 40:22

And so it just allows you to get creative when you start laying out. I did this recently with the company with just their touch points and employee journey. It's like from the moment they are applying to the moment they're with you, there's all these different touch points that are reoccurring, whether it's the application phase, 90 days, there's anniversaries, there's things that you know that you can just start paying attention and listening to things about your team that you can then come in instead of just saying, hey, here's your 5 year anniversary watch. That's just standard, like, start to infuse more of a personalized approach to it. And the idea that hospitality is a one size fits one type of idea versus a one size fits all is where people actually feel it versus it's being a commoditized person.

Mark Sandeno: 41:08

A few practical steps for anyone listening who is an aspiring business owner, entrepreneur, or a multilocation experience that maybe isn't intuitive, but you would say, hey. Yeah. If you want to start to transform your thing into something that's marked by hospitality, what would you advise them to do? What are some easy first steps?

Nathan Woods: 41:33

I mean, the first step that I like is truly taking that building out that customer guest journey that they would have with you from the moment they might first hear about you to post they've interacted with you before or they finished their service that they got from you, whether it's the experience and they're gone. And just get super detailed about what is every possible interaction you can have with that. And just pick one of those and be like, you know, I'm gonna show up differently at this one at this space. And that could you know, depending on the size of business, it could be highly customized by what you do. You know, one of the things that we would do, both farm, like so it's a scalable thing was, hey.

Nathan Woods: 42:09

The point in which they're coming into their room, how can we find stuff out about them before they show up that can be in the room before they got there? And it doesn't mean every person got their own, you know, customized experience, but it's like something that making sure they know we know it's whether it's a they're coming for a specific event or that they enjoy this kind of drink. The digging of, like, how can we find something about them that allows us to give them an experience in this specific moment that is different. One of the things that we did for a client slash friend of eyes on the employee side was he was taking his team on a retreat, like 20 people on his team. They're all going to a couple day retreat, and we're just talking about, like, what is that like for when people go on their retreats?

Nathan Woods: 42:52

And one of the things talking points and touch points came is that touch point of they leave their house to come to you. Well, they're just left behind a family, and we all have been gone from our families. There's often a burden to some degree when you leave your families with kids and things like that. So what we did, once they left, the 1st day that they're gone or 2nd day they're gone, all the families got gift cards to get dinner that night with a card to say, hey. We're really thankful that you're letting us share your spouse for these next couple of days.

Nathan Woods: 43:22

We also really value you. And so stuff like that, I'm like, you know, it was a little bit of an investment, but now they have all their employees' spouses. Like, I mean, I've been in the spot where, you know, my wife maybe doesn't love the place I'm working at, and that creates tension and all that. So now you have the spouses like, this place is awesome. And so it's just it's really just that creative, but I think it starts, like, build out every possible interaction you might have with them, from email, digital, everything else to, hey, they're showing up on-site, or they're showing up to your experience.

Nathan Woods: 43:51

Like, how can that welcome be a little bit different? You can do that, and you might find 200 different touch points that you can say, I can actually do something right there that would be easy to knock off or easy to execute, could also be potentially scalable.

Mark Sandeno: 44:04

Just real quick before we get too far beyond that, look at your business and say from the moment of them discovering you to the moment they realize the value that you're giving them, kind of the table stakes like, hey. We're you know, I gotta put the tires on the rim, you know, because we're a tire shop. Look at all those touch points and say, where can I add delight or discovery or recognition or personalization? Maybe choose some of the lowest hanging fruits, some of the easy stuff, and say, hey. I'm gonna test this out, and I'm gonna see what happens.

Nathan Woods: 44:35

And it's that little bit of, like, idea of, like, I'm gonna make them feel something versus just get something. I think Maya Angelo quote, I'm gonna butcher it, but people forget what you do or what you gave to them, but they'll never forget how you made them feel. That is highly, highly my own version of that.

Mark Sandeno: 44:53

Yeah. So feeling. So, like, to wrap up those two things, it's find those touch points and where can I cause them to feel something positive, not just because I think it's possible you could have a touch point where it doesn't cause a positive feeling or it doesn't evoke anything emotional? And so that would be the key. It's like, okay.

Mark Sandeno: 45:14

Look at these touch points, and where can I evoke a positive feeling? Anything else you would recommend?

Nathan Woods: 45:19

If you're just in the journey of, like, seeing this, like, I truly have been telling people, I don't know if I've read a better business leadership and marketing book as unreasonable hospitality. I just think people read that, and that gives you kind of this freedom to start examining it in this way after you read it. Like, it just kind of gives you this opportunity to be like, Okay, yeah, I can start thinking about this. Whether you're in real estate or financial planning or events or direct to consumer, it kind of just gives you permission to begin seeing the world and seeing your business with this lens.

Mark Sandeno: 45:51

Well, this conversation has been amazing, Nathan. I I'm impressed with your commitment and focus and on hospitality. Once again, where can people find you? What are the URLs?

Nathan Woods: 46:04

These we've said a few times, Nathan Woods dot me is a dashboard of all the things that I'm kinda doing right now, which is a lot of different things within kind of this overarching umbrella of hospitality. All my contacts, whether you wanna just see me on social or get in touch with me about diving deeper on this because it's a topic that I'm super passionate about, that's kinda where they're. And then the Ministry of Welcome, we've kinda mentioned it's a newsletter that I'm slowly trying to figure out how to be a consistent writer in that world. Not there yet. So it's more just as I have a thought that I wanna share and write.

Mark Sandeno: 46:36

So ministry of welcome.com. And also a little nod out to what brought Nathan and I together, the experiences app. Experiencesat.com is our bookable retail platform for Shopify that helps businesses do that kind of stuff. Nathan, it's been an absolute pleasure to talk to you. I hope we get to talk again, and maybe we'll cross each other's paths.

Mark Sandeno: 46:57

We're both in the Pacific Northwest, and we're really not that far away. I feel your good hospitality vibes all the way up here in rainy, wet Seattle today.

Nathan Woods: 47:06

No. Mark, I appreciate you. Like, I'm one that I just appreciate people that are doing the same. Like, whether they know it or not, I can see it and just appreciate you being someone who is welcoming others into the spaces in which you live, work, and play.