KEES Vacations
Flex Your OBX Stay
Ask Jeremy Grogg where the best place to vacation is, and you’ll get a three-letter answer: O-B-X. Since 2008, Jeremy has served as CEO of KEES Vacations, one of the top-rated vacation rental companies on the Outer Banks, the 100-mile strand of barrier islands along the North Carolina coastline that attracts more than five million visitors a year.
Under Jeremy’s direction, KEES has grown from managing a handful of condos to managing close to 400 properties from Corolla to Hatteras, ranging in size from a studio unit to a sprawling 24-bedroom oceanfront estate. Not bad for a kid from Shenandoah Valley who got his start in the hospitality industry shuffling between two jobs.
“My freshman and sophomore years of college, I worked the front desk at the Econo Lodge five days a week and at the Motel 6 two nights a week,” recalls Jeremy, who grew up in Harrisonburg, VA, and studied economics and business administration at nearby Bridgewater College. “Then, junior year I took a job as front office manager at Massanutten Resort, about 30 minutes away.”
The 6,000-acre Massanutten Resort has secured its spot as one of the premier all-season mountain resort destinations on the East Coast. Jeremy discovered it was a great place to meet his business mentor and his future wife. Today, he and Melanie live in Poquoson with their four daughters, ages 16 (twins), 14 and 10.
“The section of Massanutten that I was working for was managed by a Newport News company called Victor Management that had hotels all around,” explains Jeremy. “During senior year, my regional director, Dale Goodman, asked me what I was going to do after graduation. I said, ‘I want to be YOU one day!’”
Apparently, that was a good answer, as Jeremy was invited to Newport News to tour the office and a new hotel. He was quickly offered the job of general manager. Over the years, he gained experience managing hotels in bigger markets. “I kind of bounced around wherever they needed me – Houston, Chicago – I did that for five years,” recalls Jeremy. From there, he ended up back in Newport News as operations director for some resorts and condominiums. “One of those condo associations was on the Outer Banks, and that’s when KEES Vacations was born,” Jeremy adds.
Today, KEES has offices in Newport News; Point Harbor, NC; and a satellite office in Hatteras Village. They employ 65 people year-round and double that number of employees in the summer months. KEES is credited with introducing FlexStay™ to the OBX, a flexible vacation rental model that allows guests to check-in on the day of their choice and customize their length of stay without being tied down to a seven-day vacation that starts and ends on a Saturday or Sunday.
Jeremy Gross, CEO of KEES Vacations, has grown the company to manage hundreds of properties like SOCO in Nags Head (shown above)
Back in 2015, almost everything was exclusively a seven-night rental – Saturday to Saturday. The FlexStay™ program gives a guest the ability to rent a nine-bedroom oceanfront house, but if they want to check in on Tuesday and stay for just five nights, they can do that,” explains Jeremy.
Becky Pack-Bowen, commercial banker, has worked with Jeremy since the company moved to TowneBank in 2014. “I have been fortunate to bank Jeremy and his partners for many years to include several other businesses that they own,” says Becky. “Early on, KEES recognized an opportunity to become a premiere source for booking stays at timeshares, vacation rental properties, resorts, condos and villas. They gained success with a slightly different business model than most of their competitors, allowing for partial bookings and weekday arrivals. Not only do they provide quality accommodations and focus on communication with their guests, they also surround themselves with hard-working, dedicated employees.”
“We manage hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of real estate, and TowneBank has been instrumental in helping us and our affiliate companies with that, whether it’s trust accounting or financing options,” says Jeremy. “This may sound odd, but I think the best compliment I can give Becky and Towne is that I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about banking. It’s behind the scenes and it just works. When I need something, it’s done. That’s the best thing ever. With all of the things I do need to worry about in this business, banking isn’t one of them.”
For more information, visit KEESOuterBanks.com.