Garden Route luxury accommodation

We live in one of the world’s most beautiful areas, but are surrounded by communities who live in various degrees of poverty, much of which is the result of Apartheid and colonialism. The owners of the lodge made a conscious decision on building the lodge to source all their staff from within our area – which in this case is The Crags, Plettenberg Bay. By sourcing, training and sustaining a local workforce has the effect of stabilising family structures within the community as members have secure well paid work. This then has a knock on effect as people within the communities can see they too can progress economically, socially etc.

Our staff has a rigorous in-house training programme to ensure the lodge maintains internationally required standards, and in fact exceeds them. Alongside the in-house programme the staff are sent on accredited courses in the various sectors of the hospitality industry. This is an on-going programme - eg cooking courses, first aid courses, management, administrative & front of house skills, basic hygiene, educationals to other establishments to find out how other operations work, etc. We have also sent over four members of staff to the UK, in order to broaden their horizons. Most of our staff have been with us for many years and have worked from the bottom of the ladder up. Their position in their communities cannot be over-emphasized.

FTTSA – Fair Trade in Tourism South Africa
On the 14th of July 2005 we became the 13th property in South Africa to become Fair Trade in Tourism accredited. FTTSA encourages and publicises fair and responsible business practices through its independent & highly recognizable trademark symbol of fairness in the tourism industry. There are stringent criteria (in-depth forms, self assessment followed up by independent assessments), specifically looking into fair wages and working conditions, fair operations, purchasing and distribution of benefits, ethical business practice and respect for human rights, culture and the environment.

The Wilderness Foundation: Green Leaf Accreditation
This year, 10 May 2008, we received the Wilderness Foundation Green Leaf accreditation. We were one of the first six properties in South Africa to be accredited by the Foundation whose entry mark is a minimum of 75%. The Wilderness Foundation is a South African conservation and environmental non-profit organization, who, in partnership with Vuselela Management Services (a tourism development company), designed an independent environmental tool whereby accommodation establishments can measure their environmental footprint thereby enabling us to reduce the effects of environmental consumption and to yearly improve our environmental management & awareness skills. When assessing the establishment it looks at five elements: water, energy, waste, product and innovation. Each category is ‘measured’ or ‘weighed’ and totaled for the year, then a target for improvement is set for the following year’s independent audit & assessment.

The property was bought fifteen years ago and was at the time a wattle plantation – an alien species which has swiftly strangled the natural vegetation of the Western Cape. The de-wattlefication of the area is an ongoing process. And the progress has been enormous. The results being the indigenous forest is reasserting itself and climbing back up the gorge. During the rezoning process – changing from agricultural to resort – we chose to become a Private Nature Reserve, instead of a resort zone 2, so there would be a long-term protection mechanism over the indigenous forest which makes up 80% of our property.

The sewerage system uses specific eco-friendly enzymes, which breaks down bacterial build up. These products are also used in our kitchen area, which operate on the same principle as the enzymes in the septic system. We are presently upgrading this system to a sannitree super-sewer system, which utilises a reedbed to purify the sewerage waste and make it reusable for gardening purposes.

We help sponsor a project with Ocean Blue Adventures (OBA) called ORCA – Ocean Research Conservation Africa – a scientific boat, which looks at ways to mother our oceans while still being pro-active in the community. We send our guests out with the OBA in order to increase our guest's awareness of the importance of protecting the oceans. A portion of their fee goes to community upliftment projects.

We also sponsor:

National Sea Rescue Institute

Kurland School Project – a school for underprivileged children in the Kurland community.

Masazame Street Children Shelter – a shelter for homeless children.

Sponsor a local township band with their equipment – they are now cutting their first CD.

AIDS awareness talks on an informal and formal basis are done regularly in-house.