The MBA of Mamma Mia: What Donna’s B&B Can Teach Us About Marketing

My favourite film isn’t some Oscar-winning film. Nope. It’s Mamma Mia, a chaotic swirl of ABBA hits, questionable paternity, and enough sequins to blind a small nation. As I watched the movie for the 100th time, I noticed a very real business plot: Donna’s struggling bed & breakfast.

Now, you’d think a guesthouse on a sun-soaked Greek island, the birthplace of Aphrodite herself would be booked solid year-round. Instead, Donna’s left fixing leaks and singing to goats. Why? Because good location and a mythological backstory don’t magically equal good marketing. What went wrong? Let’s unpack it.

Location isn’t strategy

The first problem is access. In true Greek-island style, the ferry only comes once a day. If you miss it, you’re stranded. That’s romantic in theory but disastrous in practice. Businesses live and die by distribution, and Donna had none. No airport link, no plan for coordinating guests with the ferry, not even an information sheet telling people how to get there.

One of the worst traveling nightmares is that your flight got delay and your only mean of transportation only comes once every 2 days?!

If your customers feel stressed before they even arrive, they’ll simply go elsewhere. The fix would’ve been simple: arrange ferry bundles, offer a skipper service, or even send a WhatsApp pin with directions and a cold drink on arrival. With limited access, the secret is to own the journey, not ignore it.

Word-of-mouth shouldn't be your only channel

Then there’s Donna’s marketing, or lack of it. She relied on sheer luck, essentially waiting for fate or her daughter’s wedding to bring guests in. That’s not strategy, that’s wishful thinking. In marketing, social proof is currency. Without reviews, you don’t exist. Without a website or even an email list, you’ve got no way of building demand.

Imagine the tourist fleeing to the island after a couple of TikTok went viral

Donna could have started small, hosting a few creators or local journalists in exchange for photos and reviews. Within weeks, she’d have the beginnings of a brand. Instead, she put her faith in word-of-mouth and hoped. It’s the equivalent of starting a startup and waiting for Elon Musk to randomly tweet about you. Nice if it happens, but don’t bet the house on it.

Storytelling matters

Perhaps the most painful oversight, though, is storytelling. Donna is a former rock singer turned single mother living on an island linked to the goddess of love. That’s brand gold d. A place like that should sell itself as “The Goddess Getaway,” not “Donna’s guesthouse.” People don’t book rooms, they book stories.

Done right, the island could have been the next Santorini with tourist flocking to see every rock Aphrodite walked on

Imagine the narrative: live like a goddess, sleep where love was born, wake up to ABBA on vinyl. She had the perfect backdrop for Instagram-worthy moments and packages, sunrise swims, vinyl nights, love-story dinners but she never framed it that way. Without positioning, the guesthouse was just another B&B with a leaky roof.

Don't sell rooms, sell experiences

Even worse, Donna capped her revenue at room bookings. She never thought about a value ladder, upselling experiences, packages, or weddings. And weddings, hilariously, were literally written into the plot! A guesthouse on Aphrodite’s island could have built its entire business model around romance. Cooking classes, destination weddings, goddess-inspired yoga retreats, each would’ve added new revenue streams. But instead, Donna sold beds and nothing else. It’s like running a bakery and refusing to sell coffee.

Would it be a wild idea to create an all women retreat package, think Eat Pray Love for women from all walks of life on the mystical island to heal and find themselves?

Meanwhile, the movie itself is a masterclass in marketing. Mamma Mia! revived ABBA for a new generation, sold the fantasy of the Greek-island escape, and turned midlife romance into a premium box office product. It built desire, told a story, and packaged nostalgia into something irresistible. Donna had the same ingredients, but none of the execution.

If Donna Hired a Gen Z Marketing Intern…

Because let’s be honest, all she really needed was one 22-year-old with a ring light and a pastel aesthetic. Here’s what would’ve happened:

💫 Name: The Goddess Getaway™ (because “Donna’s Bed & Breakfast” is giving… TripAdvisor circa 2003).

📸 Visuals: A soft pink-and-turquoise logo with seashell motifs. Every corner of the guesthouse suddenly becomes an “Instagrammable spot”, hammocks, fairy lights, Aphrodite murals.

🥑 Breakfast: No more toast and jam. Think “Aphrodite’s Açaí Bowl,” oat-milk lattes with latte art hearts, and a €10 surcharge for anything served on a wooden board.

🎶 Experiences: Weekly ABBA-themed silent discos on the beach. Goddess-inspired yoga flows at sunrise. A TikTok series titled “Goats of Kalokairi.”

💍 Weddings: Full rebrand as The Island of Love™. Bridal packages marketed as “Get married where Aphrodite herself rose from the sea.”

Takeaway.

Donna had the raw material for a five-star brand: location, heritage, personality. But without access planning, social proof, storytelling, or diversified revenue, it was destined to flop. The movie may be all about love, but in business, love alone doesn’t keep the lights on.

And as Lay All Your Love On Me plays in my head for the hundredth time, I can’t help but wonder: are we Donna, waiting for guests to stumble across our magic spot or are we ABBA, selling out arenas because we know exactly how to market it?