Mini Tourism Indaba

Narda and Karen left on the 7th of July. Narda flew back to Holland and Karen went back to Johannesburg to continue developing business. We made a very nice deal with her. Soon you can read all about it on our website.

Talk about business: We collected our business cards and they look very nice! We thought they would come in one big package, but the company put them in nice card boxes. Perfect to store 1 in the car, 1 in my bag, 1 in the office etc. We had a meeting with our neighbouring lodge to talk about changing the signs and we are waiting for a quote now. We hope that within a few weeks the name Eagle’s Nest will be gone and everybody will spot the new kid in town “ Kurhula Lodge”.

On the 14th and 15th July 2009 Phalaborwa was the proud host of 30 of the most influential decision makers in the Tour Operators Industry. We saw the add in the local newspaper and Sander phoned the contact person to find out if it was interesting for us as well. He told her that we are still renovating, but she invited us to come and do some networking. The next day we drove to Phalaborwa with a bunch of business cards, not knowing what to expect. It turned out that each tourism product owner was given a 5 minute opportunity to market their establishment /activity /restaurant etc. to them face-to-face for free. This was a unique opportunity. The only other time that you would be able to do such direct marketing to such influential marketeers is annually at the Indaba in Durban or the Holiday fair in Utrecht.

We listened to all the presentations and afterwards chatted with several people exchanging business cards. We met other Dutch people (it turned out there are many living in Phalaborwa) and made the agreement to see each other soon for a nice braai. We were a little bit disappointed that we did not decided to speak for 5 minutes (we thought we would not be interested enough at this moment) but faith helped us a little bit. Sander had the possibility to speak to a lady of the SA star rating and she encouraged him to come back the 15th and speak for 5 minutes.

So we drove home and made a little presentation. Early next morning it was back in the car heading for Phalaborwa again. We were the last ones on the list and they did not know for sure if there was time to let us speak. Well we kept the fingers crossed and waited. And all of a sudden we heard: Next speaker “Kurhula Wildlife Lodge”. That’s us, ehm, ejjh, where is my speech???? Ehmm little panic! Now I had to face all these people, the moment of truth. With wobbly knees I did my presentation and even had the guts to put some jokes in my story, and they liked them. Afterwards I got some very nice commends and was proud of myself. Kurhula Lodge had a couple of minutes of fame :)

From chatting to nice people back to the hard hand work in the lodge. Yes, still sanding and painting. We have another 25 windows, a couple of sliding doors and a swimming pool deck to go. The roof is finished and it looks great. They cut several branches and removed the beautiful pink Bougainville in front of our house. There were so many dead branches that there was no other option, but it will grow again next year! The thatch guys did a good job, because they are offered to do the roof of Balule River Camp and other neighbours as well. Aubrey and Mike are working on rooms 3 and 4 doing the plumbing and then they will fix the water supply in the staff quarters. Hope that al the rough building will be finished end of next week.

Talk to you soon again!