BY LEE ZIMMERMAN
MOVERS & SHAKERS
MARK OLDHAM
6 | BLOUNT COUNTY QUARTERLY • FALL 2025
Successful business people often reap their rewards by taking advantage of opportunities and, when necessary, taking chances. Mark Oldham, CEO of OldhamHospitality. com, knows that all too well. As owner and operator of several profitable properties in Blount County, and Townsend and Maryville in particular-- Dancing Bear Lodge, the Appalachian Bistro, Apple Valley Country Store & Café, Dancing Bean Coffee House, Smoky Mountain Outdoor Center, Peaceful Side Social, and Peaceful Side Brewery-- both his instincts and ability have clearly paid off.
Oldham, a former resident of Nashville and graduate of the University of Tennessee Knoxville, grew his career in the hospitality industry. He founded U. S. Hospitality, which was one of the country’ s largest publishers of guest directories, serving more than 2,000 hotels in the U. S., Canada and the Caribbean. As print ad sales peaked, the company ventured into hotel lobby business centers and kiosks. That in turn led to a merger and the formation of a new company called Uniguest, which Oldham subsequently sold to a private equity firm in December 2013.
Oldham and his wife, Sharon, then took a six-month hiatus, which they spent traveling and thinking about what they wanted to do next.
“ I’ m kind of like a serial entrepreneur,” Oldham said in retrospect.“ I don’ t consider myself a restaurateur, even though we have restaurants here in Blount County. We have been small business people our entire lives. We figured we were too young to retire, but too old to go back and do what we had just done. We were ready to slow down a little bit. So the idea was to buy a little lodge somewhere. We didn’ t know where … it could have been North Carolina, it could have been Colorado, but then we saw this ad in the summer of 2014 on a