Nearly five months after Long Bay Beach Resort re-launched as a 42-room hotel, the more tightly focused entity is running more smoothly and its finances are in much better shape, its general manager said Tuesday.
“We didn’t know how the market would respond to the smaller product,” said Hugh Robertson, who runs what is now called the Long Bay Beach Club. “We were optimistic, and within four months already numbers are coming in to October 2014 and we can see that we’re already tracking well ahead of last year’s performance. So the feedback from guests and the feedback from tour operators is that, by downsizing, Long Bay hasn’t lost any of its charm.”
Until last year, the 52-acre property operated as a full-service resort that included property management services for 12 privately owned estate homes, 29 privately owned villas, and 36 poolside apartments in addition to a 54-room hotel.
In July, the resort’s owner, the Antigua-based Elite Resorts, decided to restructure, shedding an undisclosed number of staff and exiting a business model “that wasn’t working for us,” Mr. Robertson said Tuesday.
See the Feb. 20, 2014 edition for full coverage.
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