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The pool deck and the grounds of the TT Ennios St James Bay were lit up by coloured lights and it was crowded. There was a long line of trestle tables laden with food. Three suckling pigs were being roasted and numerous items were being barbecued on half a dozen gas barbecues. Over by the dance floor, a steel band was playing, and people were dancing. Brian, Belinda and Jinnie headed for the open-air bar and both the ladies asked for dry white wine; Brian had a bottle of beer.
Drinks in hand, they found a table on the terrace from where they could watch the partygoers. Brian said, “There are not too many people getting food at the moment. Why don’t you two go get something? I’ll keep the table and get some when you come back.” “OK,” said Belinda, “but keep your eye open for Patrica, we really need to chat.” Jinnie was first back with a big white bap packed with slices of the pork, on a big plate accompanied by a mountain of salad and a jacket potato with a big pat of butter melting into it. “That looks good,” said Brian. “There is so much food it’s crazy,” said Jinnie. “There are steaks, lamb cutlets, pork chops, burgers and hot dogs on the barbecue. There is an enormous piece of roast beef, a roast turkey and a huge baked fish that I didn’t recognise. There are all sorts of veg and salad, and children are queuing up for hot dogs and chips.”
Belinda came back with turkey, pigs in blankets, carrots, sweet potatoes and roast potatoes. Brian said, “I didn’t know it was Christmas,” and went to get his food. Belinda said, “Odds on he comes back with a huge steak, chips and a token bit of salad.” Belinda was nearly right: Brian had steak, chips and salad, but there were two small steaks on his plate; the last big one had just gone, and he would have had to wait for a big one to finish cooking.
Jinnie had just finished a huge piece of gâteau when Rick came strolling across the terrace and said, “So this is where the directors have been hiding. What do you think of our extravaganza?” “Well, so far so good,” said Jinnie. “The food was excellent, and everyone seems happy.” “We have a band taking over from the steel band soon, then we have a firework display at eleven, and then something I pinched from your Christmas parties mini burgers.” “I didn’t know you had been to one of our parties,” said Jinnie. “I haven’t,” said Rick. “But I had a chat with Miranda. She had some good ideas. Unfortunately, you can’t get dodgem cars over here.”
As they talked, Brian nudged Jinnie and pointed at Patrica being pushed across the terrace in a wheelchair by Jorja. Rick waved and Jorja pushed the wheelchair towards the group. Jinnie asked, “How long has Patrica been a wheelchair user?” Rick said, “Well, I didn’t know she was.” Jorja parked Patrica at the table and put the brake on, while Brian found a chair for her from another table. Patrica said, “I’m sorry to be a nuisance, but I had a fall yesterday and I’ve broken a bone in my foot. I told Jorja I would give this a miss, but she insisted on hiring a wheelchair. My, there are a lot of people here.”
Brian said, “Can I get you something to eat and drink? We have eaten, and the food is good.” Patrica replied, “I am on painkillers, so I’d better stick to a soft drink. Do they have a sugar-free cola? I think I can smell jerk chicken.” Rick said, “You might have broken a bone, but your sense of smell is good. If Brian gets the drink, I’ll get the food — jerk chicken and rice it is. Do you want anything else?” “Well, I might try a bit of that suckling pig. It looked really good as we came by.”
***
Jorja went off with Rick to get herself something to eat, and Patrica said to Jinnie, “I’m glad to be able to have a word without Jorja. I have been thinking about retiring, and this fall has made up my mind for me. I’m just getting old, and even working one or two days a week in the office is getting to be too much, I get so worn out. The doctor says it is old age; I am 74 next birthday, and my body is wearing out.”
“What will you do?” asked Jinnie. “Well, not a lot,” said Patrica. “I don’t have to worry about money; compared to most Bajans, I am very well off. What I want to do is travel. These last few years I have been to places, on business, I could only dream about. Before I got involved with you, I had never been off the island and hardly out of Bridgetown. I loved travelling from my first trip to St Lucia. Now I’ve been to Trinidad, Grenada, Jamaica, Antigua and even England. What I really want to do is go on a cruise. I see those big ships in the harbour, and I want to go on one and have my bed made and all my food served to me, and to see other islands like Aruba and Cuba.”
“I want to go to and see Disney World,” Patrica continued, “I want to go through the Panama Canal, I want to see more of England, but in the summer when it is warm. I want to go to Europe, to Africa, to Asia, to Australia. Next January, there are several world cruises that stop in Bridgetown, that I could get on and then go off around the world. I have every intention of being on one of them. There is only one problem: they seem to finish in Southampton, so I need to get home from there.”
“But all that will cost a fortune,” said Jinnie. “But I have it,” said Patrica. “Aunty JoJo’s has made me a lot of money over the years, and I have no relatives to leave it to. So, I have decided I’m going to spend my money and enjoy myself, and I’ll still have the dividend from my Aunty JoJo shares, my TT SuperBurger pension, and a State Contribution Pension I have paid for all my working life, but that last one is peanuts! Only a few hundred Bajan $’s a week.”
“So, you don’t intend to sell your shares then,” said Jinnie. “Heavens no,” replied Patrica. “I haven’t the slightest intention. I have already left them to Monica in my will. She is the daughter I never had. Did you know she has invited me to stay with her in Florida whenever I want, once she has got an apartment.”
Rick arrived back with Patrica’s food, followed closely by Brian with a Pepsi Max, and that killed the conversation, but Jinnie inwardly breathed a sigh of relief the company was not going to have to find money for a share purchase. Patrica tucked into the jerk chicken and said, “This is really good, it tastes as good as I sell.” “Perhaps that’s because it was supplied by your dark kitchen,” said a laughing Trevor. “One last thing, before young Jorja gets back,” added Patrica, “I hope you are going to leave her in charge of the company, because she is good, not as good as Monica, but still very good.”
***
Jorja had finished her second plate of food from the barbecue and was enjoying a coffee when Jinnie asked her how things were going with the Bearcat Catering. “Far better than I could have dreamed of,” she replied. “The hospital contract is six weeks old now, and we have just done a quick survey of users. I would be a liar if I said everything was perfect, we do have a couple of minor problems we are addressing, but in general we got a pretty good rating.” “Tell me more,” said Jinnie. “Well, one of the complaints we got was that the coffee available for the doctor on night shift was often ‘stewed’. We have addressed that by putting in a machine that uses pods, but we are having a problem with getting a supply of our own blend in pods. The suppliers we have spoken to are all willing to make them for us, but the minimum number is more than we need.”
“I might just be able to help you there,” interjected Rick. “I have only today been talking about putting pod machines in all the rooms here and at the Ennios Marigot Bay. We are dealing with guests who want to have a decent cup of coffee in their suites. The sachets of upmarket instant that the previous owners were putting in the cheaper rooms just isn’t what you would expect from a 5-star hotel. We already have pod machines in the most expensive rooms, and the management team suggested that we should put them in all rooms. We currently supply several different pods, like Colombian, Costa Rican, decaffeinated, even caramel. Listening to the conversation, I think we should be supplying our own blends, the cheaper one we used in the fast food outlets, but with a fancy name like ‘Continental Blend’, and the upmarket Jamaica Blue Mountain.”
Jinnie asked, “Do we have pod machines in our UK hotels?” “Yes,” said Rick, “but we only offer pods from one of the big companies. I’m sure that with five hotels and well over 1,200 rooms, we would be using enough to have our own branded pods, then we could easily supply the catering division.” “I have another idea,” said Jinnie, “let’s investigate selling them in bulk to our customers for our customers to take home. Pods normally come in sleeves of 10, we could put a notice on the counter of every SuperBurger, Aunty JoJo’s or sandwich shop: ‘If you enjoy our coffee, why not take a sleeve home with you?’ If it took off, I could see it selling in supermarkets.”
“Don’t let’s get ahead of ourselves,” said Brian. “We are basically in the food business whether it’s burgers, chicken, bulk catering, posh food, or accommodation and food. Yes, I agree, having our own branded coffee pods in hotels and catering is an idea we need to investigate and cost, even selling them from our outlets, but going up against Nescafé or Douwe Egberts in the supermarkets is a bit beyond us as a company.” “True,” said Jinnie, “I was getting a bit carried away. But let’s investigate getting our own branded stuff. Trevor, can you take it on in coordination with Jorja, she has obviously been talking to suppliers who are interested. And let me know how things go. I have a pod coffee machine at home and would love to be able to get a supply of Jamaica Blue Mountain pods.”
“Now Jorja,” said Jinnie, “would you like to continue telling us about Bearcat Catering.” “Well basically,” continued Jorja, “the hospital business is going well. The survey revealed that our food is far more popular than the old offering, and quite a few people have started opting for the premium menu. The hospital is delighted, as getting sick people to eat properly helps them get well sooner. We lost money the first few weeks, but that was to be expected as we felt our way, but I’m sure Brian will confirm that we are now making a profit. It’s not huge, but it is growing weekly. The star, though, is the coffee shop in reception, it is making a nice profit, and we have installed a coffee machine that makes 22 different drinks from fresh beans that it grinds freshly. It wasn’t cheap, but it is in huge demand and has almost paid the investment back already.”
“I can confirm that,” said Brian, “we broke even sooner than expected and are now making a small but increasing profit.” “As far as the Kensington Oval is concerned,” said Jorja, “we are due to sign the contract next week and will take over immediately. Keith has a team on standby to go in and get our branding on the outlets, and we have agreed to take on the existing staff and are ready to train them in our practices. Once again, we expect to lose money on the first few events due to the setting-up costs. But the spreadsheet shows we will soon be profitable.”
“Now a bit of extra news,” said Leah, “Keith’s latest win is a fit-out for a building for a big Korean car importer, and part of the job is to build a staff restaurant, a directors’ dining room and a big kitchen to serve them both. He asked who had been contracted to operate them, and they said no one, so he put our name forward and we have made the bidding list.” “That is good news,” said Jinnie. “Do we know who we are up against?” “Not yet,” replied Leah. “Qualification is still open for a few days, but we have been officially told we have qualified to tender and have received the bidding package.”
In the cab on the way home, Belinda said to Jinnie, “That was an interesting evening. I thought the hotel was fabulous, it’s the sort of place I’d happily stay at.” In the dark of the taxi, Jinnie heard Brian snort and mutter, “Well it must be good because you’re pretty fussy.” Belinda ignored him and said, “I thought Rick’s speech was good, and it was well received. But it was Patrica’s news that I thought was the best news of the night.” “I didn’t hear any news from Patrica,” said Brian. “That was because you were getting her drink at the time,” said Jinnie. “She said she was retiring and intended to go travelling, but she isn’t going to sell her shares and had left them to Monica in her will.” “Well, that is good news,” said Brian.
***
The following morning, Brian accompanied Belinda to the airport for her morning flight to Miami and the connection to Tampa, while Jinnie got a cab back to the TT Ennios St James for a look at the hotel in daylight and a meeting with Rick. Jinnie decided that the hotel looked pretty good in the sunshine. She had a stroll around the terrace and the beach and liked what she saw. She met Rick in reception, and he showed her around the new restaurant, where they were found a table and were brought coffees.
Rick talked about the various Ennios hotels in the group and how he was happy with progress. He said that both of the new Caribbean hotels were making a profit with having an upmarket restaurant, and the TT Ennios Heathrow was about to reopen, but it would only be with around half its final number of rooms. The snack bar was ready and would be used for buffet breakfasts and a temporarily enhanced menu for evenings until the main restaurant was complete.
Rick explained how the clientele for the various hotels varied. The Caribbean and Bournemouth were holiday hotels and generally catered for longer stays. Southampton had a mix of businessmen and people going on and coming off cruise ships, and the average stay was two or three days. While Heathrow was predicted to cater for people passing through the airport and were only expected to stay for one, possibly two nights. Rick then said that this gave them a big advantage over other chains in that by catering for several markets, they were spreading the risk. But the thing all the hotels had in common was that they went for the middle/upper end of the market, and they all had good restaurants.
Jinnie asked if Rick foresaw the chain growing, and he said that in his opinion it was only just becoming viable as a chain, and he wanted to keep growing the chain by acquisition. In his opinion, they were too small to start building their own properties, but to pick up existing hotels was the way to expand the brand. Jinnie agreed and asked had he anywhere in mind. Rick shrugged his shoulders before saying, “I don’t have any preferences, but I will know the right hotels when I see them. I suspect it is like you and restaurants; you get a feeling when you see something that is a good fit in the organisation, just like the Supreme/Belvedere deal in Bournemouth.”
“I have been told about numerous hotels in different parts of the world that I could be looking at,” continued Rick. “On paper, there are some that look better than others, one in the south of France, one in the Cotswolds, one in Torquay, one on Miami Beach and one near Rome–Fiumicino Airport that looks pretty similar to the Ennios Heathrow.” “You know that I am fluent in both Italian and French,” replied Jinnie, “and I have connections to both Rome and the south of France, so if you need help checking either, don’t hesitate in asking. One other thing, and this is a bit hush hush so please don’t spread it about, we are in the middle of setting up an Aunty JoJo’s business in Florida and on Monday we will be opening offices in Tampa and a connection to our SAP network.”
“That is interesting,” said Rick. “I rather fancy a Miami Beach hotel, but I was reluctant to try to break into the US market. It is very protective and insular, and just one tiny bit of the TT SuperBurger empire with one hotel wasn’t very attractive, but if you are already there, that changes the whole thing. It brings in a couple of other hotels in Florida I had discounted as marginal. But if we can piggyback on your investment in purchasing, distribution, offices, admin, HR and computing, it’s a whole different ball game, as the Yanks say.”
***
Jinnie and Brian cleared customs at Heathrow from the overnight Virgin flight from Bridgetown and stepped into the Arrivals building, where Miranda was waiting to drive her stepfather home. Jinnie said hello and had a short chat about the events business. Miranda assured her that business was in excellent shape, they were now averaging three events a week and making a profit, even though it was the quiet period between Christmas and the summer wedding season. Miranda explained that bookings for summer weddings were a new record, and most summer Saturdays they had two and sometimes three wedding receptions booked. The crossover with Wedding Dress Bargains was paying dividends, with recommendations going in both directions, and even the dinner party business was finally profitable.
It was a happy Jinnie who found her driver from Potters Bar Taxis and was whizzed around the M25. As she was being driven, she decided that it was a while since she had spoken with Melissa, and next time she was in Crawley she would pop into WDB for an update chat. She was more than happy Rick had the hotels under control, Aunty JoJo’s in the Caribbean was safe in Jorja’s hands, and Belinda had assured her that Monica had a firm grip on Florida. Jinnie decided that she would look at a trip to Florida — maybe she could coordinate it with Rick looking at the hotel on Miami Beach.
As always, Larry was waiting for her behind the front door and was all over her to welcome her home. She called, “Anybody home?” and Izzy replied, “I’m in the utility room.” Jinnie found her loading the washing machine and noted it was nearly all the twins’ stuff. Izzy saw her looking and said, “They were playing football in the garden at the weekend and got a bit muddy. I have washed the worst of the mud out under the outside tap, so I decided to put a load in the machine. The Ali Baba basket is nearly empty, so it’s ready for your dirty stuff.” “There isn’t much, I was only away a few days.” Taking two giant Toblerone bars from her bag, Jinnie put them on the kitchen table and said, “These are for the twins. I’m off to bed for a couple of hours, I’ll see you in a bit.”
Jinnie woke up in time for lunch and was surprisingly hungry. Izzy said, “Last time I was in Marks & Spencer I picked up a pack of their precooked poached eggs. I’m useless at poaching eggs, and the twins enjoyed them when they couldn’t get boiled eggs in that hotel we stayed at. I thought we could try them, if they are good, with a nice hard white and a runny yolk, I could get them for the twins as a change.” It took only minutes to prepare lunch, the eggs needed just 50 seconds in the microwave, and the toast took a little longer. Izzy made the food, while Jinnie made two mugs of builder’s tea.
Jinnie cut her egg open to reveal a perfectly cooked egg. “Wow,” she said, “I don’t know what I expected, but it certainly wasn’t this.” Izzy’s egg was a twin to Jinnie’s, and she said, “This is a perfect poached egg, I could never have cooked this.” “This is really good,” said Jinnie. Looking at the packaging, she continued, saying, “It says here you can freeze them; I think we should have them in the freezer for a change. And yes, I think the twins would love this, especially with a nice runny yolk to dip their soldiers in.”
After lunch, Jinnie decided that it wasn’t worth going into the office. She decided to use the garden office to get up to date with events over the weekend and then to go with Izzy to pick up the twins from school. As usual, Larry walked with Jinnie under the covered walkway that protected them from the light rain, and just before she reached the garden office, he shot off through the cat flap. By the time Jinnie reached the door and unlocked it, Larry was curled up in what Jinnie thought of as his No. 2 bed, watching her through a half-open eye — just in case she went to the tin with the Hobnobs.
Jinnie fired up the PC, thinking how much more convenient it was now that she didn’t need two PCs to access two company networks. Nigel’s people had been playing with the system again. The screen that greeted her was slightly different and, once she had entered her password, gave her access to all the various parts of the network, some of which required an additional password. It was on this selectable menu that she spotted a new item, ‘direct video messaging’. She had used applications like Teams and FaceTime before, but they had only worked if the other party had the same application installed. Now it seemed they had a company-wide system installed.
Jinnie decided to see how ‘video messaging’ worked and clicked on the menu item. Immediately, a message popped up welcoming her to ‘The TT SuperBurger’ video messaging system and explaining that the system was undergoing testing and development. The version being accessed was V 014 and was currently limited to Group Board Directors and selected senior management. It then said, ‘Select Continue or Quit.’ ‘Continue’ was on a green background and ‘Quit’ on a red background. Jinnie hit Continue and was presented with an index page with the letters A to Z and a message that said, ‘Please select the letter corresponding to the first letter of the surname of the person you wish to call or select Quit.’
Jinnie thought this is quite easy and hit the letter C for Alberto Costa and was displayed a four-name list that all started with the selected letter. The message said, ‘Please select who you wish to call, return to the index or Quit.’ Jinnie selected Alberto Costa and the screen said, ‘You have selected Alberto Costa. Do you wish to continue, reselect from the index, invite further people to the call or Quit?’ Jinnie hit Continue, and the screen displayed ‘Calling Alberto Costa’, which pulsed in time with a ringing tone. Suddenly, Alberto filled the screen and he said, “Hello Jinnie, I see you have found our new toy. Nigel’s people seem to have made this test version available over the weekend and it seems to be working well. Lots of people have been trying it and it hasn’t broken down yet.”
“Nigel seems to be quite happy with it so far,” continued Alberto, “but he tells me this is only an early version, and his team are working hard to expand it, first to more management and eventually to everyone in every company who has a desktop PC. I suggested that might make the index rather large and he said there are ways around that, like asking for the first two or even three letters of the surnames or speaking the name. Then I asked, how do I contact Jinnie, is she under D or L, and he said both. He tells me they are working on a version for company iPhones for people who are travelling.”
“I wonder how long he has been working on this,” said Jinnie. “Not long, apparently. He says his people have lashed together what he called ‘several bits of open-source software’ and only written code for the screens you see. He says adding people to the system is dead easy and it can be done by ‘scraping’ the HR records.” “It sounds like he has got everything covered,” said Jinnie. “Yes,” replied Alberto. “He told me the next version will allow you to add people to an existing conversation, so for example we could suddenly find we needed to add Brian into the discussion. At the moment, it only works with those invited at the start.”
“Anyway, I suppose I’d better get down to why I called,” said Jinnie. “I thought it was just to play with the new toy,” chuckled Alberto. “No,” said Jinnie, “there are a couple of things I need to tell you. Patrica is resigning. She says she is getting too old.” “What,” said Alberto, “she is younger than me.” “That’s true,” said Jinnie, “but life expectancy in the Caribbean is not as long as in Europe and she wants to see the world before she is too old. Besides, she has had a fall and broken a bone in her foot, and it has made her realise it is now or never. At least we have an able replacement on hand in Jorja. She is highly capable. I think we have another high-flier there.”
“That’s good to hear,” said Alberto. “I always like to promote from inside the company. It encourages others and I really don’t like bringing in outsiders who have little knowledge of the company or its ethos.” “I agree,” said Jinnie. “It takes time for an outsider to get to know how we work. Anyway, I thought you might like to know that Rick has done a magnificent job on the TT Ennios St James Bay. It is now a lovely hotel with a fabulous range of restaurants. It is more like Bournemouth than Southampton in that it caters for longer-staying holidaymakers. I was impressed, and so were the local media. We got a lot of free publicity.”
“Excellent,” said Alberto, “anything else to report?” “Yes, Rick has big expansion plans,” replied Jinnie. “I’m hardly surprised,” said Alberto, “in fact I would be a bit disappointed if a Divisional Director didn’t.” “He was talking about five more hotels,” said Jinnie. “I trust his judgement. Buying Bournemouth was an excellent move and it would still have been making us decent money even if we hadn’t struck lucky with that extra space. The St James Bay is running at about 98% occupancy, something we can only dream about. Keith’s team are currently working on Marigot Bay and even without a main restaurant it is profitable and well on the way to paying back its cost.”
“He is realistic and realises that there is no way we can afford five more hotels all at once,” said Jinnie, “but he talked about buying existing hotels as we have been doing. He thinks a new build is currently beyond us and I am inclined to agree. He has not yet visited any of the five on his shortlist, but his personal favourite was one on Miami Beach. He had pushed it down the list because he said he didn’t fancy trying to break into the United States, where we as a group have no presence. Instead, I think he was favouring one in the Cotswolds.” “I rather like the Cotswolds,” said Alberto.
“Anyway,” continued Jinnie, “I decided to tell him we are setting up to spend big in Florida and we had taken offices in Tampa with a computer centre linked in to SAP and Procurement, Distribution and Warehousing. He suddenly decided that not being alone in Florida and being able to piggyback on Aunty JoJo’s infrastructure might make all the difference, and he went away to revamp his spreadsheets. I suspect we will be hearing from him very soon. When we do, I want to go to Florida with him. I can pass an eye over this hotel and Bearcat USA at the same time.” “I would expect nothing less,” said Alberto, “but don’t be surprised if several other directors think a business trip to Miami is essential.”
In Chapter 23 – Meet Syd
© WorthingGooner 2025
