Meet Amy Dourson from Red River Gorgeous, a collection of unique cabins, treehouses, and instagram-famous cliff houses in Kentucky’s Red River Gorge. 

Growing up,  Amy wanted to be a doctor.  So, she spent a lot of her time studying as she was determined to go to medical school.

But, after a series of adventurous and serendipitous events, Amy fell in love with carpentry and decided to exchange her dreams of becoming a doctor with a new dream to become a builder. 

When Amy met her husband Aaron, his family owned a few cabins in the Nada Tunnel Road in the heart of the gorge. The business — if you could call it that — was hanging on by little more than a wing and a prayer. 

As Amy saw it, the couple had two options — let the family business run its course or adopt a new vision of building a collection of unique stays that would introduce the world to the geological wonders of the Gorge that she had fallen in love with.

The couple chose the latter. 

Tune in to hear how Amy transformed a side-hustle family business into a thriving hospitality brand, how she’s strategically partnered with folks like Canopy Crew to build one-of-a-kind treehouses, how she’s built the right team to support the company’s growth, and her vision for the future of travel and hospitality.

This episode is brought to you by our friends at Minoan. 

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About the Show

Behind the Stays is brought to you twice a week by Sponstayneous — a free, biweekly newsletter that brings subscribers the best last-minute deals and upcoming steals on Airbnb.  

Behind the Stays is hosted by Zach Busekrus, co-founder of Sponstayneous, you can connect with him on Twitter at @zboozee.