“I’m not really a morning person but I have to be,” said Michael Lawson, summing up his day-to-day duties as the general manager of Olivia’s Bridge Street Inn in New Hope.
Lawson, who also sits on the New Hope Chamber of Commerce, didn’t start out wanting to run a bed and breakfast, but the B&B life kind of chose him.
“I was in the restaurant business for years and years,” he said. “An old friend of mine bought this inn and thought I’d be perfect to run it. It wasn’t necessarily my idea.”
But Lawson quickly grew to enjoy the change of pace and scenery that running such an establishment offered.
“I love it,” he said. “I was in the restaurant business for 25 years. I like this much better. The pace is better. In a restaurant you have two hours max to create the experience from start to finish and, if there are any problems, you have that much time to fix it. Here, it’s more leisurely. I mean, we run around, but the pace is better. It’s a slower pace. You get to meet and spend time with people. In a restaurant you don’t.”
Running a bed and breakfast sounds like a dream job for a lot of people. But Lawson said that, while it is enjoyable, people should know it is a lot of work.
“A lot of people have a dream of owning a bed and breakfast,” he said. “They say, ‘When I retire I’m going to do a bed and breakfast.’ I tell them this is not something you retire and then do. This is something you retire from, because this is actually a lot of work. It’s a lot of fun but it’s a lot of work. This is something I wouldn’t want to be doing when I’m 65. It’s a 24-hour thing.”
While Lawson is not at the property 24 hours a day, he is on call day in and day out.
OLIVIA’S BRIDGE STREET INN EXTERIOR
“Sometimes I get a call at 2 in the morning because someone can’t get in. The door is locked and they forget their code for the door or can’t find something. It’s pretty much a 24-hour commitment,” he said.
That commitment has paid off for Olivia’s Bridge Street Inn, as it was sold out months in advance of this weekend’s New Hope Celebrates Pride festivities.
Lawson said the inn has drawn a loyal following since it opened in 2011.
“We’ve been fortunate in the last four years since we’ve been open to establish a regular clientele,” he said. “Even during Pride, we have the same group of people for the most part coming in. We’re usually pretty busy on the weekends between May and December. Whenever there’s a festival, we fill up. Whenever there’s a wedding, we fill up.”
OLIVIA’S BRIDGE STREET INN LIVING ROOM
With all the repeat business, Lawson said the Inn tries the keep the experience of staying there relatively the same.
“We don’t change too much. I don’t have a restaurant here, so the only meal I serve is breakfast. And I try to keep it the same, but a little different. I don’t serve a crazy full breakfast. I usually have quiche and I change the flavor, or waffles. People kind of like it the same. They keep coming back because they know what they are getting. There are four couples that come the same time of year every year. Some of them are gay. Some of them are not. They just happen to like that particular weekend.”
While bed and breakfasts are gaining in popularity in all corners of the country, picturesque New Hope provides the perfect environment — a country respite that still offers plenty of social opportunities — that the inn looks to embrace.
“There are two kinds of people,” he said. “You have hotel people and you have bed-and-breakfast people. This is kind of social here. You’re close to everybody. There’s a common area of the house. You really get to know people. Hotel people want the anonymity. They don’t want to be near anybody else. They want to keep to themselves. Here, it’s much more social. New Hope lends itself better to bed and breakfasts.”
When Lawson does get some time off to travel, he prefers to stay in bed and breakfasts, not only to relax in a social environment, but also to get ideas of how to improve his own inn.
“You get ideas from other people,” he said. “Somebody is doing something better than I am. I always stay at a bed and breakfast when I go away.”
For more information on Olivia’s Bridge Street Inn, visit www.olivias-bridge-street-inn.com.