December 9, 2025 • 40 mins
In the premiere episode of Pretty Smart, hosts Jane Dagmi, Jessica Duce, and Ericka Saurit share the real, never-before-told story of how a single courageous moment at High Point Market sparked an idea that grew into the Vacation Rental Design Summit, a thriving community, and ultimately a new platform filling an unserved space in the overlap of design and vacation rentals.
Through candid storytelling, the trio walks through the shaky beginnings, the late-night Zooms across time zones, the heartbreak of hard decisions, and the unexpected opportunities that followed. You’ll hear how they built something the design industry didn’t even know it needed—and how doing it before they felt ready became their superpower.
If you’re a designer, creative entrepreneur, or someone standing at the edge of a big idea, this episode is your reminder that ordinary isn’t profitable, courage compounds, and sometimes the boldest moves start with simply saying yes.
Episode Timestamps00:00 — The moment that sparked it all: a nervous pitch at High Point Market. 02:00 — Why Pretty Smart exists and what listeners can expect. 03:30 — How the idea for the Vacation Rental Design Summit was born. 07:00 — Saying yes before knowing how—and finding the right partners. 12:30 — Building the first summit after hours and across three time zones. 17:00 — The “Do you have an exit plan?” wake-up call. 19:00 — Canceling the Summer Escape—and what happened immediately after. 21:00 — How closing one door opened the opportunity in Las Vegas. 23:30 — Why vacation rental design is exploding—and why design actually matters. 35:00 — The standing ovation that made everything worth it. 38:00 — Courage takeaways: just do it, ask the question, take the leap.
Key Quotes- “Take a jump. Take a leap. If you believe in something, you can build it.”
- “Living in the I don’t know is not a good place.”
- “Ordinary isn’t profitable.”
- “None of us went to Summit School—we just kept doing it anyway.”
- “We poured everything into it, and that standing ovation… that’s when we knew it mattered.”
https://theprettysmartpodcast.com/
📸 Instagram- Vacation Rental Designers — https://www.instagram.com/vacationrentaldesigners/?hl=en
- High Point x Design — https://www.instagram.com/highpointxdesign/?hl=en
- Saurit Creative — https://www.instagram.com/sauritcreative/?hl=en
- J Duce Design —
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I had a major girl crush on you and I was terrified and my heart
was beating out of my chest. Take a jump. Take a leap.
If you believe in something, you can do it. You can build it, no matter
what it is. And if it turns into something ginormous, awesome. My
most beautiful moment, and I have a hard time talking about it without
crying, is at the very end when we stood
(00:22):
on the stage and thanked everybody for supporting this
event. We all know I'm an impulse person and
so just do it. Don't be afraid of
what people will think or say. I always go in my mind very
quickly, what is the absolute worst case scenario if I say this thing or I
do this thing and it's never as bad as I think and
(00:45):
I don't really care anymore if I look dumb or
silly. Like, just do it. If you live in that. I don't know.
The no will get you going. The yes will get you jumping, but the I
don't know will just keep you feeling like crap.
Welcome to Pretty Smart, the podcast where three design industry
(01:08):
insiders accidentally started a movement, mostly because no
one else was doing it. Where Erica Sarrit, Jane Dagne, and Jessica
Deuce. Friends, founders, and people who probably should have asked
more questions before launching a summit, a collective, and now
a podcast. We created this show for every designer, host,
brand, or creative entrepreneur who's ever thought. Am I the only one
(01:31):
who feels like everyone else has their life together?
Spoiler. Yes. And also, absolutely not. So
here's what you can expect. Real conversations about the courage it
takes to build something in an industry that can feel enormous
or glamorous and occasionally a little ridiculous. And
we're going to talk about the messy middle, the bold leaps, the panic, the
(01:53):
accidental wins, the strategic wins, the
friendship that held it all together and why doing something before you
know how to do it might just be the secret. We're here to pull back
the curtain on the business of creativity and what actually happens
when you follow an idea that refuses to let you go. Will it
be funny? Sometimes. Serious? More than we
(02:15):
expected. Honest? Always. This is Pretty
Smart, a design podcast for people who are building something
bigger than what they're comfortable with. Season one
starts now.
Here we are. We're live. We're doing it.
(02:36):
Oh, my God. It's our first episode. We are going
back. So how did we even get here?
I blame Jess 100%, and I'm so grateful
that I roped you two in. It wasn't.
No one was kicking and screaming, so we're all happy. Happy to
be here and happy to chat. Let people listen in to our
(02:58):
conversations. We're always having. Yeah. Go back to High point
Market, Spring 22. Right. And some
people have heard this story before, but Jess approaches me
at Universal, and what'd you say? Jess, I'd rather not
quote you, but rather you kind of quote yourself. I would like to
paint the picture quickly, though, that when I saw you, I had a major
(03:20):
girl crush on you. And I was terrified, and my heart was beating out of
my chest, and I was with Elizabeth Scruggs, telling her, I want to go
talk to Jane. Jane tagged me, and she goes, just do it.
Just go over there and do it in her sweet Nashville accent.
I went up to you, and my voice was shaking, and I said, I have
this idea. And it went from there.
(03:44):
So, just so you know, I don't remember your voice shaking.
Really? Yeah. You didn't seem nervous or anything like that. So
that's all in your head. Okay. All right. It happened, though.
Yeah. I was probably nervous. Oh, my God. Jessica Deuce.
This is a big, fancy designer from Houston. She's coming up to me.
What is she gonna ask me? You're just kidding. I even remember
(04:07):
you crossing the street at that market, and you had on one of your cool
looks and boots and jeans, and
I said your name. Cause I fangirled, and you, like,
seemed to recognize and waved, and I was like, she
knows me. She sees me. Yes. We had interviews
before that, so we had been acquainted, but at that point
(04:29):
in time, we didn't even know you. No, you hadn't.
That's. Yeah. In my Covid blackout
of not having events and high point time, I was like,
oh, this seems really cool. And then. Yeah, somehow
you guys got together, put your brains together, and found me
and brought me into the mix, and. Well, you were early
(04:51):
into the mix. I only think of the three of us for everything we've done.
Basically, Like, I know I pitched the idea to Jane, and then Jane
knew of you. And then once you came in, it was like, all right,
we've got this. As much as we could get it.
But I love that. Okay, so you had been doing vacation rental design
for a while, but when you came to High Point, Take us
(05:14):
back to when it was like, I gotta go talk to Jane and tell her
I have this idea that takes a lot of courage
to be able to go up to someone. You've been circulating
around and pitch an idea. And I think that was really cool.
Like, really cool. The timing was perfect
because we all knew who Jane was. And I'd been doing vacation
(05:36):
rental design. My first experience doing that was in 2015.
And that was also, coincidentally, when I started going to High Point. Thought I
was gonna go find my people that wanted to talk about STR design, but I
couldn't find them. And that was like morphing. The whole
idea was morphing. It was still like, what do you do? Oh, okay. You
find things on the side of the road and put them in a house. When
(05:59):
Jane left design, I loved what she was doing with
the magazine. And so when she went to hpxd, I wanted to know about it.
Yeah. And it just seemed so perfect.
Like, I felt from my few experiences with her that she
was approachable enough for me to suggest an idea.
And I honestly just assumed it would either
(06:21):
die or maybe somebody else would run with it. At that very
beginning, I didn't think I was brave enough or smart enough to be a part
of a summit to put it on. I didn't go to Summit School. None
of us went to Summit School. No, I hadn't thought that far.
I'm an impulse person. If we think about High Point. So
designers and brands, of course, buyers and exhibitors are all there at the
(06:44):
same time. And in 2020, 2021,
early 2022, the industry, like it is now still today,
it was like shifting. Things were going up and down. The conversations were changing.
But I think one of the things maybe you were seeing was
that there was no conversation around vacation rental design
outside of what you were hearing in your own echo chamber, in your world and
(07:06):
your business. But Jane, who always has her finger on the
pulse, sees opportunity in
everything. I do have trouble saying no,
but the whole idea of short term rental, vacation rental design
was appealing to me. I did a story in Designers Today a
couple years before that on it. Sure,
(07:28):
we can talk about this and passed it by the board.
It's funny when you're saying, I'm feeling your love and I appreciate all the nice
things you've been saying, but when you say who I was, like, I was not
somebody who had produced Big Event. Yes, we did the designer experience
during my time at Designers Today, but that was different.
And I had a whole team
(07:49):
event promotion team that really did the logistics of it. It
just sounded. Sure. This sounds interesting. You're passionate. I
like you. I don't know you that well. We'll figure it
out. And then, Erica, I remember we sat at High Point Market
Authority. We sat in their conference room. Jesse, this is when I ran
it by the board. And we were thinking about bringing if High Point Market Authority
(08:12):
would want to be a partner. And Tom Connolly, who was the
president and CEO at that point, said, are you talking to Erica
Sorrit? Oh, I never knew that was the connection.
I of course said, yes, we already are. I don't remember how
Erica popped into my life, quite frankly, I don't remember. But
Tom, divine intervention perhaps? Yeah, I mean, that's how
(08:34):
things work out, right? Diming, like whatever it's called, that perfect
storm of things where you don't really realize what's
going to happen. I think each of us brings that. We're in three different
quarters of this industry and we fell into building
something that nobody else was building. We saw the opportunity. But you're
right, none of us went to Summit School. None of us understood what it
(08:56):
was going to take to pull off something like this. But somehow we keep doing
it. This is going to be our third summit coming up. I
feel like we should give a little. I know we'll get into this, but thank
goodness HPXD was on board and everybody
there was cheering. And then High Point Market Authority came on and
they game changed it. They really did. They were so patient
(09:18):
and knew to do the things we didn't. We didn't know what we
didn't know. And just amazing partner we
first. Because of course HPXD's mission is to bring people to High Point
year round. I think the first thought was,
let's do this in the summer. And then
because we had never done this before, we were like, maybe we should get a
(09:41):
partner that's like solid and knows how to produce events.
And that's what led us to say, how about if we do
it in conjunction with market leading right up to market. And it was a great
idea. But people thought we were crazy too though.
Yeah, they were like, how are you going to tell use education on
vacation rental design for. For a whole couple of days. I
(10:03):
think High Point Market Authority took a big bet on us for
real and encouraged us to do that first summit just two days before
High Point Market officially started because they believe in education,
just like H Vac's mission. And we knew so much of
this would be about helping people understand that this isn't just about
(10:24):
pulling things off the side of the road, that it
actually has a strategy. There's a totally different way to price and
you think about profit in a different way. You have to talk to the investors
or the hosts in a completely different way. You're basically selling a
totally different type of Design service. And
I think they saw our passion and
(10:46):
the fact that we were really looking to bring a whole new
set, a new community of designers to High Point.
And that's really. That's big.
And I know part of this podcast is for us to help people figure out
how to do things when they don't know how. Right? Take a jump, take
a leap. If you believe in something, you can do it. You
(11:08):
can build it, no matter what it is. And if it turns into something ginormous,
awesome, you'll figure it out. You'll figure out how to do it.
Fortune favors the bold. Is that what. Oh, yeah, that's it. I love
that. Yeah. I, of course, to do number
the first summit, we also brought in Serena.
Martin, who was great. She's a great do it now kind of person.
(11:30):
But I find, like, in this, whether it's the first summit or the second summit,
there's a lot of responsibility. More than you
think. But when you keep it inside, like,
you've got to ask for help, you've got to share it, because I know from
experience, keeping it inside, then I start to get all bad feelings
inside and nervous and negative. And then the
(11:52):
minute I ask for help, I'm
like, burden off my shoulder. Even if that person doesn't
exactly know, at least I've shared it. And eventually we get to that
point where we meet somebody who can actually help. So, yeah, there have been
some challenging parts of it, but, my gosh, it's always
worth it. The power, I will say, like the power of attraction. Again,
(12:14):
doing this the first time, we didn't know what we didn't know and people
who knew what they were doing. Like, Serena is one. I know we've got a
whole podcast dedicated to the people of how
you know, that came out of this movement and are coming out of this. But
in this first summit, it was really important that we were able
to attract people who understood events and who understood how to do
(12:36):
registration and who could really support us and how to help us ask for money
and all the things it took to produce this thing. It was crazy. We didn't
know any of that. We had no idea. I think about it, we were so
grassroots and we all have day jobs, right?
So we would schedule our meetings, what, starting at
8 or 9 at night. And there were
(12:58):
many nights. We went to midnight, one in the morning. Jane
is the record holder for all of us. You
guys are. What do they call them, Night owls. I'm not. I just
trying to keep up. But that's when we Had.
We didn't know what was going to come out of it. So we
basically, all three of us built the Summit after
(13:21):
hours in between. Time zones, because we were on three
different time zones during a good time. Part of this where
you're in Texas, Jane was in North Carolina, I was in France.
And trying to coordinate times and meetings and
working back and forth. And you're right, it was built after hours.
I mean, hpxd, we did produce it. Right. So we produced
(13:43):
the first one and we pretty much produced the second one too. Because we are
boots on the ground here. And this is where it happened. The way that we're
approaching Summit three is a little bit different. The one that's in Las Vegas, but
for the first two that were in High Point, I mean, that. That was a
full time job. It was a full time job on top of your
full time job. So do you guys want to talk about the event itself?
(14:04):
The first one, Some of the things that happened, because
we're peeling back the layers here and opening the curtain. I was wearing a
boot because I had. I think it was just a
severe sprain on my left ankle. I don't think I broke that one.
The first one. Yeah, the first. I like to attend events
with boots, but yeah. So I was
(14:27):
truck. And I just have to share that Jane graciously let me stay at
her house and I packed this ridiculously
huge, heavy suitcase. Cause I was gonna be there for longer than normal,
and I was wearing a boot. And my bedroom at
Jane's house is upstairs. And
can we just picture what Frankenstein
(14:50):
would sound like carrying? No. We need sound effects, Jess.
You always have heavy luggage. Your purse is heavy.
I'm like. Your purse is like. What is in your
purse? No, but now you have a backpack. Like a really chic Tumi backpack.
I love it. £380. Why I need
what is in there? I don't even know. To be real. Is it glamour? Like
(15:13):
girl stuff? Oh, I get it. Oh, wow. Required. There
is makeup in there and then random things like stickies and a
stapler that I've never used. I have a quarter
inside of a backpack. So an episode of you unpacking your bag.
I don't know why I have a stapler in there, but I do. Oh, I
love you so much. If somebody needs it, I'm ready to go. My stapler.
(15:35):
In case a hem comes undone or something. I love it.
Yes. We were grassroots at this new place,
Congdon Yards. Mm. But we picked that place. I remember,
because there's not that Many High Point is changing, of course, but there weren't that
many places that could accommodate, like, 200 people.
So Congdon Yards, we knew it's this raw, beautiful loft
(15:57):
space. If nobody's been there, they do a lot of weddings there. And it just
seemed like designers who would come into the space would just
be inspired by the rawness of it. So that was. We were pretty
confident in that space. Now, sitting on those little ballroom
chairs for. Oh, my God, the chairs. Not ideal. And the
columns. But I think we worked around that. Okay. That. The
(16:18):
chairs. Yeah, we got comfortable chairs by Summit, too. So we
learned. That was a big lesson. Learned. But we wouldn't have known that until people
told us. That does make me think about the moment. We all
know the moment when. Oh, the moment.
High Point Market, who helped us and Cheerleaded and.
Because High Point Market was managing registration. For us,
(16:41):
and we would have, like, weekly calls with them or something. And so it was
like, how many tickets have you sold? We're like two. And
this was probably like January of 24. Yeah. And she said the
summit was in April. April, yeah. She said, do you have
an exit plan? What are you going to do if you don't get more
sales? We need to have a cutoff date if you don't have X amount of
(17:03):
tickets for your exit plan. Yeah. And we're all like,
what? It literally sucked the air out of the Zoom call.
We were all frozen. Did a day that day. I was, like, mentally
done. I think I ran to the bathroom. I don't know
that horribleness. But why would we have to cancel? This is such
a great idea. Never occurred to us. It never
(17:26):
occurred to us. Yeah. But it was the truth. And that's
part of. We remember that story. And
even I think after the summit, when we were doing like a kind of roundup
of all the highlights, we went back and talked to her about that. We were
like, listen, this was a turning point for us. We felt so scared
because none of us had ever considered that people wouldn't sign
(17:48):
up. And I. It did prepare us a little bit
for the summer event that we wanted to have. That didn't happen.
That was in our realm. Yeah, I know. And I don't want to dwell on
that. But, yeah, every time that is mentioned, my heart
stops for a brief moment. I feel ill in my stomach.
Just so everyone knows what we're talking about, I'm just going to spill the tea.
(18:10):
Okay. So we had two fantastic, super successful summits in
23 and 24, just before high Point Market
in April. And we had been planning for our next
version three summit to be 2025, right.
23, 24, 25. And we were going to do it in the summer
because we felt it be so cool to spread this out over a
(18:33):
week and make it more experiential, give people
time to settle into the showrooms, get to know more
of the people behind the brands which really have
shown up for us in such cool ways. And like, then
have pickleball tournaments, perfume classes,
sound baths, and do all this cool stuff. All these activations in the
(18:54):
showrooms that also then would be learning or education moments for
people to take back to apply to their design
and their properties. And so we had really the
full itinerary planned. We were promoting, we had a cool
brand, we had all the things, and we
had some factors like tariffs. The
(19:17):
world flipped on its end. It started, if you remember
back earlier this year, we had some news around tariffs that
really started to impact business in our industry.
And. And with that sort of uncertainty,
we made a tough call. And it was hard because
again, we've been working at this for so long and so together. And
(19:40):
again, I think one of the things that pulls us all together is our
unwavering passion and belief
in our idea and belief in our community. And we
made a tough call. We had to say, we don't.
We're not gonna get there. Some things that happened and it just didn't feel like
the right time. And it was crushing. I think we all cried
(20:02):
the whole week. A lot of tears. It was hard. I felt like we let
people down. Yeah. Jess, I came across you sent me flowers the
next day and everybody was just raw and upset. And
I know your note was, I never want to cause you pain or I never
want to see you in pain because you know how painful it was.
It was incredible. It's still hard to talk about and I avoid eye
(20:25):
contact sometimes about it, but I do think
things happen. And I know there's gonna be summer
events and other events year round, and I think they're going to be
amazing and we'll learn from it. Can
we talk about what happened almost immediately after that, though? Can't wait
to hear. Okay. Oh, no. You guys know. Come on. So I'll
(20:48):
just start this by saying great business advice for all and any
of us is that sometimes we have to close doors to let
other doors open. And that means sometimes saying no
to clients that aren't a right fit, or saying no to maybe clients have a
ton of money and just somehow Trigger our red flags or
whatever. Or sometimes we just have to again turn
(21:10):
something down. Not knowing. Or with the hope and faith
that something new will come in its place. Right. Something bigger and better.
And so I'm just going to remind you of the timing. This summer summit
was meant to be. The summer escape in High Point was meant to be in
June. By July, we were talking
with and more who wanted to give us
(21:33):
a sponsorship, a contract to bring the summit to
Las Vegas. And that's where we are right now.
That is amazing. We would never have been able to have that
conversation with them, I think, without
closing the store. Or that's just maybe how I see
it. I'm putting a positive spin on this. Here's. We had never
(21:56):
in the previous summits, the first and second, we didn't really.
We had anmore definitely participated in them. We did some tours
in their buildings and everything. And for those who and Moore is
a big trade show producer and real estate holdings,
they own like the percentage of buildings, the larger buildings
in High Point and they run the Las Vegas market and the
(22:19):
Atlanta market as well and some smaller shows too that they've bought
like Shop Object and things like that that they've picked up. But
so we were in conversations about the summer
summit with them. So we had started a real dialogue about doing some more
things together and then. But it was
great that after we made that call, they were like, let's talk
(22:42):
about Vegas. Let's look at Vegas. And Vegas is going to be
great. Yeah. We need to give the love to the
west coast too. And we've always dreamed about.
How can we share the message about our love of High Point
and vacation rental design and HPXD and all the things.
And interior design and all these passionate people. Yeah.
(23:05):
Yeah. I always feel like I have to throw this out there, but we talk
so much about vacation rental design and that is what I love to do,
but it feeds my residential design. So for designers out
there with this summit talk, we do dabble into that. This is just a
design category to add to your menu. And
it's very profitable and it's international
(23:27):
and huge and blowing up. So
what is. Yeah, that stat. Yeah, one in five.
That one. And then I'm thinking about the one with the big B's.
I have to Google because I keep confusing if it's 300 billion or 30
billion, but it's a gazillion dollar industry
(23:48):
and back in 2015 it was still in the M's
and today it's in the B's and it is projected to be
in the T's I. E trillions global changing
movement. It's not going anywhere. And one in five
people will have a second home that you're going to encounter. And every time
I say that statistic in room, I'm. I say, okay, who in here
(24:11):
has a second home or a vacation home? And our math is
always spot on or higher than that every single time.
So for designers out there, whether you're curious or
in it or no, it's not for me either way, you need to know how
to have this conversation because it's not going anywhere. It's just
exploding. And to be honest, it's just smart business because
(24:35):
if you aren't diversifying, this is advice
for financial planning or wealth management across like your personal
life or your business life. Diversification is huge.
Right. We've seen so much instability in our industry over
the last few years that residential design
can't carry at all. It's becoming super saturated
(24:58):
as well as you know, again, economic factors affecting people, how they
purchase homes, how they build homes, how they renovate their homes. However,
these vacation rental or short term rental properties,
especially on the higher end, are huge money
makers. You can actually even do things that are outside
your style profile. You can go crazy. You can work with new vendors.
(25:21):
There's just so much cool opportunity. You don't have to make it your main
business unless you really love it and want to. But just getting
curious to see what this is all about and
what are people doing here. I think it's fascinating
and I think the more people who come feel the same way, we get that
kind of response to the Summit education. It's like, man, I never
(25:43):
even knew. There was so much to learn and so much to do and so
much creativity and so much momentum behind this.
Which is to full circle that. Which is why I
approached Jane because that same trying to understand what we do and it's
different and it's exploding. We wanted brands to take a notice. Oh yeah.
That's what inspired this whole thing is definitely going into the
(26:06):
brands and saying, hey, I'm looking for this type of shipping and
this type of product and this type of. And back in
back when I approached Jane, there was still some confusion for brands.
Like wait a minute, you live in Texas but your projects are in
Oregon and North Carolina, but you
want this thing? What? Go away, crazy person. I we
(26:28):
trailblazed to get awareness. Yeah. And
that's something actually remarkable. I really think that is
a gift that we've brought. But Jess, I think
you're really spearheading it through your collective to
really make that connection between designers and brands. So
it's interesting. I was gonna say one thing. When we did this first
(26:50):
summit, we called on all of our friends, right. We did meet a few
new people. We'll talk about the. That in another episode. But we
basically called on our circle in the design world.
Barclay Butera was the keynote was the Carruthers
of her AI thing, Toby Fairley. And it was very
design heavy. And we
(27:12):
reached out to a couple sponsors for the first summit that were more
like sponsors that would show at some of the bigger STR
conferences. And they're like, who are you? What are you?
Design. What's right. We
reached out to Proper insurance, to Mino and to host gpo, whatever. We
didn't have any of those people supporting us. But after we did our first
(27:35):
summit. Well, host GPO was there, though. Did they come to the first one?
No. You know who was there? You know who was there? Tyann Marsink
Hammond. So Tyan, the goddess Tyenne was that
crossover. Yeah. Doing our side effects. She was
somebody that easily crossed over from the hardcore STR
industry. And as an owner and investor
(27:58):
and designer of her properties, she understood that. So
she was the one representative from that world. But
by Summit two, host GPO was called. They were
calling us. Conversation with us. Justin Ford, who we'll get to in
another episode, he reached out to us. We heard your summit was so
great and yeah, that was just so validating and so
(28:21):
exciting to finally have this meshing of the
two. And Jess, you've been. Eric and I haven't been to
the Burma or other conferences in that space. And I'd
love you to just. You know that design is not a big
popular topic in those conferences, right? This is for.
Not for a lack of trying. And we've all been on those calls, but Vacation
(28:43):
Rental Management Association Verma, who is the
mothership of the vacation rental management world
or the growth of str. And then there's been
chapters that have broken out or organizations like VR Nation, and they all
do amazing things and support
legislation and all of those things. And they have a ton of education.
(29:06):
And after I did my very first rental
in 2015, I was like, oh, my gosh, I'm onto something.
I'm gonna go to a VRMA conference and tell people about how I did
design and improve their ROI and go in there
skipping, singing a tune. Texas
Sparkle. Texas Sparkle. Probably
(29:28):
wearing something pink, like, looked at me like I was a weird
Vendor and I didn't have. I was just like ready to talk, made my little
business cards. Nobody wanted anything to do with me
and didn't want to hear anything about design. I went to join
VRMA because I'm like, I'm going to figure this out. And there's
still to this day no category for design. I would have to
(29:50):
sign up under housekeeping to have some type of
organizational affiliation with Vacation Rental Management
Association. I've been to the conferences. It's
very challenging to get them to want to talk to us about design. Even though
Air DNA did a year long or some really
long study and showed luxury rentals get
(30:12):
30% higher ROI out of the gate, period, end of story.
And new data is saying if you're elevated rental,
elevated luxury rental, you're thriving. Those of you that didn't keep up
and did grandma's basement, you're dying. That market that's
saturated is now only thriving in the top and dying in the
bottom. We have all the data, but yet it's
(30:34):
still very hard for them to talk to us about design. And
the only reason I've gotten to do a design panel, which I was the one
designer on a panel of other smarter people than
me, is because it was a safety panel. All thanks to
Justin Ford. And my job was to how I made safety look pret pretty.
(30:54):
This blows my mind, but it's not a problem I'm unfamiliar with.
This was part of my job at Airbnb was to
create this tier of homes where the
founders of Airbnb were seeing through their data,
right? The largest, one of the largest platforms for short term
and vacation rental in the world. But they were seeing that
(31:17):
the amount of travelers who were searching through the platform
for beautiful design, the homes that were getting those
bookings, those rentals were much higher and the hosts were making
more money. So I was part of a team who was
developing this sort of new tier of homes which was design
focused. Right. We were going to try to compete with the boutique hotel
(31:40):
industry a little bit. But to create something more than just
regular kind of marketplace which could be open to anyone who's
searching for convenience or price. But. But taking those
two elements out of the search query and making design
one of the leading drivers for the booking was part of
my job. How do I educate hosts on how they can uplevel their
(32:02):
properties to make more money? And that really was the focus
of our second conference or our second summit, which was
design. Design has
to be the drive behind what you do it. It can
affect Safety it can affect. Again, we talked about cleanliness and
accessibility, but ordinary isn't profitable.
(32:25):
And I think that moment was, like, really a big
umbrella for us to bring in all these outside
voices that are talking around design but not acknowledging
it. It's been one of our biggest challenges is to get people to
validate design as part of their investment in
the property and not just put sofas left over from
(32:47):
the street and the worst toilet paper you can find.
Oh, I didn't even. I don't think one ply should exist. I'm just gonna just
say right there. Why would you put something in your property that you wouldn't even
use yourself anyway? That is a whole nother conversation.
You know, Erica, I know we need to circle back to, like, why
we did this, but the ordinary is not profitable. Bowl was
(33:09):
brilliant, so kudos. I think the whole
summit was brilliant. I love our tagline
for Vegas summit, too. Very Vegas. Y
Design is the bet. Every house wins. Did I get
that right? You did. I have to ask. During the
summit, the first one, was there an oh, no moment
(33:32):
during the summit for any of you? Or. Oh, my gosh. Or
is there, like a crazy panic moment that you
remember? Other than Ellen having to write with
Sharpies. The space was
a little bit of a challenge. And so the very long
lunch lines. So content wise. No, I think we did really
(33:54):
great. But I, like, there was just some of the logistics around the food, but
our food was good. What about all the people who showed up? Like the walk
ins. Oh, my gosh. Yeah.
It wasn't an oh, no. That was like a. Oh, this awesome.
Oh, fork. My God,
this is great. My most beautiful moment, and
(34:17):
I have a hard time talking about it without crying, is at the very
end when we stood on the stage and thanked
everybody for supporting this event. Well,
Jess, everybody stood up and gave us a standing
ovation. And everybody was crying. Yeah.
So good. It was incredible. What a moment. I'm getting chills again. I am,
(34:39):
too. Yeah, I know. Because we poured everything
into it. Like, everything. We mentioned Serena. Serena. She was,
like, incapacitated with her back. I mean, everybody was like. She was such
a trooper. Just. We couldn't. We pulled it off and
everybody. And it was seriously after that. I
remember, like, it was the talk of marketing. Yes. And I remember.
(35:01):
So we started on a Wednesday evening. Remember how beautiful
the reception was at Pandora's Manor? Like, the weather couldn't
have been better. I remember going there feeling super sweaty because we've
been, like, working and running all day, but everybody Was there
just looking great. All of our guests were fresh. It was
beautiful. And then we just did it. And we had great volunteers.
(35:24):
And Friday we packed things up and everything. And, like, I remember, I think
four o', clock, like, leaving Congdon Yard, going home, taking a shower,
feeling completely spent and elated, and just walking over to
Kerry and company for, like, their Friday night party. And then it just started.
Everybody was like, we heard about the summit, and
I had no voice. By the next day, I had no voice, and I was
(35:46):
moderating, like, four panels. But that was, to me, like, I felt
so complete and happy. I feel like we
realized designers need community and not just content.
The first summit is that moment, that feeling that you
just shared, Jane, was why I said,
(36:07):
I need a community. I don't want to lose these people that I just spent
days with and love. And
that's how the collective was born, because of that feeling and that
moment and that cheering and applauding. But
to your. I have to share this aha moment, which I think you may
know. But the next. So that was Friday, Jane. You got stuck with a lot
(36:31):
of the packing up that day. And Saturday, I had the
insider tour that we do for High Point with Elizabeth Struggs.
And you're right, it was the talk of market. And we show up that
morning, and Adam Japko came over and
Ashley, and he said, I want to talk to you about your summit. And my
heart was like. And he said, you did something
(36:53):
that everybody said was impossible. You got people to come early
to market, stay, have this experience, and
then kick off market, and you killed it. And
nobody thought this could happen. So congratulations to you guys.
And that was so great for him to say that. Yeah. Because
he produces a ton of events. Yeah. I really respect him. His
(37:16):
opinion. Yeah. I would like to wrap this episode up soon
because we have more to talk about. It's a love fest. I'm sorry.
No, it is. If you could say one thing to
someone, listening in their car or walking their dog
or cooking dinner or whatever you do while you listen to podcasts. Thank you
very much. Maybe they're feeling overwhelmed. Right. With something
(37:38):
coming up in their life. Even if it's not a summit. But
what would it be? What's the kind of courage move you want people
to take away after listening to this episode?
Hmm. I know what I have go. We all
know I'm an impulse person. And so just
(37:58):
do it. Don't be afraid of what people will think or
say. I always go in my mind very quickly, what is the absolute worst
case scenario, if I say this thing or I do this thing and it's never
as bad as I think and I don't really care anymore
if I look dumb or silly. Like, just do it.
Because usually it works out. It's better to
(38:22):
be brave. We only have so much time. So true.
Yeah, Jane. I would say, and this is something I always have
to remind myself like every week is living in the I don't know
is not a good place. If you're scared to ask for something, just ask,
get the know and move on. But if you live in that I don't know,
that's just the no will get you going. The yes will get you jumping,
(38:45):
but I don't know will just keep you feeling like
crap. Yeah. So find out. And
mine's really simple. It's something I say all the time to clients
and to you guys and to, like, family. But
I always ask people, how do you eat an elephant?
One bite at a time. Yeah, that's the only way. I don't eat
(39:07):
elephants. But I love that. It's a beautiful visual to leave
us with, Erica. Thank you. Yummy.
Let's close out. That sounds great. Next time, we're talking about the
rigors of vacation rental design and what makes it different and valuable
and basically why it's taking over the industry. Sounds great.
I'll tune in. We're gonna name names. We're gonna
(39:30):
talk about who's doing it right, who's evolving, and
really what designers need to know. Yeah. Thank
you for joining us. See you next time. Thanks for hanging out with us on
Pretty Smart. If today's conversation gave you something to think about
or made you feel a little more seen, we'd love for you to keep the
momentum going. What's your next step? Register for the Vacation
(39:52):
Rental Design Summit. It's for community, creativity and big ideas.
Meet in person. Check out the link in the show notes or visit
hbxd.org to get your ticket to join us this January
in Vegas. But until next time, stay
inspired, stay connected, and stay pretty smart.
I had a major girl crush on you and I was terrified and my heart
was beating out of my chest. Take a jump. Take a leap.
If you believe in something, you can do it. You can build it, no matter
what it is. And if it turns into something ginormous, awesome. My
most beautiful moment, and I have a hard time talking about it without
crying, is at the very end when we stood
(00:22):
on the stage and thanked everybody for supporting this
event. We all know I'm an impulse person and
so just do it. Don't be afraid of
what people will think or say. I always go in my mind very
quickly, what is the absolute worst case scenario if I say this thing or I
do this thing and it's never as bad as I think and
(00:45):
I don't really care anymore if I look dumb or
silly. Like, just do it. If you live in that. I don't know.
The no will get you going. The yes will get you jumping, but the I
don't know will just keep you feeling like crap.
Welcome to Pretty Smart, the podcast where three design industry
(01:08):
insiders accidentally started a movement, mostly because no
one else was doing it. Where Erica Sarrit, Jane Dagne, and Jessica
Deuce. Friends, founders, and people who probably should have asked
more questions before launching a summit, a collective, and now
a podcast. We created this show for every designer, host,
brand, or creative entrepreneur who's ever thought. Am I the only one
(01:31):
who feels like everyone else has their life together?
Spoiler. Yes. And also, absolutely not. So
here's what you can expect. Real conversations about the courage it
takes to build something in an industry that can feel enormous
or glamorous and occasionally a little ridiculous. And
we're going to talk about the messy middle, the bold leaps, the panic, the
(01:53):
accidental wins, the strategic wins, the
friendship that held it all together and why doing something before you
know how to do it might just be the secret. We're here to pull back
the curtain on the business of creativity and what actually happens
when you follow an idea that refuses to let you go. Will it
be funny? Sometimes. Serious? More than we
(02:15):
expected. Honest? Always. This is Pretty
Smart, a design podcast for people who are building something
bigger than what they're comfortable with. Season one
starts now.
Here we are. We're live. We're doing it.
(02:36):
Oh, my God. It's our first episode. We are going
back. So how did we even get here?
I blame Jess 100%, and I'm so grateful
that I roped you two in. It wasn't.
No one was kicking and screaming, so we're all happy. Happy to
be here and happy to chat. Let people listen in to our
(02:58):
conversations. We're always having. Yeah. Go back to High point
Market, Spring 22. Right. And some
people have heard this story before, but Jess approaches me
at Universal, and what'd you say? Jess, I'd rather not
quote you, but rather you kind of quote yourself. I would like to
paint the picture quickly, though, that when I saw you, I had a major
(03:20):
girl crush on you. And I was terrified, and my heart was beating out of
my chest, and I was with Elizabeth Scruggs, telling her, I want to go
talk to Jane. Jane tagged me, and she goes, just do it.
Just go over there and do it in her sweet Nashville accent.
I went up to you, and my voice was shaking, and I said, I have
this idea. And it went from there.
(03:44):
So, just so you know, I don't remember your voice shaking.
Really? Yeah. You didn't seem nervous or anything like that. So
that's all in your head. Okay. All right. It happened, though.
Yeah. I was probably nervous. Oh, my God. Jessica Deuce.
This is a big, fancy designer from Houston. She's coming up to me.
What is she gonna ask me? You're just kidding. I even remember
(04:07):
you crossing the street at that market, and you had on one of your cool
looks and boots and jeans, and
I said your name. Cause I fangirled, and you, like,
seemed to recognize and waved, and I was like, she
knows me. She sees me. Yes. We had interviews
before that, so we had been acquainted, but at that point
(04:29):
in time, we didn't even know you. No, you hadn't.
That's. Yeah. In my Covid blackout
of not having events and high point time, I was like,
oh, this seems really cool. And then. Yeah, somehow
you guys got together, put your brains together, and found me
and brought me into the mix, and. Well, you were early
(04:51):
into the mix. I only think of the three of us for everything we've done.
Basically, Like, I know I pitched the idea to Jane, and then Jane
knew of you. And then once you came in, it was like, all right,
we've got this. As much as we could get it.
But I love that. Okay, so you had been doing vacation rental design
for a while, but when you came to High Point, Take us
(05:14):
back to when it was like, I gotta go talk to Jane and tell her
I have this idea that takes a lot of courage
to be able to go up to someone. You've been circulating
around and pitch an idea. And I think that was really cool.
Like, really cool. The timing was perfect
because we all knew who Jane was. And I'd been doing vacation
(05:36):
rental design. My first experience doing that was in 2015.
And that was also, coincidentally, when I started going to High Point. Thought I
was gonna go find my people that wanted to talk about STR design, but I
couldn't find them. And that was like morphing. The whole
idea was morphing. It was still like, what do you do? Oh, okay. You
find things on the side of the road and put them in a house. When
(05:59):
Jane left design, I loved what she was doing with
the magazine. And so when she went to hpxd, I wanted to know about it.
Yeah. And it just seemed so perfect.
Like, I felt from my few experiences with her that she
was approachable enough for me to suggest an idea.
And I honestly just assumed it would either
(06:21):
die or maybe somebody else would run with it. At that very
beginning, I didn't think I was brave enough or smart enough to be a part
of a summit to put it on. I didn't go to Summit School. None
of us went to Summit School. No, I hadn't thought that far.
I'm an impulse person. If we think about High Point. So
designers and brands, of course, buyers and exhibitors are all there at the
(06:44):
same time. And in 2020, 2021,
early 2022, the industry, like it is now still today,
it was like shifting. Things were going up and down. The conversations were changing.
But I think one of the things maybe you were seeing was
that there was no conversation around vacation rental design
outside of what you were hearing in your own echo chamber, in your world and
(07:06):
your business. But Jane, who always has her finger on the
pulse, sees opportunity in
everything. I do have trouble saying no,
but the whole idea of short term rental, vacation rental design
was appealing to me. I did a story in Designers Today a
couple years before that on it. Sure,
(07:28):
we can talk about this and passed it by the board.
It's funny when you're saying, I'm feeling your love and I appreciate all the nice
things you've been saying, but when you say who I was, like, I was not
somebody who had produced Big Event. Yes, we did the designer experience
during my time at Designers Today, but that was different.
And I had a whole team
(07:49):
event promotion team that really did the logistics of it. It
just sounded. Sure. This sounds interesting. You're passionate. I
like you. I don't know you that well. We'll figure it
out. And then, Erica, I remember we sat at High Point Market
Authority. We sat in their conference room. Jesse, this is when I ran
it by the board. And we were thinking about bringing if High Point Market Authority
(08:12):
would want to be a partner. And Tom Connolly, who was the
president and CEO at that point, said, are you talking to Erica
Sorrit? Oh, I never knew that was the connection.
I of course said, yes, we already are. I don't remember how
Erica popped into my life, quite frankly, I don't remember. But
Tom, divine intervention perhaps? Yeah, I mean, that's how
(08:34):
things work out, right? Diming, like whatever it's called, that perfect
storm of things where you don't really realize what's
going to happen. I think each of us brings that. We're in three different
quarters of this industry and we fell into building
something that nobody else was building. We saw the opportunity. But you're
right, none of us went to Summit School. None of us understood what it
(08:56):
was going to take to pull off something like this. But somehow we keep doing
it. This is going to be our third summit coming up. I
feel like we should give a little. I know we'll get into this, but thank
goodness HPXD was on board and everybody
there was cheering. And then High Point Market Authority came on and
they game changed it. They really did. They were so patient
(09:18):
and knew to do the things we didn't. We didn't know what we
didn't know. And just amazing partner we
first. Because of course HPXD's mission is to bring people to High Point
year round. I think the first thought was,
let's do this in the summer. And then
because we had never done this before, we were like, maybe we should get a
(09:41):
partner that's like solid and knows how to produce events.
And that's what led us to say, how about if we do
it in conjunction with market leading right up to market. And it was a great
idea. But people thought we were crazy too though.
Yeah, they were like, how are you going to tell use education on
vacation rental design for. For a whole couple of days. I
(10:03):
think High Point Market Authority took a big bet on us for
real and encouraged us to do that first summit just two days before
High Point Market officially started because they believe in education,
just like H Vac's mission. And we knew so much of
this would be about helping people understand that this isn't just about
(10:24):
pulling things off the side of the road, that it
actually has a strategy. There's a totally different way to price and
you think about profit in a different way. You have to talk to the investors
or the hosts in a completely different way. You're basically selling a
totally different type of Design service. And
I think they saw our passion and
(10:46):
the fact that we were really looking to bring a whole new
set, a new community of designers to High Point.
And that's really. That's big.
And I know part of this podcast is for us to help people figure out
how to do things when they don't know how. Right? Take a jump, take
a leap. If you believe in something, you can do it. You
(11:08):
can build it, no matter what it is. And if it turns into something ginormous,
awesome, you'll figure it out. You'll figure out how to do it.
Fortune favors the bold. Is that what. Oh, yeah, that's it. I love
that. Yeah. I, of course, to do number
the first summit, we also brought in Serena.
Martin, who was great. She's a great do it now kind of person.
(11:30):
But I find, like, in this, whether it's the first summit or the second summit,
there's a lot of responsibility. More than you
think. But when you keep it inside, like,
you've got to ask for help, you've got to share it, because I know from
experience, keeping it inside, then I start to get all bad feelings
inside and nervous and negative. And then the
(11:52):
minute I ask for help, I'm
like, burden off my shoulder. Even if that person doesn't
exactly know, at least I've shared it. And eventually we get to that
point where we meet somebody who can actually help. So, yeah, there have been
some challenging parts of it, but, my gosh, it's always
worth it. The power, I will say, like the power of attraction. Again,
(12:14):
doing this the first time, we didn't know what we didn't know and people
who knew what they were doing. Like, Serena is one. I know we've got a
whole podcast dedicated to the people of how
you know, that came out of this movement and are coming out of this. But
in this first summit, it was really important that we were able
to attract people who understood events and who understood how to do
(12:36):
registration and who could really support us and how to help us ask for money
and all the things it took to produce this thing. It was crazy. We didn't
know any of that. We had no idea. I think about it, we were so
grassroots and we all have day jobs, right?
So we would schedule our meetings, what, starting at
8 or 9 at night. And there were
(12:58):
many nights. We went to midnight, one in the morning. Jane
is the record holder for all of us. You
guys are. What do they call them, Night owls. I'm not. I just
trying to keep up. But that's when we Had.
We didn't know what was going to come out of it. So we
basically, all three of us built the Summit after
(13:21):
hours in between. Time zones, because we were on three
different time zones during a good time. Part of this where
you're in Texas, Jane was in North Carolina, I was in France.
And trying to coordinate times and meetings and
working back and forth. And you're right, it was built after hours.
I mean, hpxd, we did produce it. Right. So we produced
(13:43):
the first one and we pretty much produced the second one too. Because we are
boots on the ground here. And this is where it happened. The way that we're
approaching Summit three is a little bit different. The one that's in Las Vegas, but
for the first two that were in High Point, I mean, that. That was a
full time job. It was a full time job on top of your
full time job. So do you guys want to talk about the event itself?
(14:04):
The first one, Some of the things that happened, because
we're peeling back the layers here and opening the curtain. I was wearing a
boot because I had. I think it was just a
severe sprain on my left ankle. I don't think I broke that one.
The first one. Yeah, the first. I like to attend events
with boots, but yeah. So I was
(14:27):
truck. And I just have to share that Jane graciously let me stay at
her house and I packed this ridiculously
huge, heavy suitcase. Cause I was gonna be there for longer than normal,
and I was wearing a boot. And my bedroom at
Jane's house is upstairs. And
can we just picture what Frankenstein
(14:50):
would sound like carrying? No. We need sound effects, Jess.
You always have heavy luggage. Your purse is heavy.
I'm like. Your purse is like. What is in your
purse? No, but now you have a backpack. Like a really chic Tumi backpack.
I love it. £380. Why I need
what is in there? I don't even know. To be real. Is it glamour? Like
(15:13):
girl stuff? Oh, I get it. Oh, wow. Required. There
is makeup in there and then random things like stickies and a
stapler that I've never used. I have a quarter
inside of a backpack. So an episode of you unpacking your bag.
I don't know why I have a stapler in there, but I do. Oh, I
love you so much. If somebody needs it, I'm ready to go. My stapler.
(15:35):
In case a hem comes undone or something. I love it.
Yes. We were grassroots at this new place,
Congdon Yards. Mm. But we picked that place. I remember,
because there's not that Many High Point is changing, of course, but there weren't that
many places that could accommodate, like, 200 people.
So Congdon Yards, we knew it's this raw, beautiful loft
(15:57):
space. If nobody's been there, they do a lot of weddings there. And it just
seemed like designers who would come into the space would just
be inspired by the rawness of it. So that was. We were pretty
confident in that space. Now, sitting on those little ballroom
chairs for. Oh, my God, the chairs. Not ideal. And the
columns. But I think we worked around that. Okay. That. The
(16:18):
chairs. Yeah, we got comfortable chairs by Summit, too. So we
learned. That was a big lesson. Learned. But we wouldn't have known that until people
told us. That does make me think about the moment. We all
know the moment when. Oh, the moment.
High Point Market, who helped us and Cheerleaded and.
Because High Point Market was managing registration. For us,
(16:41):
and we would have, like, weekly calls with them or something. And so it was
like, how many tickets have you sold? We're like two. And
this was probably like January of 24. Yeah. And she said the
summit was in April. April, yeah. She said, do you have
an exit plan? What are you going to do if you don't get more
sales? We need to have a cutoff date if you don't have X amount of
(17:03):
tickets for your exit plan. Yeah. And we're all like,
what? It literally sucked the air out of the Zoom call.
We were all frozen. Did a day that day. I was, like, mentally
done. I think I ran to the bathroom. I don't know
that horribleness. But why would we have to cancel? This is such
a great idea. Never occurred to us. It never
(17:26):
occurred to us. Yeah. But it was the truth. And that's
part of. We remember that story. And
even I think after the summit, when we were doing like a kind of roundup
of all the highlights, we went back and talked to her about that. We were
like, listen, this was a turning point for us. We felt so scared
because none of us had ever considered that people wouldn't sign
(17:48):
up. And I. It did prepare us a little bit
for the summer event that we wanted to have. That didn't happen.
That was in our realm. Yeah, I know. And I don't want to dwell on
that. But, yeah, every time that is mentioned, my heart
stops for a brief moment. I feel ill in my stomach.
Just so everyone knows what we're talking about, I'm just going to spill the tea.
(18:10):
Okay. So we had two fantastic, super successful summits in
23 and 24, just before high Point Market
in April. And we had been planning for our next
version three summit to be 2025, right.
23, 24, 25. And we were going to do it in the summer
because we felt it be so cool to spread this out over a
(18:33):
week and make it more experiential, give people
time to settle into the showrooms, get to know more
of the people behind the brands which really have
shown up for us in such cool ways. And like, then
have pickleball tournaments, perfume classes,
sound baths, and do all this cool stuff. All these activations in the
(18:54):
showrooms that also then would be learning or education moments for
people to take back to apply to their design
and their properties. And so we had really the
full itinerary planned. We were promoting, we had a cool
brand, we had all the things, and we
had some factors like tariffs. The
(19:17):
world flipped on its end. It started, if you remember
back earlier this year, we had some news around tariffs that
really started to impact business in our industry.
And. And with that sort of uncertainty,
we made a tough call. And it was hard because
again, we've been working at this for so long and so together. And
(19:40):
again, I think one of the things that pulls us all together is our
unwavering passion and belief
in our idea and belief in our community. And we
made a tough call. We had to say, we don't.
We're not gonna get there. Some things that happened and it just didn't feel like
the right time. And it was crushing. I think we all cried
(20:02):
the whole week. A lot of tears. It was hard. I felt like we let
people down. Yeah. Jess, I came across you sent me flowers the
next day and everybody was just raw and upset. And
I know your note was, I never want to cause you pain or I never
want to see you in pain because you know how painful it was.
It was incredible. It's still hard to talk about and I avoid eye
(20:25):
contact sometimes about it, but I do think
things happen. And I know there's gonna be summer
events and other events year round, and I think they're going to be
amazing and we'll learn from it. Can
we talk about what happened almost immediately after that, though? Can't wait
to hear. Okay. Oh, no. You guys know. Come on. So I'll
(20:48):
just start this by saying great business advice for all and any
of us is that sometimes we have to close doors to let
other doors open. And that means sometimes saying no
to clients that aren't a right fit, or saying no to maybe clients have a
ton of money and just somehow Trigger our red flags or
whatever. Or sometimes we just have to again turn
(21:10):
something down. Not knowing. Or with the hope and faith
that something new will come in its place. Right. Something bigger and better.
And so I'm just going to remind you of the timing. This summer summit
was meant to be. The summer escape in High Point was meant to be in
June. By July, we were talking
with and more who wanted to give us
(21:33):
a sponsorship, a contract to bring the summit to
Las Vegas. And that's where we are right now.
That is amazing. We would never have been able to have that
conversation with them, I think, without
closing the store. Or that's just maybe how I see
it. I'm putting a positive spin on this. Here's. We had never
(21:56):
in the previous summits, the first and second, we didn't really.
We had anmore definitely participated in them. We did some tours
in their buildings and everything. And for those who and Moore is
a big trade show producer and real estate holdings,
they own like the percentage of buildings, the larger buildings
in High Point and they run the Las Vegas market and the
(22:19):
Atlanta market as well and some smaller shows too that they've bought
like Shop Object and things like that that they've picked up. But
so we were in conversations about the summer
summit with them. So we had started a real dialogue about doing some more
things together and then. But it was
great that after we made that call, they were like, let's talk
(22:42):
about Vegas. Let's look at Vegas. And Vegas is going to be
great. Yeah. We need to give the love to the
west coast too. And we've always dreamed about.
How can we share the message about our love of High Point
and vacation rental design and HPXD and all the things.
And interior design and all these passionate people. Yeah.
(23:05):
Yeah. I always feel like I have to throw this out there, but we talk
so much about vacation rental design and that is what I love to do,
but it feeds my residential design. So for designers out
there with this summit talk, we do dabble into that. This is just a
design category to add to your menu. And
it's very profitable and it's international
(23:27):
and huge and blowing up. So
what is. Yeah, that stat. Yeah, one in five.
That one. And then I'm thinking about the one with the big B's.
I have to Google because I keep confusing if it's 300 billion or 30
billion, but it's a gazillion dollar industry
(23:48):
and back in 2015 it was still in the M's
and today it's in the B's and it is projected to be
in the T's I. E trillions global changing
movement. It's not going anywhere. And one in five
people will have a second home that you're going to encounter. And every time
I say that statistic in room, I'm. I say, okay, who in here
(24:11):
has a second home or a vacation home? And our math is
always spot on or higher than that every single time.
So for designers out there, whether you're curious or
in it or no, it's not for me either way, you need to know how
to have this conversation because it's not going anywhere. It's just
exploding. And to be honest, it's just smart business because
(24:35):
if you aren't diversifying, this is advice
for financial planning or wealth management across like your personal
life or your business life. Diversification is huge.
Right. We've seen so much instability in our industry over
the last few years that residential design
can't carry at all. It's becoming super saturated
(24:58):
as well as you know, again, economic factors affecting people, how they
purchase homes, how they build homes, how they renovate their homes. However,
these vacation rental or short term rental properties,
especially on the higher end, are huge money
makers. You can actually even do things that are outside
your style profile. You can go crazy. You can work with new vendors.
(25:21):
There's just so much cool opportunity. You don't have to make it your main
business unless you really love it and want to. But just getting
curious to see what this is all about and
what are people doing here. I think it's fascinating
and I think the more people who come feel the same way, we get that
kind of response to the Summit education. It's like, man, I never
(25:43):
even knew. There was so much to learn and so much to do and so
much creativity and so much momentum behind this.
Which is to full circle that. Which is why I
approached Jane because that same trying to understand what we do and it's
different and it's exploding. We wanted brands to take a notice. Oh yeah.
That's what inspired this whole thing is definitely going into the
(26:06):
brands and saying, hey, I'm looking for this type of shipping and
this type of product and this type of. And back in
back when I approached Jane, there was still some confusion for brands.
Like wait a minute, you live in Texas but your projects are in
Oregon and North Carolina, but you
want this thing? What? Go away, crazy person. I we
(26:28):
trailblazed to get awareness. Yeah. And
that's something actually remarkable. I really think that is
a gift that we've brought. But Jess, I think
you're really spearheading it through your collective to
really make that connection between designers and brands. So
it's interesting. I was gonna say one thing. When we did this first
(26:50):
summit, we called on all of our friends, right. We did meet a few
new people. We'll talk about the. That in another episode. But we
basically called on our circle in the design world.
Barclay Butera was the keynote was the Carruthers
of her AI thing, Toby Fairley. And it was very
design heavy. And we
(27:12):
reached out to a couple sponsors for the first summit that were more
like sponsors that would show at some of the bigger STR
conferences. And they're like, who are you? What are you?
Design. What's right. We
reached out to Proper insurance, to Mino and to host gpo, whatever. We
didn't have any of those people supporting us. But after we did our first
(27:35):
summit. Well, host GPO was there, though. Did they come to the first one?
No. You know who was there? You know who was there? Tyann Marsink
Hammond. So Tyan, the goddess Tyenne was that
crossover. Yeah. Doing our side effects. She was
somebody that easily crossed over from the hardcore STR
industry. And as an owner and investor
(27:58):
and designer of her properties, she understood that. So
she was the one representative from that world. But
by Summit two, host GPO was called. They were
calling us. Conversation with us. Justin Ford, who we'll get to in
another episode, he reached out to us. We heard your summit was so
great and yeah, that was just so validating and so
(28:21):
exciting to finally have this meshing of the
two. And Jess, you've been. Eric and I haven't been to
the Burma or other conferences in that space. And I'd
love you to just. You know that design is not a big
popular topic in those conferences, right? This is for.
Not for a lack of trying. And we've all been on those calls, but Vacation
(28:43):
Rental Management Association Verma, who is the
mothership of the vacation rental management world
or the growth of str. And then there's been
chapters that have broken out or organizations like VR Nation, and they all
do amazing things and support
legislation and all of those things. And they have a ton of education.
(29:06):
And after I did my very first rental
in 2015, I was like, oh, my gosh, I'm onto something.
I'm gonna go to a VRMA conference and tell people about how I did
design and improve their ROI and go in there
skipping, singing a tune. Texas
Sparkle. Texas Sparkle. Probably
(29:28):
wearing something pink, like, looked at me like I was a weird
Vendor and I didn't have. I was just like ready to talk, made my little
business cards. Nobody wanted anything to do with me
and didn't want to hear anything about design. I went to join
VRMA because I'm like, I'm going to figure this out. And there's
still to this day no category for design. I would have to
(29:50):
sign up under housekeeping to have some type of
organizational affiliation with Vacation Rental Management
Association. I've been to the conferences. It's
very challenging to get them to want to talk to us about design. Even though
Air DNA did a year long or some really
long study and showed luxury rentals get
(30:12):
30% higher ROI out of the gate, period, end of story.
And new data is saying if you're elevated rental,
elevated luxury rental, you're thriving. Those of you that didn't keep up
and did grandma's basement, you're dying. That market that's
saturated is now only thriving in the top and dying in the
bottom. We have all the data, but yet it's
(30:34):
still very hard for them to talk to us about design. And
the only reason I've gotten to do a design panel, which I was the one
designer on a panel of other smarter people than
me, is because it was a safety panel. All thanks to
Justin Ford. And my job was to how I made safety look pret pretty.
(30:54):
This blows my mind, but it's not a problem I'm unfamiliar with.
This was part of my job at Airbnb was to
create this tier of homes where the
founders of Airbnb were seeing through their data,
right? The largest, one of the largest platforms for short term
and vacation rental in the world. But they were seeing that
(31:17):
the amount of travelers who were searching through the platform
for beautiful design, the homes that were getting those
bookings, those rentals were much higher and the hosts were making
more money. So I was part of a team who was
developing this sort of new tier of homes which was design
focused. Right. We were going to try to compete with the boutique hotel
(31:40):
industry a little bit. But to create something more than just
regular kind of marketplace which could be open to anyone who's
searching for convenience or price. But. But taking those
two elements out of the search query and making design
one of the leading drivers for the booking was part of
my job. How do I educate hosts on how they can uplevel their
(32:02):
properties to make more money? And that really was the focus
of our second conference or our second summit, which was
design. Design has
to be the drive behind what you do it. It can
affect Safety it can affect. Again, we talked about cleanliness and
accessibility, but ordinary isn't profitable.
(32:25):
And I think that moment was, like, really a big
umbrella for us to bring in all these outside
voices that are talking around design but not acknowledging
it. It's been one of our biggest challenges is to get people to
validate design as part of their investment in
the property and not just put sofas left over from
(32:47):
the street and the worst toilet paper you can find.
Oh, I didn't even. I don't think one ply should exist. I'm just gonna just
say right there. Why would you put something in your property that you wouldn't even
use yourself anyway? That is a whole nother conversation.
You know, Erica, I know we need to circle back to, like, why
we did this, but the ordinary is not profitable. Bowl was
(33:09):
brilliant, so kudos. I think the whole
summit was brilliant. I love our tagline
for Vegas summit, too. Very Vegas. Y
Design is the bet. Every house wins. Did I get
that right? You did. I have to ask. During the
summit, the first one, was there an oh, no moment
(33:32):
during the summit for any of you? Or. Oh, my gosh. Or
is there, like a crazy panic moment that you
remember? Other than Ellen having to write with
Sharpies. The space was
a little bit of a challenge. And so the very long
lunch lines. So content wise. No, I think we did really
(33:54):
great. But I, like, there was just some of the logistics around the food, but
our food was good. What about all the people who showed up? Like the walk
ins. Oh, my gosh. Yeah.
It wasn't an oh, no. That was like a. Oh, this awesome.
Oh, fork. My God,
this is great. My most beautiful moment, and
(34:17):
I have a hard time talking about it without crying, is at the very
end when we stood on the stage and thanked
everybody for supporting this event. Well,
Jess, everybody stood up and gave us a standing
ovation. And everybody was crying. Yeah.
So good. It was incredible. What a moment. I'm getting chills again. I am,
(34:39):
too. Yeah, I know. Because we poured everything
into it. Like, everything. We mentioned Serena. Serena. She was,
like, incapacitated with her back. I mean, everybody was like. She was such
a trooper. Just. We couldn't. We pulled it off and
everybody. And it was seriously after that. I
remember, like, it was the talk of marketing. Yes. And I remember.
(35:01):
So we started on a Wednesday evening. Remember how beautiful
the reception was at Pandora's Manor? Like, the weather couldn't
have been better. I remember going there feeling super sweaty because we've
been, like, working and running all day, but everybody Was there
just looking great. All of our guests were fresh. It was
beautiful. And then we just did it. And we had great volunteers.
(35:24):
And Friday we packed things up and everything. And, like, I remember, I think
four o', clock, like, leaving Congdon Yard, going home, taking a shower,
feeling completely spent and elated, and just walking over to
Kerry and company for, like, their Friday night party. And then it just started.
Everybody was like, we heard about the summit, and
I had no voice. By the next day, I had no voice, and I was
(35:46):
moderating, like, four panels. But that was, to me, like, I felt
so complete and happy. I feel like we
realized designers need community and not just content.
The first summit is that moment, that feeling that you
just shared, Jane, was why I said,
(36:07):
I need a community. I don't want to lose these people that I just spent
days with and love. And
that's how the collective was born, because of that feeling and that
moment and that cheering and applauding. But
to your. I have to share this aha moment, which I think you may
know. But the next. So that was Friday, Jane. You got stuck with a lot
(36:31):
of the packing up that day. And Saturday, I had the
insider tour that we do for High Point with Elizabeth Struggs.
And you're right, it was the talk of market. And we show up that
morning, and Adam Japko came over and
Ashley, and he said, I want to talk to you about your summit. And my
heart was like. And he said, you did something
(36:53):
that everybody said was impossible. You got people to come early
to market, stay, have this experience, and
then kick off market, and you killed it. And
nobody thought this could happen. So congratulations to you guys.
And that was so great for him to say that. Yeah. Because
he produces a ton of events. Yeah. I really respect him. His
(37:16):
opinion. Yeah. I would like to wrap this episode up soon
because we have more to talk about. It's a love fest. I'm sorry.
No, it is. If you could say one thing to
someone, listening in their car or walking their dog
or cooking dinner or whatever you do while you listen to podcasts. Thank you
very much. Maybe they're feeling overwhelmed. Right. With something
(37:38):
coming up in their life. Even if it's not a summit. But
what would it be? What's the kind of courage move you want people
to take away after listening to this episode?
Hmm. I know what I have go. We all
know I'm an impulse person. And so just
(37:58):
do it. Don't be afraid of what people will think or
say. I always go in my mind very quickly, what is the absolute worst
case scenario, if I say this thing or I do this thing and it's never
as bad as I think and I don't really care anymore
if I look dumb or silly. Like, just do it.
Because usually it works out. It's better to
(38:22):
be brave. We only have so much time. So true.
Yeah, Jane. I would say, and this is something I always have
to remind myself like every week is living in the I don't know
is not a good place. If you're scared to ask for something, just ask,
get the know and move on. But if you live in that I don't know,
that's just the no will get you going. The yes will get you jumping,
(38:45):
but I don't know will just keep you feeling like
crap. Yeah. So find out. And
mine's really simple. It's something I say all the time to clients
and to you guys and to, like, family. But
I always ask people, how do you eat an elephant?
One bite at a time. Yeah, that's the only way. I don't eat
(39:07):
elephants. But I love that. It's a beautiful visual to leave
us with, Erica. Thank you. Yummy.
Let's close out. That sounds great. Next time, we're talking about the
rigors of vacation rental design and what makes it different and valuable
and basically why it's taking over the industry. Sounds great.
I'll tune in. We're gonna name names. We're gonna
(39:30):
talk about who's doing it right, who's evolving, and
really what designers need to know. Yeah. Thank
you for joining us. See you next time. Thanks for hanging out with us on
Pretty Smart. If today's conversation gave you something to think about
or made you feel a little more seen, we'd love for you to keep the
momentum going. What's your next step? Register for the Vacation
(39:52):
Rental Design Summit. It's for community, creativity and big ideas.
Meet in person. Check out the link in the show notes or visit
hbxd.org to get your ticket to join us this January
in Vegas. But until next time, stay
inspired, stay connected, and stay pretty smart.
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