US Motel Industry Tells Story of Indian-American Immigrants
英语课
Roadside motels are a quintessential feature of Americana dating back to the 1940s and '50s. Even today they are a staple 1 of the American highway landscape. Their story, the subject of a new book, tells an equally American tale: the immigrants life.
The U.S. motel industry, from small independent motels to large economy franchises 3, is now dominated by Indian-Americans, many of whom are gathering 4 in Atlanta, Georgia this week for the annual convention of the Asian American Hotel Owners Association. The convention has enough pull to draw big name speakers such as former President Bill Clinton, former General Electric Chairman Jack 5 Welch and other well-known celebrities 6.
The phenomenon of Indian-American predominance in the motel industry is explored in the new book, Life Behind the Lobby: Indian American Motel Owners and the American Dream, by Pawan Dhingra, a sociology professor at Oberlin College.
“[Indian-Americans] own over half of the motels in the country,” Dhingra said. “But they make up less than one percent of the population, and since most of the hotel owners are from the Indian state of Gujarat, it’s a subset of one percent.”
Dhingra said Indian-Americans didn’t come to the United States with plans to take over the motel industry.
“The first ones referred to themselves as accidental hoteliers,” he said, adding that most, if not all, arrived in the U.S. with no experience in the business.
According to Dhingra, it all started with Indian immigrants who were working in agriculture in northern California. The workers lived in residential 7 hotels, one of which was owned by an Indian immigrant. Others learned the business from him.
Many of the workers found that running a motel was a much better life than working in the fields and scraping by, said Dhingra. And running a motel turned out to be a good match for new immigrants’ skills. They could succeed with some basic maintenance and business knowledge, and didn’t need to be fluent in English. Moreover, said, Dhingra, Indian-Americans are just good at running motels.
“They're very good at cutting costs while providing a quality experience,” he said. “They do a lot of work themselves, have no staff other than family members and they often live at the motel.”
That last fact has been key to the spread of Indian-owned motels and motels.
“The fact that you can live in the motel for free allowed for family members to come from India, learn the business and then go into the business themselves,” Dhingra said.
In the wake of the 1965 Immigration Act, which opened the doors to immigrants from more diverse backgrounds, many more Gujaratis came to the U.S. and went into the motel industry. Gujaratis who had been living in East Africa, where they were often small business owners, also began to make their way to the U.S. and into the motel business.
And they entered the industry at the perfect time. According to Dhingra, the wave of Indian immigration to the U.S. came when a lot of motel owners were looking to sell their motels, often for a good price.
The keys to success today, Dhingra says, are a combination of opportunity, motivation and a large and growing network of fellow Indian-American motel owners
The Asian American Hotel Owners Association, for example, lobbies for the interests of nearly 11,000 members and offers numerous opportunities for them to network and learn best practices from each other. Its members own more than 20,000 hotels, worth approximately $128 billion in property value, according to its website.
For many motel owners, Dhingra says, it’s more than a job.
“They talk about it in the same way as if they’d built their own car - in a really sincere and emotional way,” he said, adding that when he’d walk through a motel with the owners, they would often brag 8 about how they’d done remodeling, new wiring or put in new carpeting.
“It’s not just a business to them; it's a way of life. They may not make a lot of money, but most are able to send their kids to college, provide a living and it's also seen as a property investment.”
The younger generation of Indian-Americans isn’t as enamored with the hotel business as their parents’ generation, but nonetheless, they often choose it as a career path.
“The younger generation, raised in the motel business, will say they have no desire to stay in the business,” Dhingra said. “They see how much their parents work. They go to college, get a degree and work in a white-collar job.”
But, he says, many of them end up deciding they’d rather be self-employed, so they may go back and run a franchise 2.
He then related the story of a young Indian-American who, upon graduating from college, was offered a job at New York’s famous, high-end Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. He turned down the offer so he could run a low-budget franchise motel his family owned.
“His American friends were surprised,” Dhingra said, but his Indian friends understood that he wouldn’t want to go to the Waldorf and be ‘middle management.’ “They really want to be in charge of their own destiny, and small businesses allow that.”
n.主要产物,常用品,主要要素,原料,订书钉,钩环;adj.主要的,重要的;vt.分类
- Tea is the staple crop here.本地产品以茶叶为大宗。
- Potatoes are the staple of their diet.土豆是他们的主要食品。
n.特许,特权,专营权,特许权
- Catering in the schools is run on a franchise basis.学校餐饮服务以特许权经营。
- The United States granted the franchise to women in 1920.美国于1920年给妇女以参政权。
n.(尤指选举议员的)选举权( franchise的名词复数 );参政权;获特许权的商业机构(或服务);(公司授予的)特许经销权v.给…以特许权,出售特许权( franchise的第三人称单数 )
- TV franchises will be auctioned to the highest bidder. 电视特许经营权将拍卖给出价最高的投标人。 来自《简明英汉词典》
- Ford dealerships operated as independent franchises. 福特汽车公司的代销商都是独立的联营商。 来自辞典例句
n.集会,聚会,聚集
- He called on Mr. White to speak at the gathering.他请怀特先生在集会上讲话。
- He is on the wing gathering material for his novels.他正忙于为他的小说收集资料。
n.插座,千斤顶,男人;v.抬起,提醒,扛举;n.(Jake)杰克
- I am looking for the headphone jack.我正在找寻头戴式耳机插孔。
- He lifted the car with a jack to change the flat tyre.他用千斤顶把车顶起来换下瘪轮胎。
n.(尤指娱乐界的)名人( celebrity的名词复数 );名流;名声;名誉
- He only invited A-list celebrities to his parties. 他只邀请头等名流参加他的聚会。
- a TV chat show full of B-list celebrities 由众多二流人物参加的电视访谈节目
adj.提供住宿的;居住的;住宅的
- The mayor inspected the residential section of the city.市长视察了该市的住宅区。
- The residential blocks were integrated with the rest of the college.住宿区与学院其他部分结合在了一起。
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motel