The Dream and the Reality of Running a Bed and Breakfast: PART I

Excerpts from an article by Rob Johnson
for the Wall Street Journal

PART I - The Dream
A Dream Come True

Barry Werner wanted to be an innkeeper all his life. when he was a child, he and his grandmother added variety to the game by pretending to run a small bed-and-breakfast, welcoming guests, cooking pancakes for them and hearing how much they enjoyed their visit.

Mr. Werner found fulfillment in making menus, bonding with guests and even doing mundane jobs

The fantasy lingered into Mr. Werner's adulthood as he labored at a succession of jobs he didn't love. By the time he hit his 30s, he realized the clock was ticking on the B&B dream.

In early 2007, he coaxed his life partner, Jeff Finlay, into attending an innkeepers industry convention in Myrtle Beach, S.C. At one seminar, a speaker offered a reality check by asking the audience, "Why do you want to own a bed-and-breakfast?" When a woman volunteered that she loved making muffins, the speaker advised that she might be better off running a bake shop. "He said, 'Do you like plunging toilets and cleaning carpet stains?' " Mr. Werner recalls.

Nevertheless, he and Mr. Finlay were intrigued. They began talking to real-estate agents and settled on a six-bedroom, six-bath row house near Baltimore's Inner Harbor. "I liked that a bed and breakfast could be in a city and at the same time near a resort area, parks and museums," says Mr. Werner, now 34.

By June 2007, with the real-estate market starting to tank, the B&B newbies hit a financial bump. They had estimated that selling their house in Germantown, Md., would largely pay for the Baltimore inn, called Scarborough Fair. But Mr. Werner says they not only took a loss on the sale of their house, "we had to use up our savings too" to buy the dream business.

The rocky start was soon forgotten as the joy of running the place took over. Coming up with items for the menu is a special pleasure for Mr. Werner, such as a chocolate-and-bacon waffle dish that came together after lots of trial and error. "When people cleaned their plates, it was awesome," he says.

Then there was the businesswoman from Egypt who let Mr. Werner know in advance about being a vegan. He loaded up on such alternatives as tofu and soybeans, "but the first morning she sat down at the breakfast table and told me she was allergic to them too," he says.

So, Mr. Werner came up with dishes based on nuts and fruit. "When she left a few days later, she told me she was so happy and eating more than she had in years," he says, adding, "This is putting your stamp on something that's very personal to people; it feels wonderful."

Mr. Werner finds fulfillment in more mundane tasks, too, such as doing an occasional load of laundry. Indeed, his roll-up-your-sleeves taste for chores is a common attribute among newly minted entrepreneurs.

His attention to detail helped him get close to many of his guests One  liked his holiday decor, which was more mysterious than scary, and thought it would be perfect for her small son, who had a phobia about costumes. Since then, the family has visited Scarborough Fair on vacation and thanked him for his inspiration. "It made me feel really close to them, and really good about what I do," Mr. Werner says.

He's also finding gratification in planning the remodeling of his inn's six bedrooms, each with the theme of a famous author. Mr. Werner say he and Mr. Finlay, now 45, spent about $20,000 on the first conversion, called the Edgar Allan Poe Suite. They plan to rename Scarborough Fair with the Latin phrase Ex Libris, meaning "from the books."

The money worries haven't gone away entirely. Mr. Werner says that so far the B&B is just moderately profitable, and Mr. Finlay still works as a computer programmer to earn money that's needed during the inn's slow winter months.

But the cash isn't the most important thing, Mr. Werner says. "One thing that makes this job perfect is you're helping people have the perfect vacation, or business trip," he says. "You're the person who makes their lives everything they want them to be for a few days. The rewards of that are immeasurable."

Mr. Johnson is a writer in Roanoke County, Va. He can be reached at reports@wsj.com
 
Read Part II: A Rude Wake up Call

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