Lifestyle businesses: Insights into Blackpool's hotel sector

The vast majority of firms in the sector are micro-businesses employing 10 or fewer staff. Indeed many are so small as to employ no permanent staff at all. Those running these businesses are not classical entrepreneurs driven by a need to maximise profits and build a business empire. Many are best described as lifestyle entrepreneurs, their key motives are more associated with improving their quality of life. This paper reports on the owners of a significant sample of Blackpool hotels. The majority have sold a domestic property to buy the hotel. Few have any prior hotel experience, or small business experience, for that matter. The linkage between commercial and domestic provision of meals and accommodation convinced many of these interviewees that they had the skill sets required for hotel ownership and management. The paper also confirms earlier findings that a subtantial minority withdraw from the hotel business in their first year. The lack of training in the business aspects of the hotel operation has serious implications for the quality of hotel operations in places like Blackpool, because a significant segment of hotel stock is being managed by these lifestyle entrepreneurs who are not primarily concerned with commercial objectives which prioritise service quality as a way of generating profits and growth.