Business View Caribbean
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The hotel still adheres to environmentally sustainable
principles with its “reduce, reuse, and recycle” policy
and its conscientious efforts to use solar energy tech-
nologies, natural detergents and beauty products, and
locally grown fruits and vegetables.
And yet, Hermitage Bay doesn’t scrimp on luxury. Pris-
tine white linens, ivory cushions, and creamy white
walls soften the rich hues of the wooden floors and
furniture. All rooms have outdoor showers and slatted
louver windows, a flat screen TV and DVD player, Wi-
Fi, ceiling fans, air conditioning, and natural bathing
and skincare products. And the food is superb. “We’ve
always held that the food has to be excellent,” says
Thesen, “because at the price point where we’re sell-
ing, our people are used to eating out regularly at very
good restaurants. So the food is very good. We use as
much locally-grown and organic produce as we can,
and are very proud that we have our own organic kitch-
en garden, onsite.”
But Thesen believes that the strongest differentiator
between Hermitage Bay and other nearby hotels and
resorts is his 100-members staff, who have been in
charge of the hotel’s daily operations ever since The-
sen and his family moved back to England, a few years
ago. “We’ve drawn on the natural Caribbean hospital-
ity and culture of the islands and they’re doing a great
job at looking after guests and providing top job ser-
vice in a very human way,” he says. “To me, it’s really
important that everyone is local. There’s no foreign,
first-worldy, European or North American in there to
run the show. And I think that message is extremely
powerful. And that’s why guests feel that it’s a special
place.”
Initially, many of those early guests came from the
United Kingdom. “We started off very strong in the
U.K.,” Thesen says, “but in the Recession, we swiveled
our sights onto the U.S., because it’s nearer and fairly
easy to get to. So now, the U.S. is number one – it’s the
U.S., the U.K., and Italy.” According to Thesen, the hotel
sustains its 86 percent occupancy rate by reaching out
to potential guests in a wide variety of ways. “The main
one would be tour operators,” he notes. “And we deal
directly with larger travel agencies in the U.S. We work
on our online presence; we invest quite a lot in search
engine optimization; we’re doing quite a lot of pay-for-
click work now; and our rates are available on Google,
Trip Advisor, Kayak, Trivago – all the meta-sites. We’re
on the cutting edge of what hotels are doing in the
online space.”
Thesen says that even though he is planning to add
