CHAIRMAN of the Barbados Hotel and Tourism Association, Roseanne Myers, has challenged repeat visitors to Barbados to consider giving some of their holiday time to volunteerism.
Addressing returning guests of Sandals Resorts on Tuesday night, she made reference to this developing tourism niche and encouraged the scores of loyal Sandals customers to give back by volunteering at least an hour of their time during their visit.
Sapphire, emerald and diamond awards were presented to scores of customers who patronised hotels in the chain, during a lavish open-air buffet dinner and show at the recently opened Sandals Royal Barbados Resort. The awards were in recognition of hotel stays between25 and 100 nights.
It was the 25th annual Reunion Week, which was celebrated at all Sandals properties over the Easter weekend.
The dinner was a highlight of the activities which included an excursion. This year the Barbados event was jointly hosted by Sandals Barbados and Sandals Royal Barbados, which together employ1 200 people.
Thanks guests
Myers joined general manager of the two Christ church hotels, Ferry Zievinger, in thanking guests for their patronage. She also appealed to the repeat visitors to continue to support Barbados’ tourism as the island continued working on the problems with which it was currently confronted.
“We are absolutely a piece of paradise, but we are not perfect,” Myers said. “We have many things that together we know we have to work on.”
But she expressed confidence it could be done. Telling the Sandals guests they were “fantastic customers”, the BHTA chairman said: “We feel that we are committed and Barbados is proud of the fact that we operate as a Social Partnership between the private sector, the Government and the unions. We feel very passionate that is the only way for us to survive.
“That partnership helps us to chart the way in terms of what we want to be in another 60 years as a tourism destination,” she added.(GC)
