When Jeffrey Bierly took over for Laurie McDonald as the Deerfield Inn’s new innkeeper in early October, the career move marked both a new adventure and a return to his old stomping grounds.
Originally from Middletown, Ohio, Bierly, 65, graduated from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 1982, where he played basketball as a shooting guard and studied hospitality and tourism management. While basketball and hotel management may read as interests on distant islands, Bierly said the two are linked.
“My job is really a coach,” Bierly said sitting at a table in the Deerfield Inn. “Just like on a sports team, you have different players who have different skill sets who bring different talents to the table … It’s my job to evaluate the talent and be able to take those individuals, build upon that and then build a strong team … We’re all going in the same direction, we’re all heading for the same goal, and I’ve set clear direction and expectations just like a coach would for a sport.”
After college, Bierly skipped between Sunderland, Easthampton and Northampton while working at the Northampton Hilton Hotel for about seven years where he “cut [his] teeth.”
Bierly moved from Massachusetts to Cromwell, Connecticut, where he worked at a Radisson Hotel and Conference Center and Holiday Inn before moving to Hartford to work at the Crowne Plaza and Homewood Suites. Bierly said household names often checked in at the Radisson, including former President Bill Clinton, former Vice President Al Gore and Robert Kraft, owner, chairman and CEO of the New England Patriots.
“Then, it was time to move out of Connecticut, and I tried my skills in the South,” Bierly said.
After helping run hotels in Georgia and South Carolina, Bierly tried his hand at managing resorts at Cove Haven Resort, a 150-acre couples’ resort in the Pocono Mountains. When he returned to the states seven years later, Bierly managed a Residence Inn and Comfort Inn in State College, Pennsylvania.
Bierly said no two days are the same in hospitality, a mix of customer service, food and beverage service and planning special occasions and other events.
“You get bitten by this bug,” Bierly said. “I just love it, I can’t see myself doing anything but what I’ve done for so many years.”
If there was a hotel brand bingo card, Bierly’s 45 years in hospitality would fill the board. After managing hotels with 50 to 350 rooms, Bierly is back in the Valley near his children and running the 24-room Deerfield Inn.
Bierly said the standards of branded hotels can create a comforting consistency, but this benefit can sour into a downside when even small decisions like changing a shampoo bottle must be run by upper management.
“What I like about the independent properties is the fact that you can create your own standards,” Bierly said. “It allows you to be more nimble on your feet.”
He said this flexibility speeds up responses to economic challenges and guests’ requests and questions.
“You really get to call your own shots,” Bierly explained.
Each stop in Bierly’s career path sold something different to its guests. While hotel chains often sold a soft bed for corporate employees after long days of conferences, the resort sold a social getaway. To Bierly, the Deerfield Inn sells its guests memories.
“People come here with a specific purpose, it’s not as if … ‘Well, I have to be in Cincinnati because that’s where my job takes me,'” Bierly said. “People choose to come here for the historical value of the inn and I feel, as an innkeeper, as a hotel here, we sell a memory. That’s what we do.”
Whether a wedding, dinner at Champney’s Restaurant & Tavern, skii slopes or Historic Deerfield’s “Deerfield After Dark Ghost Walks” color these memories, “You want somebody to walk away with that warm and fuzzy [feeling of], ‘I have a great memory of the Deerfield Inn.’ … so when they walk away, they remember you.”
Bierly said he is still settling in at the inn but has a few ideas in mind. He plans to introduce a new menu at Champney’s to establish signature dishes at the inn and partner with local breweries and wineries for guest experiences, like a bottle of wine packaged with a tour of the boozy businesses. Bierly also wants to continue collaborating with Historic Deerfield.
“You don’t have that in too many places where you can stay at a historic inn that was built in 1884 and walk outside and walk up and down a living, breathing, working Main Street from the 1800s,” Bierly said, referring to houses dating back as far as 1730 lining the streets of the “outdoor museum,” according to Historic Deerfield’s website.
Bierly remembered walks through Historic Deerfield and picnics on Mount Sugarloaf’s peak in Deerfield during his college days and career beginnings in the Pioneer Valley. Driving through the Valley since joining the Deerfield Inn, Bierly recognized other nostalgic spots like Sugarloaf Frostie and Bub’s BBQ in Sunderland and Fitzwilly’s Restaurant in Northampton.
“It’s been one of the best decisions I’ve ever made,” Bierly said. “It feels like coming home.”