Breakfast

We've noticed that a lot of bed and breakfasts take pride in (and are known for) their elaborate and rather formal breakfast service. This is usually a multi-course affair where everyone sits together and waits to be served by the innkeeper. We've seen a lot of fruit cocktails as starters, followed most likely by an egg dish of some sort. The issue is that you often have to wait for everyone to arrive before being served (or finish before moving on to the next course). In addition, the meal, quite simply, is often too heavy for the day's activities. We were thinking to rather follow in the European tradition of a breakfast buffet. This would include homemade breads and jams. Yogurt, granola, fruit, cereal, cheese. The list could go on, and of course the focus would vary from day to day so that guests would not tire of the same thing day after day. That is our feeling on the matter. But what is yours?

Which is a better breakfast?
	extensive serve-yourself buffet
	multi-course and served
pollcode.com free polls

Business Planning 101

This weekend we spent much of our time creating the business and marketing plan for our possible new venture-to-be. Steve was responsible for the numbers portion of this (thankfully), while I was in charge of creating the presentation and developing some of the marketing ideas that would help grow the business. Regardless, we both needed a crash course in what, exactly, goes into a business plan. Thankfully the Harvard Business Review has a little, handy, pocket-sized guide to this. AND it is well-designed! BONUS! Therefore, I was happy to sit down and read this cute mini book cover to cover Friday night. The whole process sounds so straight-forward until you actually start doing it. Then you quickly realize how many components there are and, oh!, how long it's going to take. The good news, however, is that Steve could not figure out how to make The Numbers NOT work. A good sign indeed.

Day Two : Sonoma

Since Day Two did not officially begin until 12pm, we decided that while we were in Sonoma, we may as well visit a winery during our free morning. I know. It was a tough decision. We limited our choices to wineries within the Sonoma area, since that was where we would be for our appointments. Gloria Ferrer, known for their sparkling wines, was the ultimate winner. And so we spent the morning sipping Rose Cuveé and Carneros Cuveé on the winery terrace. It was beautiful. Hot. But lovely. After this we were ready to view the final two properties on our trip. The first was a block or two off of the main square in Sonoma. We had never been to the heart of Sonoma, and it was adorable. Much like a mini-version of Healdsburg. (Healdsburg being already quite small, Sonoma is even more so. Perhaps that is why it was so sweet?). We couldn't believe we had never been there.

The first inn was also quite small. With only six rooms, it felt quaint. There was some potential here, but the two buildings of the inn felt jumbled and tight. It also needed a fair amount of work, despite the solid furniture and great location. We kept this in our mind as we moved on to the second inn—the last we would see this trip.

Inn number two was a five minute drive from the town center. The location, we lamented, could have been better as it sits off of the main two-lane Sonoma Highway. That said, we were immediately impressed with the scale of the property—which included a (relatively) considerable amount of land. The inn itself, also had a good basis upon which to improve. There was decent furniture and linens. Room for expansion. And, of course, the opportunity to improve the business. This, we thought, could be it.

At this juncture, our next step is to sign a confidentiality agreement so that we can receive the financial documents for the inns we are interested in. Once we are able to review those, we will able to fully assess if this is all possible. Or not.

Day One : Napa

We landed late-ish in the day on Wednesday into the Sonoma County airport. Correction, the Charles M. Schultz Sonoma County airport. With Snoopy to welcome us back to the area, we looked forward to two days of searching for properties to "acquire" (as our broker kept saying). Day one would focus on two inns in the Napa area—one in Napa itself, and the other in Calistoga. Since our first day didn't begin until 1pm, we spent the morning exploring the Oxbow market. This was a very very small version of what you see in Seattle's Public Market and even the Ferry Building in San Francisco. We bought some gifts of olive oil from The Olive Press, and set out to the first inn. This luxury inn, located in the heart of Napa, is rated one of the very best in the area. We loved the thought that clearly went into the operation, and were charmed by the charismatic owner. Unfortunately, we felt that although the inn needed work, it didn't need the TLC we were hoping to give. This lead us to the second property, located further up the valley in Calistoga—a historic inn clearly in need of all the TLC it could get. However, we felt that if there ever was a true life Money Pit, this was it. With zoning and water issues surrounding the town of Calistoga, to the structures sorely in need of rebuilding, this project was not for us. We hoped for better on day two.

Western Voyage

Tomorrow, bright and early, we leave for our long awaited trip out West. We'll first head to Idaho for the 50th anniversary of the Rubin family lake cabin. From Friday afternoon through Thursday it'll be all-you-can-eat-s'mores (I hope) and a good dose of family togetherness. Our side of the family (meaning Steve's immediate family) are in charge of dinner Saturday night and breakfast on Sunday. For breakfast, Steve and I hope to create an incarnation of our ideal bed and breakfast buffet. This means granola and fresh fruit with yogurt and honey. Fresh hard boiled eggs and cheese. A variety of breads and spreads (including Nutella, naturally). Breakfast cereals. Juices. The list goes on, but in reality, we'll have to see what's actually available in this remote locale!

On Wednesday we will fly into the Sonoma County airport for the Napa portion of our trip. It's during these three days that we hope to learn more about buying a bed and breakfast, and to see if there is one out there for us! We have four appointments—two on Thursday and two and Friday. In between we hope to slip in a few winery visits, of course. How could we ever get through a trip to Napa without doing so?

Options

Today we finally had the opportunity to review the inns-for-sale-websites sent to us by our bed and breakfast broker (there's got to be a shorter, better name for that job). Unfortunately, these sites arrange the inns by state, so that you need to know the various areas within the state to know if the inn is in the location you want. Make sense? So, after scrutinizing the sites several times over we've developed a list of five inns to see when we visit in two weeks. FIVE. That's it. AND that includes one inn that is WAY out of our price range and two that are quite likely bad business opportunities. Sigh. The "expensive" one is a fancy shmancy boutique inn in Napa. It's lovely. It's perfect. It's what we would want to end up with (not start with). The two smaller inns include the historic inn, which we discussed in an earlier post, and a four room inn, which is simply too small to be profitable for us. All this leaves us with the two possibilities we identified initially, both in Sonoma. Though one has an unfortunate name, both are a decent size (six to seven rooms each) WITH space for expansion. We plan to see all these when we visit Napa, but it seems that our biggest challenge in opening a bed and breakfast may simply be finding one to buy.

Looking Forward to August

Yesterday our bed and breakfast broker sent us a cryptic email. This was in response to an inquiry about our schedule for when we visit Napa to look for properties in August. Her email said "I think you and Steve would be better served if we spoke by phone rather than email." Immediately we thought of the negative. Were there no properties to be had? Were banks not lending? Was she quitting the business and abandoning us mid-search? After some hand-wringing, we finally got a hold of her. It turns out that she simply wanted to find out more information about what properties we would like to see while we are there. She forwarded us links for several websites where we can search what is currently available. At first glance it seems that there are only two properties that are based in the area that we are interested in (Sonoma). We will have to do some research to determine if the locations of the others are viable. If nothing else, this narrows down our search considerably!