The room Moore County is still missing

Whiskey Creek already bet big on overnight tourism. Could a 12- to 20-room boutique lodge work in Moore County?

12:37 p.m. Sept. 10, 2026

Editor’s Note: This is the fourth in a five-part series looking at small businesses that could fit Moore County’s size, traffic, workforce, and economy. The idea is not to pitch businesses for the sake of growth, but to look at where money is leaving the county and where a small operator might find room without crowding into a lane that is already full.

DUANE CROSS
MCO Publisher•Editor

By late afternoon, Lynchburg starts giving up cars.

Folks who toured Jack Daniel, walked the Square, bought something to take home, and found a bite to eat point the hood toward someplace farther down the road. Moore County did the hard part by getting them here. Too often, somebody else gets the room money.

That makes a small boutique lodge – perhaps 12 rooms to start, with room to grow toward 20 – one of the more obvious business opportunities in Moore County. Anybody pitching it, though, has to answer the question locals are bound to ask: What about Whiskey Creek?

Chip Hayes saw this same hole years ago. He just went after it with a much bigger shovel.

Whiskey Creek made the larger bet

The Retreat at Whiskey Creek grew from the same basic premise. Lynchburg attracts a lot of visitors and has few places for them to stay.

Moore County approved 79 tiny-home lots across roughly 23.5 acres in 2022. The plan centered on small permanent homes, many of which could enter the short-term rental market. Hayes later sought approval for a 45-space RV park on adjoining property.

So, yes, in one sense Hayes took the overnight-lodging idea and put it on steroids. Whiskey Creek bets that Moore County can turn day-trippers into overnight guests on a scale far beyond a dozen-room inn.

The smaller operator would not need dozens of lots or an entire neighborhood to take shape. One property under one hand is a simpler proposition.

Hayes got there first. He just chose a much bigger way to go about it.

Whiskey Creek changes the math

Nobody considering a lodge here can pretend Whiskey Creek does not exist.

As of the Observer’s August reporting, all but eight of its 79 approved lots had been sold, though only a handful of homes had been built. Hayes said electric and water work in Phase 1 is ongoing, with 32 lots ready for construction.

If Whiskey Creek continues building slowly, Moore County remains short on places to stay. If it eventually fills with tiny homes, enough of those properties could land in the nightly-rental market to matter.

That makes the job harder for a lodge, but not pointless.

Whiskey Creek gives a guest a detached house. A small lodge can offer something simpler: one operator handling reservations, maintaining the property, and answering the phone when the air conditioner quits at 10:30 at night.

The customer may be the same. The stay does not have to be.

Twelve rooms can answer the question

The 2025 community profile counted The Lynchburg Inn with 24 rooms, along with eight bed-and-breakfasts. Jack Daniel attracts roughly 300,000 visitors a year.

Those numbers do not make the case for a 100-room hotel. They make a fair case for finding out whether a dozen good rooms can stay busy. A big hotel has to fill beds on ordinary Tuesdays in February. A pretty annual visitor number will not tuck anybody in on a cold weeknight.

Start with a lodge, an upscale motor court, or a cabin court on a site where a few more rooms could be added later. See what guests will actually pay and how the weekdays hold up. Find out whether enough couples will turn an afternoon in Lynchburg into a weekend.

If the rooms fill, add more. Do not build Phase 2 because it looked good on the architect’s drawing.

Don't try to out-Hampton the Hampton

A small lodge here should not compete with a chain hotel by trying to look like one. Lynchburg has something an interstate exit cannot manufacture: Lynchburg.

The place ought to feel like it belongs here without turning into a whiskey gift shop with pillows. Give people a porch worth sitting on and a good room behind it. Make parking easy. Make the shower work right.

The landscaping should look like Middle Tennessee, and the lobby does not need marble. It needs somebody who knows where to send a couple for supper and can tell them what is worth seeing before they head home tomorrow.

There is no great reason to build a full restaurant into the first phase, either. Sending guests into town is part of the point.

Coffee in the morning and something made locally could be plenty. Let existing businesses sell the biscuits and supper. Maybe that guest wanders back onto the Square before leaving.

The bed keeps him here long enough to spend again.

Jack Daniel cannot be the whole plan

The distillery would drive plenty of bookings, but no sensible operator should depend on tour traffic alone.

Wedding parties need rooms, and so do folks coming home when the family house is already full. There is also a weekend market within driving distance of Lynchburg. A couple can come down Friday, spend Saturday around town, and leave Sunday without burning a vacation day or buying an airline ticket.

Visitor spending in Moore County reached nearly $14.9 million in 2025, but only about $504,000 was attributed to lodging. Moore County knows how to get people here. The harder trick is keeping more of them after the Distillery tour ends and Main Street starts thinning out.

An overnight visitor buys supper, sleeps here, and may grab coffee or walk the Square again before heading home. Those extra hours give local businesses another shot at a customer already standing in Moore County.

That is the value of the room. It buys the county more time with the visitor.

Whiskey Creek is after those same overnight guests. A boutique lodge could go after them with less land and fewer complications.

Ask about sewer before picking out the porch swings

This is where the pretty part of the idea needs to stop until somebody makes a few phone calls. The 2025 MTIDA profile reported sewer treatment use of 250,000 gallons per day, against a capacity of 300,000 gallons.

Nobody should treat those figures as an engineering answer today, but they tell a developer where to start.

Before buying land or paying somebody to draw cabins under string lights, sit down with the Metro Utility Department. Find out what the site can support and how much it will cost to serve. Water and fire-flow needs belong in that conversation, too.

A good lodging idea can die under a bad infrastructure bill, and Whiskey Creek has already given Moore County a long lesson in what happens when development gets ahead of the pipes.

Learn that lesson before picking out the porch swings.

Prove the first dozen

Whiskey Creek matters because Hayes already put serious money behind the belief that Lynchburg needs more overnight lodging. His project does not settle the question for every other operator, but it does mean the next person through the door cannot act as though nobody else saw the opportunity.

The next operator can make a smaller bet: put a dozen rooms under one owner and make sure the sheets are clean, the porch light comes on, and somebody answers when a guest needs help. If those rooms stay busy often enough, add a few more.

Moore County already brings the customer to town. The opportunity is keeping a few more from packing up at 4 o'clock.

Build 12 rooms and prove it. There will be plenty of time for No. 13.

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