How to set up and run a successful chambres d’hotes in France
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If you have a big house in a charming surroundings with some empty bedrooms, it might be interesting for you to turn your house into a lovely B&B or “chambre d’hotes” in French.
However, it is important to not mix up Gite and chambre d’hotes: a gite is a self-catering holiday home whereas a chambre d’hotes is no more than a bed with breakfast included, with the owner living on site. Moreover, if you decide to provide more than 5 bedrooms your property would be classed as a hotel. The next step before starting your own business is to define what kind of business you are intending to run and what income you are expecting to make: will it be your main activity or just a supplement to your main occupation?
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Nevertheless, chambres d’hotes have a great reputation in France that you’ll have to maintain, and you will have to fulfil some conditions such as: delivering breakfast every morning and keeping the house clean (including towels and bed linen) at all times. Lunch and dinner are usually not included though some chambres d’hotes do offer it, they’re called “table d’hotes”. However these properties cannot use the designation “restaurant” in their advertisement because they can only serve the guest.
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In France, there are two types of chambres d’hotes:
– “professional”
-“non-professional”
A non-professional chambre d’hote implies that you make less than 50% of your income through this business. If you exceed this limit, your activity will be considered as professional. Running the latter is slightly different from the non-professional one as you will have to register your business to the local “chambre de commerce” and your tax declaration will be modified.
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As it is quite complicated to implement, rest assured that the local tourist office will help you with all the formalities and you can use them to advertise your property.
It is indeed more advantageous to offer several bedrooms as it will increase the profitability of your business. You can also increase it by improving the decoration because the more luxurious the surroundings are, the more you can charge. This guest house in South of France near les Sables d’Olonnes for example has every chance of attracting tourist thanks to its charm and character. Moreover, the more assets you can provide (pool, garden), the more clients you will receive and the more they will pay. This chambre d’hote with pool thus also has every chance of being full throughout the year.
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Running a chambre d’hotes implies doing some marketing, with character, smartly decorated houses that are well advertised always attracts new tourists even in out of season periods. And since a picture is worth a hundred words, you will have to make sure the pictures you provide for advertising really show it off to its best advantage.
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Furthermore, it is important to facilitate every step for the potential customer; it is wise for example to have a well structured website that’s easy to navigate, with small easy to read paragraphs : it definitely improves your chances of attracting new customers.