Butch Stewart, who founded Sandals the year Adam was born
Adam Stewart, former reservations clerk and now CEO Sandals
Recently in New York, Sandals founder Butch Stewart did something at a podium I’ve never seen before.
He thanked the wait staff. Twice.
That really struck me. After all, here’s a guy who has built a significant hotel empire. I sense he doesn’t travel in coach, or golf on public courses. Yet here he was, going out of his way to thank the servers in a restaurant mid-Manhattan.
It says a lot about the corporate culture at Sandals – and it clearly is a culture. Hoping to learn more about the staff at Sandals and Beaches, I had a phone chat with Wayne Cummings, Director of Business Processes & Administration, Sandals Resorts International in Montego Bay.
Like a ton of Sandals employees, Cummings - a former Sandals resort GM – is terribly proud of the company which is 31 years old and currently has just over 10,000 employees. It’s predicted they’ll surpass the 11,000 mark by year end – “Not bad for a humble Caribbean company,” he says proudly. (To help you put this in perspective, there are about 8,000 Westjetters.)
Most are locals of the island where they work, a combination of sustainability philosophy and the realities of work permits. However, the company is careful to employ international chefs for their themed restaurants (Brits for a pub, Italians for Italian etc.) to ensure the transference of skills to the local people. And, immigration laws permitting, they try to encourage their staff to move around the company to other islands.
“Butlers are big at Sandals,” Butch mentioned over lunch, and now 20% of their rooms offer butler service. All are trained at the Guild of Professional English Butlers who also train butlers for legendary hotels such as Raffles in Singapore and the Peninsula in Hong Kong. “We enjoy pleasantly shocking our clients,” says Cummings, who says they’ll go to great lengths to find out a customer’s likes and dislikes, and have even arranged for a couple’s favourite butler in Exuma to come over and serve them during their holiday in Jamaica.
No employee ever goes straight to work: there’s at least a 2 week ‘Sandalizing’ period where recruits learn about the company and its philosophy. The company has also launched its own Corporate University in Jamaica and mandates ongoing training for all staff.
While turnover is very low, the occasional employee does leave the nest (one was spotted recently working at Toronto’s snazzy new Ritz Carlton Hotel).
One employee unlikely to leave the Sandals fold is Butch Stewart’s son Adam, who is now CEO. He started pitching in during his teens and there is no job within the company he has not done. Throughout the luncheon, he referred to Butch as “my Dad”- reminding us all that behind the technicolour ads, the smoochy couples, the perfect families and the huge machine that is Sandals… it’s a family affair after all.
