{"id":9414,"date":"2015-07-13T11:18:51","date_gmt":"2015-07-13T15:18:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/?p=9414"},"modified":"2015-09-24T14:32:28","modified_gmt":"2015-09-24T18:32:28","slug":"his-first-career-hotelier-in-macedonia-beach-included","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/?p=9414","title":{"rendered":"His first career: Hotelier in Macedonia. Beach included."},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Necovski
Necovski snapped this picture of himself on the beach at his hotel and resort, which sits
on Lake Prespa within the Galichica National Park.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Less than a year after graduating from TCNJ with a degree in international business, Alexander Necovski \u201911, a native New Jerseyan, found himself running a hotel in Macedonia.<\/p>\n

But it wasn\u2019t a complete departure for Necovski, whose parents were born in the Balkan country, and wanted the family to return and start a business. When he and his father visited an aging hotel in the small town of Otesevo, they knew they\u2019d found their investment. They\u2019ve been managing and revitalizing the cozy Lakeview Hotel and Resort for the last three years.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought it was a good chance for a change in my life,\u201d Necovski says of his move to Macedonia. \u201cI saw it as an opportunity to get a different kind of life experience, and I also wanted to see where my parents\u201d\u2014who grew up about 10 miles from the hotel\u2014\u201ccame from.\u201d<\/p>\n

Built in the early 1950s by political prisoners, the hotel needed tender loving care and modernizing when the Necovskis took it over. That meant yanking up weeds and grass on the beach and carting in sand, reinvigorating the summer garden and courtyard, and updating many of the hotel\u2019s 22 rooms.<\/p>\n

Necovski says the work has been difficult\u2014especially early on, when his family struggled to jump through unfamiliar legal hoops to obtain permits for even the smallest renovations. But he says it\u2019s also been an opportunity to challenge himself and put the business theory he learned at TCNJ into practice.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think learning a new culture helps you grow as a person, and lets you take a look back at your life and how you were brought up,\u201d he says. \u201cOne of the most enjoyable things about this job is meeting people from all over. You see how connected the world can be.\u201d<\/p>\n

Macedonia has escaped the economic trouble plaguing its neighbor, Greece, says Necovski. The country\u2019s economy is growing, he says. And, of utmost importance to him, the hotel industry there is going strong.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur business has been improving steadily since year one,\u201d says Necovski. That\u2019s partly due to guest referrals, he says, but also due to a recent push the country\u2019s tourism board has made to position Macedonia as a destination for adventure and active tourism. Says Necovski, \u201cWe\u2019re situated between a lake, a mountain, and two national parks, so that\u2019s been great for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2014Molly Petrilla<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Less than a year after graduating from TCNJ with a degree in international business, Alexander Necovski \u201911, a native New Jerseyan, found himself running a hotel in Macedonia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":63,"featured_media":9364,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,77],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni-corner","category-summer-2015"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/63"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9414"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9414\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}