Santosha, the stylish, family-operated, small-scale self-catering retreat in its serene location in St Andrew overlooking the East Coast has another secret weapon in addition to its awesome ambience.
The property is now being managed by well known hotelier Alvin Jemmott, chairman and CEO of Jemmott Hotel Management Inc.
Jemmott who is known in the hospitality industry for the past 42 years having entered as a waiter back in 1980.
“My first job was as a waiter in a restaurant, that is how I got into the hospitality industry. In 1981 I began my employment at Marriott’s Sam Lord’s Castle where I began my career as a waiter and ended as a Director of Sales and Marketing,” he said.
In 1981, he went on to work at major hotels before becoming the Chairman of the Barbados Tourism Marketing Inc. in 2014 a tenure which he thoroughly enjoyed. However, it was in 2018 that he made the bold decision to start his own company Jemmott Hotel Management Inc. to address some of the deficiencies that he saw over the years in small hotels.
Santosha is one of those small hotels which is part of the Intimate Hotels of Barbados which is celebrating 23 years as a group. The membership association represents the best of the island’s small hotels, apartments, guest houses and villas.
Santosha, the ten-room, self-catering accommodations, now has the benefit of Jemmott’s touch and the comfort of being part of an “intimate” group.
About his business, the career hotelier noted: “We started the company in order to lend assistance to various entities as we thought it was necessary to bring together a group of skills that small operations normally would not have. When we started Jemmott Hotel Management Inc. it was with the view of bringing various disciplines to lend completeness to smaller operations. In 2019, we started our journey here at Santosha and it has been going great since then,” he said.
Jemmott said that COVID-19 was an unprecedented experience for the Santosha, but they made it through.
“Those were some trying times but we made it through as we held firm on our staff engagements so there were no disruptions to the staffing. It was difficult operationally and financially, but we sought to make sure that our staff was not disenfranchised during the pandemic,” he said.
Reflecting on the experience, Jemmott said the staff at Santosha is a part of his family, and he is grateful to have such a stellar team of workers on whom he can depend.
“Santosha has a family atmosphere as they know everyone who is staying here. The staff work closely together, depending on each other for moral support in their day-to-day activities,” he said.
Santosha’s management joined up with the Intimate Hotels of Barbados knowing that there is strength in numbers.
“As a ten-room property we found it necessary to come together with a grouping of like-minded individuals in order to get the impact that we desire. Being a member of Intimate Hotels which caters to properties that are 75 rooms or less was the place for Santosha to be,” Jemmott added. (Write Right PR Services)
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