Innovating for Success in Tourism - Belize's Chaa Creek Case Study
Angela Wu: Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to the second session of our final course in the Belize Tourism Futures series, Building Resilient Branding and Community Collaboration. Today's topic is Innovating for Success in Tourism. My name is Angela from Belizing. com and I will be your host for today's session.
As you know, The Belize Tourism Futures series aims to transform the tourism industry by fostering innovation and sustainability. This initiative, inspired by Lorenzo's dedication to Belize's economic growth, is supported by the Emergent Ventures Grant from the George Mason University's Mercatus Center in collaboration with Belizing. com and The Lodge at Chaa Creek. Today we welcome back Christy and Orion from The Lodge at Chaa Creek's marketing team.
They previously presented on sustainability and conservation in August, so it's great to have them back to present on innovating for success in tourism using The Lodge at Chaa Creek as a case study. Before we begin, I'd like to cover some housekeeping notes. There is a chat box available for comments or questions. We will address all Questions at the end of the presentation during the Q& A session. If you'd like to use your camera or your mic during the Q& A, please send a request by hovering over the mic icon at the bottom of your screen on a laptop or a desktop. You could also tap the mic icon at the top right corner of your mobile device to do so.
I will hand it over to Christy and Orion for today's session. Christy Valdez: Hi everybody, it's a bright sunny day in San Ignacio, although we're awaiting a little bit of cold according to the weather forecast, but thankfully we're all dry. Everything is good with us. So my name is Christy, and as Angela shared, myself and Orion will be presenting. Alright, so our presentation is Innovating for Success in Tourism, which comes along part of the initiative started by Lorenzo.
Okay, so it's presented by Chaa Creek's marketing team, which is headed by Ms. Fleming. She is one of the co founders and owners of the property.
She has led Chaa Creek's marketing team since the beginning, myself, Christy Valdez. Currently, I am the Marketing Coordinator and by career, I am a Social Anthropologist. I studied in the in Chetumal at La Universidad de Quintana Roo. And I majored in Identity when it comes to Mayans in the 20th century, which is kind of interesting.
Then we have Orion, which is right beside me. He is Currently the marketing assistant, but he does much more than that, he's a great photographer and videographer. The three of us work together along with Jared, which is our webmaster. And most of Chaa Creek's marketing is done in house. So we're very proud of that. Today we're looking at what is innovation? Why is it important? Using Chaa Creek as a case study.
And of course the key takeaways, with a short question and answer section at the end. So, the first slide, what is innovation? It can seem a very intimidating word, I totally agree. But what does it mean? Innovation means to bring forth new ideas. New methods, new products, services that create value not only for you, but for your customers. Innovation also encourages creative problem solving and process improvement and competitive advantage.
And it ensures that the company remains relevant, competitive and thrives in a changing market. So now that we're in 2024 heading into 2025, you don't want to say, well, I'm going to implement this now to be innovative. No, innovation comes and grows. So with that in mind, we're not saying, you must do this. No, take a look back at what you're doing.
Do a self audit of what you're doing, what you want to do. And with that, without you really knowing you're innovating because you're thinking for the future. All right, so types of innovation. This is very important because often when we think about a concept, we don't realize that this concept is just the beginning.
Types of innovation, we have technological innovation, process innovation, product innovation, and service innovation. Each of these types focuses on something very important. For example, technological innovation focuses on leveraging new technologies that enhance products, service, or processes. Process innovation is streamlining workflows and internal operations.
Product innovation is developing unique products or services that meet or even anticipate market trends and customer preferences. While service innovation enhances service delivery. Customer Engagement, and Overall Value Proposition. Alright, so now that we have gone through those, what is this picture we're seeing on your screen? Earlier this year, the BTB embarked on a campaign, part of their Grab Life campaign. They said, how can we be innovative? How can we bring Belize to people that are impaired? One of these was bringing to life a virtual reality program where they put the Belize Barrier Reef on it and they say, you know what, hey, you can come here. So although it seemed for the direct eye was like, hey, yeah, whatever, it's actually innovative because it creates that spark of travel to Belize.
So in that sense, that's where we're heading for, your innovation will not create a wildfire, it will create a spark to where we want to go, not only as a hotel, not only as a restaurant. But as a country, okay, so why does it matter? You might say, hmm, yeah, it actually drives expansion. It enhances products, attracts new customers and mitigate risks. This is very important. Growth is not something that occurs overnight. It's something that takes time.
When you drive expansion with innovation, it opens doors to new markets and customer segments. When you enhance products, you improve what you're doing, and align with what the customer is demanding. It attracts new customers. For example, what the BTB did.
Who would have thought that a person confined to a wheelchair would want to travel to Belize? That wasn't even part of what they had in mind, but with this campaign, they might want to come to Belize. Even if it's just to be there, to visualize, to feel that breeze on their face, to feel the sand in their hands, on their toes. It attracts new customers and also mitigates risk. Staying innovative helps businesses adapt to market changes and avoid disruption. So what are these benefits? Benefits for customer attraction and retention. That's very important.
As a destination that thrives with people, we need to make sure that we're reaching whom we want to attract to come to Belize. One thing is reaching, one thing is attracting, but the next thing is retention. I am sure everybody has guests that come every year.
So how will you be able to retain this, These guests that come every year, a family of five that come every year for thanksgiving. I'm sure they say, well, we already did everything there. So what else can we do? That's where you become innovative.
You're understanding that your customer needs something new. You're staying relevant. You're staying on trend. You're building brand loyalty and driving sustainable growth. So by thinking about this family of five that comes to you every thanksgiving, You say, hey, last year we did a buffet, but this year we want to do maybe a special setup for these people, you know? So you're looking at what they need.
What you were offering and what you can offer. That is the importance of this. For example, again, with the BTB, with their Grab Life campaign, by displaying, you know, Belize's beautiful attributes to the United States, to a particular city, they're able to attract.
So that is one of their goals. Whatever you do, it might not be at the level of the BTB, Total Understandable, we don't do that either. But whatever little things you do, you'll be going towards these goals. So here we have a picture of Miss Lucy and Mr. Mick. I can surely say this was back in the 1970s.
And we also have a picture of our Ixchel Villas which were built in 2016. So, what does this mean? Why am I showing you this? I'm showing you this because it reflects innovation. It reflects growth. And it reflects our journey of more than 40 years. We started off as a farm in 1977 when Mick and Lucy came.
They didn't come with, I want to build a five star resort. That totally wasn't their mind, you know. They came to Belize and they discovered a 140 acre farmland on the banks of the Macal River. Never did they think, oh, this will be Chaa Creek. So it started as a farm where they used to sell milk, yogurt, cheese, eggs, and vegetables.
They would plant these, harvest these, preparing the yogurt and all that stuff, bringing it down to San Ignacio to sell it. However, they did understand that this was not what they wanted. They had a desire to be important, a desire to simply express What they wanted, as conservationists, as people that love the land, they wanted to say, what else can we do? So when they were in their farmland, we had the arrival of Europeans, which would be stopping at Chaa Creek as a backpackers, you know, just as a stop before headed to Tikal.
So in that sense, the Flemings are providing that accommodation for them at eight US dollars a night. So, that is where it all began, you know, as just a pit stop, you know, and that was the birth of Chaa Creek as a destination. And afterwards, well, we could see here, in 1981, we welcomed our first guest. This was back then, Chaa Creek Cottages, as you can imagine, one touch roof. One barbed wire fence and just a lot of green, which reflected where we come from. You know, even though Mr.
Mick is a farmer at heart, we still have our Maya farm, but we're able to innovate. We're able to grow, you know, so I'm sure that all of, all of you guys, you know, that work in the travel industry started with a dream, a desire to provide something. The Flemings had the same desire, you know, be able to provide, be able to share what they love.
So, here you can see our first cottage, we had to travel by canoe because Chaa Creek, there was no road. So the Flemings, and you can see Miss Lucy in the front, Mr. Mick's mom in the middle and himself, you know, piloting the boat in that sense to the Macal River. So this is our first cottage, and as time went by, we're able to expand, even if it meant, you know, transitioning from thatches to zinc, we need to see innovation as one step at a time.
Since then, much has changed here. I will share more of our growth. In 1983, we had infrastructure development. The Chaa Creek Road was built by the British Army Corps, so we no longer had the only waterway for transportation, there was the road. And additionally, dining room to serve guests, and six cottages were built.
1987, modern amenities arrived, so we had electricity now, so people, they could use washing machines instead of scrummy boards. You know, they're using deep freezer to eliminate the need for salted ice blocks today. And there was even a water pump, which improved water supply, replacing the gasoline relay pump system. In 1981, there was an expansion of these facilities.
The cottages expanded to a total of 16. Now we have 28, accommodating more visitors. And in 1990, the San Ignacio office was built, which is where we are right now.
The nature trails were created for horseback riding and hiking, and the property expanded to 230 acres. Today, 2024, we are 500 acres. So, you can see the innovation, the thriving to grow, to provide, and to share. And here we have a little bit more of pictures in 1981, the Chaa Creek team, the 1990s, that was a property. You can see where our gift shop is now. And actually it has changed so much if you remember visiting us these days, or if you haven't, we invite you.
This is the Macal River Suite in 1990s. We still have that same suite in that same location, but it doesn't look like that. And in 2024, our Chaa Creek Cottage Collection has grown and has eventually been shaped to express that quiet luxury of being able to hear the howler monkeys, to hear the crickets, to hear the toucan.
To hear the soft rustling. In that sense, you can see that the brand has been maintained, the essence is still there. But have we changed? Yes, of course we have. All right.
So I'm going to hand it over to Orion. He's going to go into all the details of all the types of innovation. If you have any questions, feel free to ask at the end. Orion Lind: Thank you Christy, for providing the A bit of history and backstory of Chaa Creek's humble beginnings, and I think it's very important to know in this context, but today I want to tell you a bit more of the different categories and how Chaa Creek innovates within the categories.
Starting off with technological innovation, at Chaa Creek, we see an influx of people online on a day to day basis. Thank you for joining us. And these people are usually curious about various details and information concerning our main lodge and property. To cater to as many people as possible, we've set up a system of automated messaging on our social media platforms. These include Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. Through these automated messages, we are able to funnel people directly to our reservation systems, booking systems, as well as our websites.
Speaking about websites, we also have integrated these website chatbots, which are little widgets or icons you see in the corner of our main Chaa Creek website. And these chatbots, helps, especially our reservation team for quicker customer support, both automatically and manually, whereby our reservation, reservations team are able to go into the chatbots themselves and personally help people curious about the various details of our lodge. All these platforms, as I mentioned previously, our social media platforms on our websites, also helps as a form of data collection, providing valuable analytics to our marketing team, especially for us to tailor specific marketing campaigns or deals and target specific niches into buyer conversions. In terms of sustainability, technology has helped us stay in line with our ethos.
For example, one of the biggest technological advancements that we've had on property would be our array of 156 solar panels. These, solar panels provide green, clean energy throughout the entire reserve. And they're particularly used in our laundry department where our industrial dryers use up more of the lodge's power. Throughout the day, Chaa Creek runs on pure, green, clean solar energy throughout the 500 acre nature reserve when the most amount of power is being used, obviously. And that night, we then switched to the electrical grid provided by BEL.
But moving on, and to reiterate a bit about what Christy had explained previously about process innovation, process innovation has been crucial for Chaa Creek. We have over a hundred and eighty employees on property throughout the reserve, and there needed to be processes put in place. for us to allow a better streamline and a more efficient streamline of day to day operations, especially with our boots on the ground employees.
Some of the ways to begin with were utilizing fingerprint time clocks. All our on site staff are required to clock in their start and end times utilizing these fingerprint scanners. These scanners also help accurately record their shifts.
The fingerprint scanners also helps our management staff immensely and efficiently to track and calculate these employees working hours. Long gone are the days of manually writing down your beginning time, your break time, your end time on books and what's not. POS systems, or point of sale systems, are scattered throughout The Lodge at Chaa Creek is the main lodge, as well as the Guafalim Cafe, and these POS systems also play a crucial part in efficient processes by improving transaction efficiency for our guests, which we cater to, especially dealing with foreign currency, online transactions, as well as credit card details.
Property Management Solutions are utilized by our reservations team, providing real time room availability and detailed financial reporting. So whenever a guest calls our reservations team looking for specific room nights or what have you, our reservations team are able to pull up this information. These PMSs, and it allows them to accurately check which rooms are available for the specific nights our guests requested. To give you a bit of context before I get into it, at Chaa Creek, we consider the reserve more than just a lodge, but as a safe haven for the different wildlife that both migrate and live on the property. However, our naturalist guides, to record the different wildlifes, they would have to venture out into the bushes for multiple days, manually recording their findings, and reporting on what they saw.
To work around this, we recently implemented trail cameras. And these trail cameras were placed strategically throughout the 500 acre nature reserve. And they were used to help our naturalist guides to further improve the health of our local ecosystems and biodiversity, and these trail cameras are also used within our marketing departments to promote the wildlife that's within the property. Moving on, product innovation plays a big part in evolution, and as a result of innovating the products, of your business or establishment, you're able to stand out in today's market. But how has Chaa Creek separated itself in its respective market ? Well, unfortunately, we aren't able to provide white sandy beaches or turquoise blue waters. But to work around this issue, we partnered with sister properties located on the coastlines, which includes San Pedro, Caye Caulker, and Placencia.
By partnering with these different destinations within Belize, we're able to provide our guests with the complete Belizean beach and jungle experience. We also do have 12 on site activities within The Lodge, which I will get into a bit later, but apart from these activities, we also have what we like to consider wow factors, which are experiences uniquely tailored to specific guests, utilizing these 12 on site activities. And these wow factors.
We call them wall factors because they literally make our guests go, wow. And one of the signature wall factors that we have at The Lodge that we like to keep in our back pockets for very special occasions are, is the Dinner at the Lookout. This Dinner at the Lookout is a private dinner setting located at Chaa Creek's highest point. Overlooking the sunset, of course.
You're also provided with your own personal butler and your own private chef. So while you're enjoying the beautiful sunset over the horizon, You're provided food, fresh farm to table food by your butler and your personal chef. Speaking of butlers we also have butler service available for guests who book the complete Ixchel Villas or our master suites as a way to offer personalized assistance and appreciation to our guests who decide to book these premium packages at Chaa Creek. We provide unique locally routed experiences and high quality service. So from the moment you arrive to Belize at the airport, you are picked up in modern 2024 SUVs or vans by our professional and licensed tour guides, which would be great.
I always offer you a warm welcome to Belize. We also like to say that the moment you arrive and are picked up by our guides, you learn everything about Belize. You learn about the different cultures up until the moment you arrive at our lodge. You continue learning through all of these on site activities and things that we do within the property. And the moment you leave, the moment that you arrive at our lodge, You leave with a wealth of knowledge about Belize's diverse cultures and Belize's diverse ecosystems, which includes flora and fauna. Now as I said before, we offer 12 on site activities.
With these 12 on site activities, we offer six of them complementary to every guest who decide to come. to book a stay at Chaa Creek. Some of these complimentary on site activities includes guided bird watching, a guided medicinal trail, a guided natural history center tour, a butterfly farm tour, and these complimentary on site activities is usually, it enhances our guest stay with things to do across our entire 500 acre nature reserve. Apart from the off site activities from your typical Xunan or Caracol or what have you. Gastronomy is also, one of Chaa Creek's biggest and strongest selling point. Mr.
Mick himself has his own organic Maya farm within The Lodge, which he always tries to innovate new techniques to provide fresh, fresh fruits, fresh veggies, directly to our mariposa restaurant. Which serves as an alternative and healthier farm to table option rather than your typical day to day meals that your guests would normally consume using ingredients from his farm. This is another big one.
We are excited, really excited about this actually. Chaa Creek has always strived to cater to the diverse desires of our guests. And we recognize a growing demand for immersive nature based experiences. So we revived a product that offers something distinctly different from the luxury of our main lodge. The Macal River Camp has always been a part of and within Chaa Creek's reserve. But unfortunately, due to COVID, we did have to shut it down for quite some time.
But with the demand for these immersive experiences, and knowing that we had the Macal River Camp laid dormant, we decided to rebrand the Macal River Camp into the Belize Rainforest Retreat. And this Belize Rainforest Retreat offers an opportunity which appeals to travelers seeking raw and authentic jungle experiences. With limited technology and a deep sense of tranquility. By offering the Belize Rainforest Retreat as an alternative, we not only fill a gap in the market, but also meet the needs of guests who yearn for simplicity, adventure, and a closer connection to nature. It's also interesting to note that We do provide the six complimentary activities that I mentioned earlier to guests who book a stay at the Belize Rainforest Retreat.
Lastly, how does Chaa Creek innovate its service? If you've ever been to Chaa Creek and now knowing that we have over 180 employees, you'll notice that we like to keep our service 100 percent personalized. From our reservations team to our front desk all the way down to our concierge team, we always have someone giving our guests the attention and time that they deserve to better tailor their vacations to how they want it. Of course, we're not all completely perfect and we do receive negative feedback from time to time.
However, we do try our best to monitor all these feedbacks. to improve in the areas that need the most attention. We also continue to continue offering better service to current and future guests, Chaa Creek ensures to offer our up and coming employees professional training both abroad and in country to maintain and further improve the standards of service which Chaa Creek is known for. For example, we recently had a renowned guest from the UK, Chef Ceylon Butcher, and he came to the Guava Limb Cafe for a whole month. They train the kitchen staff and at the end of the the month period, he then certified the kitchen staff according to the level of expertise they're currently at, and he's also coming back next week to continue training. with our Chaa Creek kitchen staff at The Lodge.
But, with that said, I'll give it back to, give back the mic to Christy one last time to wrap up the presentation today. Christy Valdez: Alright, that was very detailed. Thank you very much, Orion.
So we went ahead and shared with you our background, our history, our daily operations, how we work. So what's missing? Well, how do we market? How do we get that word out, from Belize to the world, basically? So we do personalize our marketing campaigns. All our marketing campaigns are set out with, determined by seasons, determined by what we're looking for, determined by the audience, whether it be solo travelers, romance, and family travel. So all of that we do take back and look at what the people that came, the past guests, and say, hey, so these people came, honeymooners came during this time, families came during holiday season, and during summer we had a bit of like solo travelers. So we look at that data, and then we do the personalized marketing campaign.
We also use AI content marketing. This is something that we explored with Lorenzo in the courses before this. It's quite new. It's intimidating, I would say. It took us a while to get used to it, even myself.
As a writer, I do go into writing blogs, writing captions, and all that stuff. It takes a lot of time to get correct information out. So, when we use AI, it helps us better our language. If a post needs to be exciting, AI will help you.
If that post needs to be serious, you're dealing with a delicate matter, such as come the, uh, we're waiting a tropical storm. You know, you want, that language that you're portraying on social media to be accurate, to be sincere. So AI will help us with that.
We have been using that, especially for our social media. The dynamic pricing strategies is handled by our sales team. And they would go and say, let's take out 20 percent off, 10 percent off, book now, book direct and all that stuff.
So depending on the demand, if we're seeing this number being booked out, Hey, do we need some people for Thanksgiving? We might offer that out there to direct booking. User generated content, content campaigns. This is very important because sometimes on social media or even for a website. We tend to think that it's all about what we have to say.
What about the people that have come to our establishments? What do they have to say? If it's something good, if it's something great, you want other people to know about it. So reposting it on your platform is a very good practice, such as what we saw here with when we posted that for hosting this webinar. People seemed interested, and they actually even commented, such as Miss Michelle, that said, Lovely, Chaa Creek is the absolute best, and in so many ways, and clearly founded on love and respect for the country, the people, the earth, the animals, and each other. By highlighting these comments, you, as a company, are portraying not what you're saying, but what others are saying about you. So in that sense, that is creating trust between you and a potential customer. Basically what we're doing here is audience engagement via social media.
Instagram and Facebook have become very important. We have received bookings that say, Hey, I saw you on social media. We have had conversation with travel agents that said, Hey, your Instagram is good.
You know, we get, we get to know you because of what you post out there. So things like that is how you get the word out. We also do geotargeted advertising. We look back at our, point of sale system. We look back at our RDP and we're able to see where our guests are coming from. And from there, we see, if we see a rise.
On a certain location, we're able to put more targeted advertisements out there, targeted content, maybe blogs, maybe videos. We also do SEO for visibility. We write with a purpose. So whenever we write for Google, we would say, Hey, what's trending? What words should we use and how to become visible? So we do that whenever we're writing, especially blogs. And also brand repositioning. Like I said, when we began this presentation, we talked about innovation.
Some people might be touchy about growing with the brand or even changing a certain color or even looking at saying things a certain way. You must be confident enough to make these changes because if you don't, you'll stay behind. So it's important for your brand to grow, your brand to flourish. If your brand has an old voice to say, you know what, all my family is. Only families. And that's all you're seeing.
So that's the people you're going to be bringing. But what if you want to expand your market and say, well, families, friends, grandparents and solo travelers, romance. So you're going to be growing your brand. That is repositioning yourself to be out there. So we tend to do that a lot. We try to provide something for everybody looking to travel to Belize.
Which comes with innovating and evolving. We also do a lot of ecotourism. When we started, ecotourism wasn't even something that was on people's mouth. It wasn't on people's goals.
But Chaa Creek became ecotourism in Belize. Ecotourism means that we focus on nature, we focus on community first initiatives, and we foster this for our guests. That is what it means for us to be ecotourism, not only to be green, but to be able to create a legacy. We have also dealt into regenerative travel, which is a mission driven approach, focused on making a positive impact on the environment and local communities. Since early on, Ms.
Fleming has advised we can only be so much ECO if we do only conservation. But how do we know that our legacy will live on? Only by involving the people. So that is how we have been seeing our legacy grow. Chaa Creek started with the Flemings, but now it has become so much more. It has become communities. It has become education.
It has become a responsibility for us to continue thriving. We also provide immersive slash experimental travel. We have a inland expeditions team, which is in charge of all the tours, and they provide guests with deeply engaging experiences that connect them to Belize's natural and cultural heritage.
Chaa Creek provides accommodation. Chaa Creek provides legacy. But Belize provides what people are looking for. So in that sense, when we bring people to Belize They come to Chaa Creek, but they come to explore Belize.
So we need to put that in the table. So that is always one of our first goals whenever we gather as a marketing team. What are we doing? What are we showing people? So we do take into account, we do trips and marketing team goes out to these trips, capture content or share content. That is very important. Sustainable trends, which we focus on renewable energy as Orion shared, we did start using solar energy. Also purchasing more land from 400 acres to 500 acres.
We don't purchase land to say, hey, we're now 500 acres. We purchase land to be able to provide a haven for wildlife, flora. Just enabling the ecosystem to grow around us. We had a lot of fires this year, but in Chaa Creek, we didn't have one fire.
So we had a lot of visitors coming around, little creatures, running away from the fire. The fact that we're able to provide that for these little creatures means that we're not only doing this to grow in 400 to 500 acres, but we're doing this for the ecosystem. We also focus on wellness travel.
We have a Chaa Creek Spa. And as Orion mentioned, the opening of the Belize Rainforest Retreat, which was a former Macal Camp. We're opening on December 1st. Our 10 casitas are still there. We're using solar energy. We have expanded all, you know, snippets of what we're doing, but we're very excited about this project because it not only shares what the endless possibilities of travel can be to Belize, but it shows the potential of how we can come back.
It shows that there can always be hope. Once you are willing to grow with that, you're willing to provide something to travelers, you will be okay. It was very hard on us when we got to close because of COVID and seeing the camp there for two or three years really did touch our hearts on the humble beginnings. Will we ever be able to go back? Obviously not, but we are able to provide something innovative.
We didn't have solar panels back then, but we do now. Does that change the Belize Rainforest Retreat? No, it doesn't. Nature is still there. Excellent service is still there. So we are able to provide that. We also cater to by leisure travel, which is that we provide fast Wi Fi, private meeting areas, which is our conference center.
The property has Wi Fi all over the accommodations, restaurant and bar, front desk and pool. And we have been adding more laptop and charging ports at the bar, at the restaurant, at the conference center, and even waiting areas So, after this very long presentation, what are our key takeaways? Innovation has many faces. We encourage you to start exploring it today. To stay competitive, it's important to make innovation a part of you, you have to tackle it.
It is part of what you do every day. By taking a look back and auditing what you do every day as a company, as a person, that means that, hey, you've been innovating and it's, and you just need to put it out there. We had to do this exercise with Lorenzo and it was very impressive for us to realize. What we do every day, putting a name to it, putting a label to it, and sharing with you guys, that was very important. Innovative concepts guide Chaa Creek's evolution while staying true to its foundational values.
When I came on board with the property, they always ask, what is anthropologist doing in marketing? Obviously, not something you do every day. But I did realize that tourism, marketing, and Belize holds endless possibilities. And merging it with who you are, remaining your core values will create something for you.
So I would say the same thing, put that marketing work, put that foundation value into who you are. Don't say, because I have a restaurant that only serves rice and beans, that's all I'm serving all the time. No. Serve what people are asking for. What your main goal is, you're serving delicious food. So for me, that will be something that not only I have realized as a person, but I am able to see it with Chaa Creek, and it's been such a journey.
So that's our presentation. I've had such a great time talking to you guys, meeting new people, even if it's via the internet. We're open for any question and answer, so I would say yeah, Lorenzo and Angela, we're done on our end.
Lorenzo Gonzalez: Thank you and you're not done. We have some really difficult, challenging questions for you, . Christy Valdez: Alright, well let's begin. Lorenzo Gonzalez: Well, I do have a few questions in mind, but, I would like to ask the audience if you have any questions, please type it out in the chat, and if we get a chance, we can ask Christy and Orion to answer those questions for you. To start off, I do have one thing to say about what, Christy said at the ending where, Christy, you mentioned what is, a cultural anthropologist doing in marketing . But you're adding your special touches to marketing and growing
ecotourism in Belize, just the tourism industry, overall, we appreciate that because it means you bring, a certain perspective to marketing and that actually improves marketing as a whole for tourism in Belize, everyone that comes, like everyone that dabbles into marketing or dabbles into tourism into Belize, I'd say, like, the most important thing that you can bring is your background, your experiences, and also your personality. This is something that a lot of people sometimes don't consider, but your personality is what makes you unique and your background is what makes you unique. So bring that, to the table and, and it's always appreciated and, and we are better for it. Christy Valdez: Yes, thank you Lorenzo.
And also just to add, all that stuff comes to life with Orion, capturing all the little things that happen behind us. He's been in a growing process himself. Just not very talkative about it, but he's been growing with us alongside too. Lorenzo Gonzalez: It's even better when you have a colleague that is able to talk, positive things about you.
Orion Lind: Agree, keep it coming. Lorenzo Gonzalez: Are you guys able to see us, Christy and Orion? Christy Valdez: We can stop sharing screen right now. Lorenzo Gonzalez: So, yes, um, so the first question for you is, you painted a good picture for us what innovation is and what it's like at Chaa Creek, and it was very interesting for you to touch on the different types of innovation, the technological, the process, the product, the service innovation.
Based on that, what do you think is the most transformative for your operations and why? Christy Valdez: That's a tough one, because, all of them touch on different aspects, but for us in marketing, I would say the technological innovation, we're able to reach people from behind our desktop, from behind us. So just being able, like the BTB touch somebody that's, confined to a wheelchair, I mean, I mean, that's amazing, being able to portray Belize on a worldwide platform, I think that for us would be the most, innovative, aspect of tourism now that it goes beyond a screen. It goes into not only your visual, but you're listening to it. Your senses are involved. So I think for the tourism industry and for Chaa Creek, back in 1977 when Mick and Lucy came, I'm sure you never thought that somebody in the United States could reach Chaa Creek through their phone from day to day basis. So definitely technological innovation.
Orion Lind: I'd like to quickly add here that it could be in par with product innovation, because as Belize as a growing country, and Chaa Creek as an ever growing reserve and resort. Innovating products has always been something that everybody at Chaa Creek always thinks about. What can we do different? What can we provide for future guests or current guests? It's always a question of what more unique things can we do to enhance our guests experience. Lorenzo Gonzalez: Excellent, thank you. Okay, with immersive travel experiences gaining popularity, like not only in Belize but all around the world, we know that more tourists are interested in experiential travel, immersive experiences. Does Chaa Creek have, anything in the horizon, like, are you considering any experiential travel experiences that are out there? Christy Valdez: At the moment, we're heading into 2025 with a full agenda, we have gone on our due diligence, we have looked at what other experiences there lies apart from here in the West, and we have realized that down South is something that we would like to explore.
Not only adventure, but also adding cultural flair, such as Garifuna Settlement Day was yesterday. So what if we're adding tourists to going down south, even we Belizeans enjoy seeing that big parade in Dangriga and all that stuff. So definitely Chaa Creek, you know, Chaa Creek's fleet is going places in Belize. So you can for sure say we're looking at different Waterfall experiences, different jungle experiences, and of course, community and cultural experiences down south.
Lorenzo Gonzalez: That's excellent. Yeah, Southern Belize is definitely an untapped resource. I know more people are visiting Southern Belize, but at one point I'd say maybe just like Five years ago, Toledo was the least visited district in Belize when it comes to tourism. But I know that's changing because there's so much untapped, potential and cool things to discover down south. It's full of culture jungle and amazing experiences.
As a follow up question to your, experiential travel experiences, can you describe, besides the Dinner at the Look Out dining experience, can you describe any other wow experiences that you have at The Lodge? Christy Valdez: Another one we can say, confidently is the open heart cooking experience. We have an open heart kitchen, which is an outdoor kitchen outside of property, and guests are able to pick whether they want to cook mestizo, maya, East indian, or Garifuna food. It's open every day. I can say it's a wow factor in its own quiet way.
Because it's getting hands on experience into doing something immersive, cultural, ancient and even sacred. Whenever guests get to hear that it's something passed on from my grandma, from the great grandma, we have our cooks, saying my grandma used to cook this and I used to see being cooked when I was a child and now I'm showing you, you are sharing that knowledge with the guests, which makes it a hundred times perfect. And even, even the early morning birding, we go to the lodge, and to be able to see not one toucan, but two toucans just jumping all over the trees in the morning, that's for me, imagine if I had never seen a toucan in my life, and I'm able to see one jumping from the screen out there, so I would say yes, it's just a matter on how, how you say it, you know, you add that flair. Orion Lind: And also, Chaa Creek has an entire 500 acre nature reserve.
We have multiple beautiful venues on the property itself that could be used as a wedding ceremony or someplace private for you and your partner? A lot of romantic settings apart from just the lookout, which can be used. For example, our bamboo trail was used as a photo shoot for, a model. Christy Valdez: Miss Universe. Orion Lind: Miss Universe, use our bamboo trails as a setting to show off her costume, which was a Jaguar. So, in between all of the bamboos you have a beautiful costume.
We also provide beautiful wedding venues, which we decorate uniquely to every guest. It's nothing typical. Everything's unique. There's a lot. Lorenzo Gonzalez: Thank you. Yes, to touch back on the birding experience you mentioned, Christy, I agree.
I'm surprised how much I read online about guests that visit Belize saying that they weren't birders, they had no interest in birding, and just like one simple birding activity while they were traveling in Belize turned them into diehard birders. I was like, wow, that is transformative, right? They go on vacation and come back and they're different people. Christy Valdez: I myself can say, I didn't do birding ever in my life. I never would have thought I would find myself stalking birds, but hey, it happened. Lorenzo Gonzalez: Okay.
Wonderful. You mentioned that, regenerative travel is a key focus of innovation, and I understand the reason why you say this, because it's an evolution of sustainable tourism, right? Like, ecotourism is an evolution of sustainable tourism. Regenerative travel is also an evolution of that. It's just like taking it to the next step. So, can you elaborate on any specific regenerative practices at Chaa Creek, that you're currently, doing or have done? Christy Valdez: For regenerative travel, we've had a, a big discussion when it comes to the concept itself. But we're taking, this is our take on it.
So, for us, regenerative travel is strongly aligned with community. For Because we have the Eco Kids Camp, right? So we used to do that camp before. So although because of COVID we couldn't do it anymore, it's coming back in 2025. So that is for us, returning to travel, is ensuring a love for nature. Ensuring our respect for nature coming from our youngest citizens in Belize to be able to have that.
So we're not only going from, hey we plant trees, yeah, we're going into planting trees, planting love, planting legacy for the future. So for us that is primarily our take in regenerative travel and that's what we're trying to do. We're trying to get funding, we're trying to get international observance or international curiosity when it comes to these things. Because it's not only about 400 to 500 acres, it's 400 to 500 acres for a haven for flora and fauna. So that is our take on it. We're expanding, but we're expanding with a purpose.
We're expanding for the planet and we're expanding for our people. So I can say that for sure. Lorenzo Gonzalez: Excellent. Let's look at some questions in the chat.
I can see Lesia said that, her resort, recently became an adults only resort, and she's wondering if Chaa Creek would be interested in adding another sister property to their packages. Christy Valdez: We can, ask our managerial team what they think about it, our sales and management, and of course our marketing head, Ms. Fleming, to see what her opinions are on it. But hey, why not? We never know, but possibly in the future, definitely an interesting proposition. Let us know. We have our contacts emails.
Our social medias are open. Orion Lind: You can always shoot your shot there as well. Christy Valdez: It's not something that we have considered. Angela Wu: I asked the audience what's the most innovative thing their company has done and we've received about seven to eight responses. Miss Anna, said that they've implemented a web chat on their website.
So that's one innovative thing that they've done. Um, this said that, the most innovative thing they've done is being a Garifuna owned resort, which is, brilliant because you get to touch on the food culture of that specific ethnic group in Belize. A lot of travelers, come to Belize and want to experience, what it's like to be a local, they get to experience things like that. A lot of the gastronomy and cultural tours are popping at this moment, so that's a really good one. Ms.
Charlene said that Blue Zen is known for its commitment to wellness, offering everything from specialized spa treatments, to yoga and wellness programs designed to enhance relaxation, rejuvenation, making it a standout location for those seeking both luxury and holistic well being. I think that ties well to the name Blue Zen, so that's awesome. Lesia said that, since there was only one adult property on the peninsula, we transitioned to adults only. Offering this service has gained us many new bookings as most tourists were looking for something quiet and out of placencia, so what's located in Maya Beach was an asset, so that's great.
We also have a couple other responses. Ms. Carlene said, most recently moving to a renewable energy with now being 100 percent solar powered. Wow, that's amazing.
And then, Carlos said that merging the natural environment of the rainforest, flora and fauna, and guest experience throughout their stay with us. Very similarly to what Chaa Creek has done, these responses sound like they've, made note of what they have as a service or a product, and then use that as an advantage to innovate. I think an important thing to take note of is, not necessarily, about, The resources that you may or may not have, but being resourceful. So like Chaa, they have the property. They know what's on site and with that, they innovate to see what they could offer with their guests.
And I think that's a good, key to take away from this session. It's not necessarily about, having all the money that you can to, to let quote unquote, innovate, but looking at what you currently have, how you can use that to your advantage and sort of make a market for yourself. So I think that's an important take out to get away from not only the presentation, but what everyone has shared, in terms of what they've done to be innovative in tourism. Lorenzo Gonzalez: Yes, and building on what Angela was saying, one of my favorite examples or an easy example I often share about being innovative is Cook your own catch tour in Hopkins and think about why it's innovative. So for a long time, you would just take your guests to go fishing and that's it. It's a great experience.
There are a lot of people that travel to Belize just for fishing. But then, what happens if you make that tour even better by allowing the guests to go to an island, help cook the meal, see how it's prepared and then eat it at the end of the day, this makes the experience way more memorable because they get to interact with the guide and learn about their culture. Instead of just spending the day fishing, now they spent the day fishing and had their own cooking lesson. That's an easy example of innovation. So always think about ways how you can improve your products and services and what you offer overall. So I think that's it for today.
I can pass it back to Chaa Creek and to Angela to sign off for today. Christy Valdez: Thank you so much, Lorenzo and Angela. It has been such a growing experience. Orion Lind: As Chrissy was saying, thank you all who participated in today's webinar.
Thank you all who listened to our presentation. It was a pleasure. Thank you, Lorenzo, for having us on this incredible journey throughout this year, 2024 specifically.
Angela Wu: All right. Before we conclude, I have some exciting news for everyone about our final session to wrap up this series. We will be hosting a live session on December 21st at the Guava Limb restaurant and cafe in San Ignacio. The invites for this live event will be sent out individually to those who have received the first two certificates of the series and have also stayed up to date with the sessions and tests in this third course of the series.
So be sure to stay on top of that if you haven't done that as yet in order to receive the invite. And as mentioned earlier, this initiative is supported by the Emergent Ventures Grant from the George Mason University's Mercatus Center in collaboration with Belizing.com and the Lodge at Chaa Creek. Thank you Christie.
Thank you Orion. Thank you Lorenzo for joining and of course, thank you to everyone who attended this session. We appreciate everyone's participation and engagement.
If you have any questions or feedback. Please feel free to reach out to us and don't forget to complete your test for today and stay on track with these lessons in order to get your invite to next month's live session. Thank you once again and we look forward to seeing you next month at our live session at the Guava Limb restaurant and cafe.
2024-12-04 04:41
