Welcome to the latest edition of our “Meet The Experts” interview series on Inhaven’s blog, “In The Know.” In this exciting installment, we speak with Inhaven’s Head of Analytics, Katrin LeStrange. She has an impressive background, including a tenure at Tiffany & Co. She holds a degree in Economics from Harvard and has a passion for data-driven decision-making. Katrin brings a wealth of experience and insights to our conversation. Join us as we delve into her journey, her role at Inhaven, and her vision for the future of the vacation rental industry.

MIMI: Good morning, Katrin! Thanks for making time for us today. I’m excited for your contribution to our “Meet The Experts” series, especially since you’re such an integral member of the Inhaven team.

KATRIN: Of course! It’s good to be here.

MIMI: This is our second interview for “Meet The Experts.” I think we have some great questions lined up for you today. Shall we get started?

KATRIN: Sure!

MIMI: First, can you tell us how you got involved with Ashley and found yourself in her circle? A quick peek at your LinkedIn profile showed me that you have some experience working with Tiffany and Co. I thought there was a connection there.

KATRIN: Correct, yes. Ashley and I go way back. We spent a solid number of years at Tiffany together in various roles within the Merchandising team. So we essentially grew up together professionally and also got to see different parts of our personal lives mature.

We were either on the same team or partnering very closely throughout our time at Tiffany on all things Merchandising. Whether it was forecasts or talking through strategies when she was in her regional roles, we were always pretty much intertwined throughout. We both actually left Tiffany around the same time, she to go to Home Depot, the company store, and then me to go to Casper.

So that's when we both joined this home furnishings world.

MIMI: How did you two reconnect?

KATRIN: Ashley was building Inhaven. We had a couple of conversations. She introduced me to some people within her network. At that time, I had been working closely with another fellow Tiffany mentor that Ashley and I worked with, and that person was encouraging me to throw my hat into the consulting world.

They encouraged me to take some time and just work on some projects, and reconnect with some people. I ultimately ended up reconnecting with Ashley, who had some fun projects at hand for Inhaven and then joined the team a few months later.

MIMI: You have a very impressive professional background—you were Harvard–educated in Economics, and have a graduate degree from the Gemological Institute of America.

KATRIN: I actually just got my graduate gemologist degree there. I took an accredited jewelry professionals course and then several stone courses. As part of the capstone project, we were given a set number of stones, and we had to correctly identify them using either a loupe or a microscope, taking into consideration the light while looking at the different qualities of the gemstone. At the end of that process, you become a graduate gemologist. So that was part of the Tiffany journey.

MIMI: You know, as part of these “Meet The Experts” interviews, we like to ask a recurring question to help contextualize the impact Inhaven has had on the Vacation Rental Industry. How has working with Inhaven changed what you value when booking a vacation rental listing?

KATRIN: I now pay close attention to the list of amenities that I expect to see during my stay. For example, I recently went to Asheville, NC, and stayed in a vacation rental. I immediately checked to see if the dishes matched, the glasses matched, and if we had full sets of things in the kitchen. Now I’m really thoughtful about linen and towel quality. I also notice if they have makeup washcloths - such a great touch.

So, really, it's the standardization and quality of everything, which I know is our mission and vision. Every vacation rental should have that - it makes it so much easier for the property managers and the guests.

MIMI: So you're seeing it as a non-negotiable at this point?

KATRIN: Correct, yes.

MIMI: Can you give us a few words about Inhaven's drive to standardize and professionalize the vacation rental experience from a B2B perspective?

KATRIN: From a B2B perspective, it's driving efficiency, making people's lives easier, making the lives of property managers easier, and making the lives of vendors easier because we are expanding their operational limits and creating a seamless experience.

I mean, what really stands out to me is the quality tiers as well.

It's about being able to bring some classic Merchandising strategies into a world that didn't necessarily have them before, and it simplifies things both for the customer and for the businesses that work with us.

That ease saves a lot of time for people, and it creates a lot of comfort for our clients. So, I see in the future that our Inhaven customers will be able to select homes based on what they like and know what to expect. And I think there's a level of that guarantee, and knowing that you don't have to stress about that on your vacation or wherever you're going that is huge as well.

MIMI: It sounds like the subtext of what you’re saying is that the vacation rental industry is catching up with hotels in the hospitality industry, and that's a good thing.

KATRIN: Yes. I know we use the Westin Heavenly Bed quite a bit as an example. That personally meant a lot to me way back when they first introduced it. I remember thinking, “I need to buy this, and I need to buy it now.” I did not necessarily have the means at that point in my professional path to purchase it. I looked at the price and said: “No, thank you.”

But I was thinking to myself, it would be pretty amazing if you could get that kind of quality at a vacation rental. If that price point is out of reach, you have other options–it's shopped similarly.

So it's also a very personal example for me.

MIMI: You’re, of course, talking about the Inhaven Quality Checklists. Can you tell us a little bit about what you do for Inhaven?

KATRIN: Yeah, so analytics is obviously a very broad term. I cover everything from working with our tech team, etc. to data cleanup. It's a little bit of data science there, making sure that the information we're getting from our systems is something we can easily use and think through going forward. In my day-to-day work, I’m thinking about data architectures and categorizations, working closely with merchandising, and ensuring we have information in a usable format.

MIMI: Were you always as interested in data? What was your journey to get to this place in your career?

KATRIN: I've been asked this quite a bit in the last year and I would say I attribute it to being a pianist growing up. Music has always been a huge part of my life. I attended Manhattan School of Music on Saturdays until high school. I did not end up studying music in college, but I was thinking about it. I ended up doing chamber music and just keeping the piano alive in my life. It is still something I do today.

Music is such a left-and-right-brain thing. A lot of musicians tend to be very proficient with math because it involves patterns, problem-solving, and bringing things together. That's why I'm drawn to Excel spreadsheets and formulas and making things work really well together.

It's akin to creating something, like trying to take a million cells in a spreadsheet and turn them into something that makes a point.

MIMI: Can you give us more details about your daily responsibilities?

KATRIN: For us, the customer always comes first. The reason to come to us is not just efficiency and streamlining, it's also because we're giving you good pricing as well. So, a lot of my job is making sure that mission stays true.

Another way to describe my job is that it's a lot of really giant Excel spreadsheets and lots of coding things to tie them together so that we can easily see how we're doing as a company and if there are any opportunities to innovate or iterate.

MIMI: That’s very impressive. Can you tell us about a few industry trends that you’ve begun to notice from your vantage as Head of Analytics at Inhaven?

KATRIN: You know, I'm hearing a lot more about quality and tiering. It's happening across the landscape, but it does feel like Inhaven is being mentioned quite a bit more, as well as the whole concept of standardization. I don't recall it being mentioned as much even a year and a half ago when I first started. It didn't come up quite as often. I went to a few industry conferences, and that was not the main topic of conversation.

MIMI: I’ve noticed that myself. There seems to be a drive to standardize accessibility, as is the case with Lorraine Woodward and Becoming rentABLE, and safety with Eric Thibodeaux through SaferVRs.

KATRIN: Yes!

MIMI: And then yes, Inhaven, obviously, and it feels like there's a fork in the road for vacation rental industries. There's the unique Fresh Prince of Bel-Air listing, and then there's the “I just wanna make sure that I don't hate the experience I just paid for” market.

KATRIN: Yeah, that's true for sure. I think that's totally accurate.

MIMI: So what do you think drives that? What do you think is at the heart of that movement toward standardization?

KATRIN: In my mind, and this might just be anecdotal, drawing on my own experience, I've had enough poor experiences now with properties that were pretty highly rated…so much so that I really think twice before going the vacation rental path.

For example, even on this Asheville trip I just took for my cousin's wedding, we were doing a vacation rental, and I had a moment where I thought we should just do a hotel because I have my kids with me and I wanted to be sure of what we were walking into and that we would have everything we needed.

If the location, house or amenities aren’t what they seem…it's just…too much of a gamble. I do everything I can in advance, like checking Google Maps, looking at the photos of the surrounding area, looking at every single photo on the listing, and trying to read the reviews, but sometimes it’s not enough.

That's just my experience, but in talking to a lot of my friends, they’ve experienced the exact same thing. I've had friends have to leave a stay and book a hotel because it wasn't what the listing advertised, or things were missing, or the bed was super uncomfortable.

A high percentage of people in my life (including myself) have experienced this issue. It makes me think that percentage applies to the much broader population and is pushing that kind of fork in the road for the industry.

MIMI: Yeah, something like 80% of reviews left on Airbnb are 5-star ratings, so from a customer’s perspective, what are you supposed to do with that? How do you distinguish meaningfully between a great listing and a potentially horrible experience? Do you feel that the impetus to move towards standardization and professionalization from a property management perspective is in response to customer needs and views?

KATRIN: Yes, and I would also add that the boom in short-term vacation rental popularity happened during the Pandemic, with many people escaping their apartments during COVID-19 to go somewhere else.

And I think the willingness to accept subpar standards was higher because of what was going on from a macro perspective. And it's almost as if now that we're back to a relatively normal way of life, priorities have changed a little bit.

People are no longer saying, “I need to get out of my apartment because I want more space and I want to be able to feel safe with my family now.”

Now they’re more likely to be thinking, “I want to relax. I want to be comfortable.” They’re no longer feeling as though they have to run away from their apartment anymore. So, I think the macro environment has allowed us to focus on standardization more as well.

MIMI: When we talk about the people in the Vacation Rental community who are really interested in standardization, one of the things that strikes me is that they feel that their small part of the standardization movement is motivated primarily by values. Recently, The Art of Hospitality Podcast hosts mentioned that Airbnb seems to be very profit-motivated, whereas people like Eric Thibodeaux see safety as a core value of his property management business, and Lorraine Woodward sees accessibility as a core value of her business. Do you see the movement towards standardization and professionalization as profit- or value-driven?

KATRIN: I mean, it's a mix. Customers’ needs have changed, and they're getting more specific about what they want. The review system for a large portion of the vacation rental industry doesn’t help customers find the specific elements for which they’re looking. In response, customers will likely start looking for keywords that help them find the things that are most important to them. Safety, personally, is something I hadn't really thought about too much until I started going to these vacation rental conferences and really learned about some of the bad things that can happen. It’s important to consider what can happen if the home isn't set up properly. So it's typically both.

MIMI: That makes a lot of sense.

Katrin, it's always enlightening to chat with you. Thank you for sharing your perspective and vision with us today. Your passion for enhancing our industry is truly inspiring.

KATRIN: Thank you for having me, Mimi. It's great to discuss these topics with someone who understands the nuances of what we do at Inhaven. I’m looking forward to seeing how our efforts continue to evolve and impact the market.

MIMI: Absolutely, I'm right there with you. Here's to pushing boundaries and setting new standards together!

KATRIN: Cheers to that, Mimi!

Thank you for joining us for this insightful conversation with Katrin in our "Meet The Experts" series. Keep an eye on our "In The Know" blog for more interviews like this, where we'll continue to uncover the stories and expertise of the people who make Inhaven a leader in vacation rental innovations. Don't miss out on the opportunity to gain behind-the-scenes knowledge and tips from our team of experts. Stay tuned, and discover how Inhaven is shaping the future of travel and hospitality—one expert at a time.