Last month, I accepted an offer to join Wheelhouse.
For the last few months, I’ve been growing closer to the Wheelhouse team – as I both (a) leveraged their platform to manage portfolios, and (b) started creating content with them to help other teams recover from COVID.
A number of you might see my joining Wheelhouse in a sales, content & product role as a surprising move.
Why?
First, I’m a revenue manager, not a sales person.
Second, in my prior role running revenue for StayAlfred, I used to compete against Wheelhouse’s OpCo – Lyric.
Therefore, I wanted to share a bit more about why I am joining Wheelhouse, and why you might want to hop aboard Wheelhouse, as well.
Over the past year, I built a business as an independent Revenue Management consultant.
In doing so, I managed portfolios of various sizes, for both urban and traditional Vacation Rentals, advising & managing portfolios from 50 to 1,000+ listings.
Prior to this, I spent (7 years) as the Head of Revenue Management at Stay Alfred.
Being one of the first 10 employees at Stay Alfred, I was fortunate to participate in the growth of this industry, during one of its most exciting (and volatile) periods of growth & change.
For example, when I first started managing revenue at Stay Alfred, 80% of sales of even urban stays were closed on the phone and all rates had to be manually updated across every channel.
And, this was at a time when one of Airbnb’s major “innovations” was that they automatically posted your advertisements to CRAIGSLIST!
Yes, a lot has changed 🙂, but needless to say, I am more excited than ever about the current state of the industry.
Using Wheelhouse as a Revenue Manager:
During my time as a consultant over the past year I had the opportunity to use Wheelhouse as an end user.
Though Wheelhouse was only on the periphery of my radar during my tenure at Stay Alfred, as a customer I came to believe that they have been quietly developing the most robust & important pricing platform the short-term rental space.
And, after a year of utilizing Wheelhouse’s Professional Dashboard, I was thoroughly impressed.
First, I had the opportunity to manage properties in markets where I had gained extensive experience with Stay Alfred. I quickly was able to validate and trust the rate recommendations produced by the best in class pricing engine.
Second, having access throughout the year to the Pro-Tools beta revealed a platform truly designed for the professional manager. Wheelhouse was finding the balance between scientific accuracy, intuitive UI and accessible granularity that made it the perfect tool for me as a Revenue Manager.
Third, I’ve seen first hand their current pace of development – as they released not only a re-built pro platform, but also release of their Pro-Tools, Market Reports and Competitive Sets… – 3 major releases in under 12 months!
And, as my comfort with the product & team grew, I started collaborating with Andrew Kitchell, the founder of Wheelhouse, on another passion of mine – creating content to help other businesses in our space thrive.
By the end of these collaborations, both Andrew and I were convinced it was time to team up.
Deciding to join Wheelhouse:
When Wheelhouse made me an offer to join the team it ended up being an easy decision for the following reasons:
- Wheelhouse’s Platform and Algorithm are best in Class – I knew this was the case from personal experience and wanted to help other industry professionals experience the benefits of an excellent platform dealing with a complicated subject.
- The Team is both Hungry and Helpful – Having been both Revenue Management experts and operators they understand the importance of excellent support for their customers which enables them to build the best possible platform for clients.
- An Opportunity to Teach AND Learn – I learned a ton over the last cycle of the industry and want to help others, both professionals who survived the pandemic and new entrepreneurs, learn how to tackle a complicated and critical element of their business. By bringing on a team member with the perspective of the end user (and Revenue Manager!) I knew Wheelhouse was committing to producing the best platform and enabling users to benefit from it.
At the end of the day I will always be a Revenue Manager and Data Analyst at heart but I am thoroughly excited to represent such a fantastic product and get to talk to so many great professionals and entrepreneurs about their companies and their stories.
If you are wondering how you can improve your revenue and get a handle on pricing as you scale, please reach out because Wheelhouse has the solution for you.
If you aren’t yet sure or don’t know what you don’t know but you want to talk about Revenue Management and learn more – please reach out and we’ll start a conversation.
I look forward to meeting you, hearing your story and digging into the nitty gritty of Revenue Strategy!
John deRoulet
www.usewheelhouse.com
john.deroulet@usewheelhouse.com
