Playa Viva will be ending our 3rd season of operations at the end of July, yet we are already excited about the upcoming season starting October 12th, 2012. We have already started our strategic planning initiative with programs that extend to our 4th and 5th seasons. What are these strategic initiatives and how do they build on the strong base we have already created?

At our end of season team meeting, we reviewed our team initiatives for the last few years and discussed the goals for the upcoming seasons.

Our goals this past year are (see below for difference between our team yearly goals and overall mission):

1) Security – due to insecurity felt by North American travelers, our goal was to make Security goal number one and make all guest feel 100% secure from time of arrival to departure.
2) Hygiene – Mexico is known for “Montenzuma’s revenge”, yet we do NOT want Playa Viva on that list, so we made Hygiene a major initiative for 2011-2012 and beyond (especially related to training team members who are new to the hospitality industry)
3) Sustainability – our goal was to continue to train our team on sustainability issues and have them be leaders at Playa Viva and in their communities.

Added for 2012-2013
4) Garden to Table – work harder to have more produce from our garden and deliver more fresh dishes from Garden to Table. This includes additional training and increased cooperation for and between our kitchen and permaculture teams.
5) Transparency – this includes more reporting and information provide to guests on-site and through our community via the Internet related to our sustainability activities, specifically in the following areas: Water, Energy (Solar, Gas LP, Gasoline & Diesel – use and production), Food and Compost.

Currently we have an intern on site, Monica Oyarzun (who is working on a project related to our GIIRS rating) we will be more transparent with information about our vendors and suppliers and asking them to be more socially and environmentally conscious and make efforts to improve their impact in both of these areas. Vendor and Supply chain ripple effect on sustainability will be an even bigger goal for 2013-2014.

Check out our GIIRS Rating.

Let us know what is important to you in social and environmental impact assessment. What is your feedback on our goals for upcoming seasons to improve our overall service offering.  Note: These team annual goals differ from our overall mission of Creating Meaning Community, Transformational Experiences, Abundant Biodiversity, Clean Energy and Water and a Living Legacy.