Stabilizing Operations Through Leadership and Local Marketing
Riverglen House | Littleton, NH | Sona managed May 2021 – 2023
Set in the White Mountains of Littleton, NH, Riverglen House sits in a region known for skiing, fly fishing, and hiking — a distinctive market that called for a locally-minded approach to leadership and outreach. Riverglen was one of Sona’s earliest management engagements, running from May 2021 to January 2023; Sona has not managed the community since, and this case study reflects that period only, not current conditions or resident life at Riverglen today. The turnaround playbook built here — stabilize leadership first, then build sustainable demand — has shaped how Sona approaches every community since.
The Challenge
When Sona began managing Riverglen House, the community was working through real staffing and leadership gaps that were affecting day-to-day operations and the resident experience. On the sales and marketing side, Riverglen leaned almost entirely on costly third-party referral services to generate leads — a dependence that limited both profitability and the community’s ability to build lasting, organic demand.
The Approach
Sona’s on-site leadership team worked hand-in-hand with Riverglen’s staff, treating the leadership gap as the first problem to solve rather than a footnote to marketing:
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Stabilized leadership on-site. Sona hired new directors to close the staffing gaps and bring consistency back to day-to-day operations — the foundation every other improvement depended on.
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Rebuilt resident life. Stronger, more consistent programming gave residents more reasons to engage with the community and with each other, turning day-to-day experience into the community’s best marketing asset: word-of-mouth.
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Shifted the marketing strategy at its root. Rather than continuing to pay for third-party leads, Sona rebuilt Riverglen’s outreach around organic, direct traffic — reducing reliance on costly referral services and building a more sustainable pipeline.
The Results
Over the course of the engagement, Riverglen House moved from reactive, leadership-gap-driven operations to a more stable footing: consistent on-site leadership, richer resident programming, and a healthier, more cost-effective lead pipeline built on organic outreach rather than paid referrals.
Sona’s management of Riverglen House concluded in January 2023. The engagement remains one of the clearest examples of Sona’s approach to community turnarounds — stabilize leadership first, then build sustainable, lasting demand — a playbook every community in the Sona portfolio has benefited from since.
