Five-star hotel educates local youth
27-11-2013
The Ritz-Carlton is the first five-star hotel at Aruba. Next to the 320 rooms and 450 local jobs the hotel brings education to the island as well. Together with maritime biologist Dr. Richard Murphy from the Jean-Michel Cousteau’s Ocean Futures Society, the hotel developed an innovative environmental curriculum for primary school students. The education modules will be available on the Green Aruba website to learn about the island’s unique environmental assets and how to protect them. The youth is introduced to the ‘Ritz-Calton Succeed Through Service Program’ to enhance their leadership qualities. Though these and other collaborations Prime Minister Mike Eman and Bill Marriott agreed to a long-standing commitment to enriching education on the island and a Green Aruba.
KLM shows current response time
25-11-2013
Nowadays you get quicker response to a question/problem by sending a message via Twitter or Facebook than using customers service by phone. KLM will show how long it will take before you get a response to your question. The airline introduced the current response time in the header of Twitter, on the customer support page of KLM.com and soon on Facebook. KLM receives approximately 30,000 messages per week and promises customers to respond within one hour. By showing the current response time, KLM will show if they really stick to the promise to respond within one hour.
NIX18
21-11-2013
The age limit for buying alcohol and tobacco in the Netherlands will increase to 18 years on January 1, 2014. The Ministry of Health has launched the campaign NIX18 in collaboration with a number of partners. The campaign was kicked of on November 18 in the Feyenoord Stadium by Ronald Koeman and the secretary of Healthy Martin van Rijn. NIX18 draws attention that young people under the age of eighteen should not smoke or drink. Some famous Dutchies tell their story about not drinking or smoking under the age of eighteen on the website of NIX18. Partners of the campaign also organize some one-on-one activities for children and their parents to encourage to explain that they are not allowed to buy alcohol and tobacco.
Baileys Chocolat Luxe cocktails
19-11-2013
The dark days before Chrismas deserve special winter cocktails. Baileys Chocolat Luxe inspired us with three different cocktails. The Rococo serve is created by Bompas & Parr from the U.K. and served in a high glass with ice and raspberry. Liqueur expert Missy Flynn from London came up with the Chocolate Black Forrest (with cherry liqueur) and Chocolate mint (with mint frozen into ice cubes).
New Year’s Eve dinner at the Waldorf Astoria
15-11-2013
Since 1931 the Waldorf Astoria NY has been a legendary destination for elegant New Year’s Eve celebrations. They now want to see how many Waldorf Astoria NY New Year’s Eve photos they can collect! They ask their fans at Facebook and their Twitter followers to find and post photos, everybody can vote and the person who did make or found the winning photo will receive a dinner for 2 at the Waldorf on New Year’s Eve! A great promotional campaign, simple to execute and who knows they might even run into some great photo’s from private albums.
Lidl pop-up restaurant at Michelin-star level
14-11-2013
Restaurant Dill opened on September 13 in Stockholm. London-based chef Michael Wignall** made the menu and organized the kitchen. A 9-course menu was prized at an astonishing € 55,-, and the restaurant was fully booked from day one on. Too good to be true? Yes it was! It appeared to be a marketing stunt for Lidl. Only four ingredients (including liquid nitrogen) that were used for the preparation of the courses weren’t part of the supermarkets assortment.
Inspiration from NOMA
12-11-2013
By Julia Soldic.
Last Thursday, November the 7th, we were at a lecture of René Redzepi (Noma. Copenhagen) about his new book ‘A Work in Progress’. Organized by Babooka, a bookstore in Leiden and LeidsLekkers to herald the Restaurant Week in Leiden. During this lecture René rapidly exchanged reading passages from his diary with images and videos of his restaurant and chefs. Julia Soldic, a Norwegian who recently graduated from the Hotelschool The Hague, has had an internship of a few weeks at Noma in 2012. She was at the lecture with us and writes in her column below of her experience and leaves between the lines a number of ‘learnings’, such as encouraging creativity and the importance of team building and contact with your guests.
QR-mosaic project QRio
12-11-2013
The Rio de Janeiro government has installed QR-mosaic in the sideways to provide tourists with more information and a map. The QR-code opens an app that makes road signs unnecessary.
Theme park with Michelin-star restaurant
8-11-2013
Europa-Park (Germany) is the first theme park with a Michelin star. Within a year after opening fine dining restaurant Ammolite, located in the lighthouse of the ‘Bell Rock’ theme hotel, has received the star rating. The restaurant has 36 seats and the kitchen is successfully run by chef Peter Hagen (36 years old). For the design of the restaurant designer Claudio Carbone was inspired by a snailhouse, the name ‘Ammolite’ refers to fossil shells from the Rocky Mountains.
For fans of Franch chansons
8-11-2013
Marc Cruellas, de zingende patron van ‘Le Bistrot de la Place’ in Den Haag, treedt elke vrijdag- en zaterdagavond samen met zijn pianist Guillaume Marcenac op in zijn eigen bedrijf. Hiermee creëren zij telkens een Parijse sfeer van ‘Montmartre’ en ‘La vie en rose’ in de bistrot.
Op zondag, 1 december, treden zij echter samen op bij de Franse Bistro Bord’o in Leiden. Tijdens het optreden verzorgt het team van bistro Bord’o een 3-gangenmenu ‘Beaujolais Nouveau’, met typische Franse bistro gerechten. En Marc en Guillaume zingen en spelen alle bekende Franse chansons. Voor de liefhebber hiervan een heerlijke avond! En een mooi voorbeeld van samenwerken!
