How The Claremont turned haunted lore into hotel demand

In this episode of Hotel Moment, Karen Stephens, CMO of Revinate, sits down with Mickey Stout, Director of Marketing at Claremont Resort & Club, to commemorate the podcast's 200th episode. With more than 20 years of experience spanning marketing, PR, brand development, and frontline hotel operations, Mickey brings an insider perspective on driving guest demand for a century-old resort spanning Berkeley and Oakland, California.

Mickey details how the Claremont shifted from keeping paranormal rumors quiet to building high-demand October activations like Witching Hour evening tea and luxury haunted tours. She also breaks down how historic properties can gather authentic stories from long-tenured employees and leverage unified CRM data to extend guest lifetime value across dining, wellness, and membership.

What you'll learn:

● Embracing historical lore: Why moving away from treating ghost stories as taboo allowed the Claremont to build an October program that sells out in six days.

● The influencer FAM model: How hosting targeted creators for an overnight stay generated a 200-person waitlist and drove regional travel from Sacramento and Fresno.

● Lifestyle over room nights: How managing a resort with 276 rooms, three pools, and 70 weekly fitness classes requires marketing an ongoing membership lifestyle.

● Cross-selling through CRM data: Why tracking the guest journey in a CRM prevents hotels from boxing seasonal event attendees into a single category.

● Mining employee memories: How interviewing staff members who have been at the hotel for over 40 years reveals unscripted, bookable historical narratives.

● Strict seasonal boundaries: Why keeping haunted tours exclusively contained to October preserves brand prestige and creates annual booking urgency.

● Packaging F&B activations: How pairing guided resort tours with craft cocktails and evening tea boosts food and beverage spend per guest.

● Social video proof: How capturing authentic, unexpected moments on social clips, like moving carpet indents, fuels organic audience engagement.

Karen and Mickey also discuss the Claremont's origins in 1915 following a high-stakes checkers match in a local bar and ghost encounters reported on ESPN by NBA star Tim Duncan.

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Episode Highlights:

[00:02:35)] A childhood goal comes full circle. Mickey Stout shares her personal connection to the property, having set her sights on the Claremont as a child before returning as Director of Marketing. "I told my mom that one day I was going to work at the 'White Castle on the Hill,' which was the Claremont. I think I was five years old when I first said that."

[00:04:27] A high-stakes wager creates an iconic resort. Mickey details how two investors settled the property's fate following a fire on the original residence. "On a drunken day at a local bar, they were playing checkers and decided they were going to bet the property in a checkers match. So they played checkers, whoever won got full ownership of the property, and he decided he was going to turn it into a resort."

[00:08:32] Catching unexpected evidence on social video. While filming promotional clips during a guided tour, the marketing team noticed something unusual in the final footage. "Sure enough, you see footsteps trailing the tour and you could see like the carpet moving. I think that's the first time I really saw something that kind of gave me the creeps a little bit, but it was kind of cool. Like as a marketer, I was like, 'Whoa, we really caught something that we can put on our socials.'"

[00:11:00] Generating demand through familiarization trips. Hosting local creators and media transformed a single spooky night into a major regional attraction. "Once all the posting started happening, it just blew up. It became this thing where it's like, 'This is something you have to do in the Bay Area.' People were coming from like Sacramento, from Fresno, just to come check out these tours... I think we had a waitlist of 200 by the time the season was over."

[00:16:07] Moving guests out of single booking categories. Effective CRM strategy relies on understanding broader guest interests across the entire property portfolio. "I think having a CRM and finding out what that journey is is very important. A lot of times we might get stuck in like, 'They came here for a haunted tour,' and we check that box, but we don't want to keep them in that box. We want to see what else they're interested in."

Chapters:

00:00 - Intro

00:02:35 - Returning to the White Castle on the Hill

00:04:27 - The 1915 checkers match and resort features

00:06:16 - Famous ghost sightings from Tim Duncan to Mrs. Thornburg

00:09:59 - How an influencer FAM created a six-day sellout

00:14:51 - Marketing resort lifestyle beyond hotel rooms

00:17:09 - Uncovering bookable history through veteran hotel staff

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Previous guests include: Shannon Knapp, CEO of Leading Hotels of the World (LHW), Patrick Norton of Brittain Resorts & Hotels, Shawn Jereb of Montage International, Carlo Del Mistro, Chief Digital Officer of Ennismore, Jason Pirock of Springboard Hospitality, and many more.

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