“I am just starting what will be a 12-month program upgrading all our bedlinens,” says Sandra Juez, executive head housekeeper at Finca Cortesin Hotel, Spa & Golf in Andalucia, Spain.
“It is a lengthy process, and it will cost about €60,000 (US$71,000). As well as the 67-key hotel, we have six letting villas, with four bedrooms each. Most of our beds are California king-sized. We have four sets of linen for each bed. One set is in use, one is waiting to be laundered by a local company, one is going through the laundry process, and the fourth set is resting, to help the fibers last longer,” she explained.
Bedlinens are being upped from 300- to 400-thread count, at the request of the resort’s owner and the GM, Rene Zimmer, both of whom believe strongly that investment in quality increases customer satisfaction, and thus room rate and RevPAR.
The new linens will, like the old ones, come from Spain’s oldest textiles factory, Bassols, founded in 1790: Top sheets are embroidered with the hotel’s name and carob-tree logo. The discarded 300-thread items will be sent to local charities (every year, since the resort’s opening in 2008, at least 10% of all linens have had to be discarded, anyway, through wear and tear).
To help run her 36-strong department, which includes maids, valets, cleaners and the laundry, Juez has four assistants, one who recently joined from Four Seasons Marrakech, Morocco. Her room attendants, all female, come from a nearby village and, in an area where youth unemployment is 29%, their jobs are really coveted.
“These girls are young and energetic, which is useful because it is physically hard work; for example, full-length drapes are given thorough vacuuming every six weeks,” says their boss.
They work separate morning and evening shifts. Morning shifts do seven rooms each, working solo. Turning rooms round in takes a minimum 45 minutes, as there is a complete linen change, unless requested otherwise (“it is generally our Scandinavian guests who want to re-use bed linen”). This is a resort where night turndown, from 7 until 10:30 p.m., is still much appreciated.
“Typically, guests have been playing golf, sightseeing or enjoying our beach club, five minutes’ by shuttle, or three pools here at the resort. As the sun goes down they return to their rooms, shower or take a bath, and they do like to have everything tided while they are at dinner,” she explained.
Repeat guests have initialled bathrobes, and special requests are followed. Juez handles stock control for all her department’s branches, placing orders through purchasing. Finance then signs before passing the relevant paperwork to GM Zimmer.
Juez works closely with long-time partner Ecolab (“whenever I have tried another brand it has been a disaster”, she revealed). The hotel has two annual mystery-shopping experiences, one organised by Preferred Hotels & Resorts and one commissioned by her GM.
How did a young lady born in the north of England come join Finca Cortesin in February 2009? “I was never trained in housekeeping – I was a qualified florist – but I had business skills, understood managing people and I think I have common sense,” she said. After her two-year professional floristry course, she married a Spaniard and traveled with him to Madrid, Spain, where they both worked – he as a head waiter, she as florist – at The Westin Palace, Madrid. “Then they eliminated the florist role so I moved over to housekeeping,” she explained, adding that she has always treated any hotel as if it were a private house.