New Year, New Look
The Importance of our Yearly Closure at Long Beach Lodge
written by Mikey Nixon, November 2024
Ever wonder why we close down the lodge from late December to early January every year? Well, we caught up with our Maintenance Manager, Neil Lounsbury, to find out why our yearly closure is so important to our brand.
“We're redoing 12 lodge rooms this season: new carpet, new paint upgrades- that’s essentially what we're doing,” explains Neil. “We're also painting all the pet rooms and upgrading them with our new paint colour, so I think it'll actually be a total of 20 rooms with a fresh look.”
Make no mistake, it’s all business for Neil, his team and the staff from other departments who stick around to help out. And with so many tasks to accomplish in a short period of time, the whole process needs to be very organised.
“We’re also upgrading the fireplaces in 12 of our cottages to match the improvements we've made in the lodge over the past two years. Four of the cottages are getting brand new floors, carpets, kitchen cupboards, kitchen counters, and new paint. Basically, we're setting a new standard for the look of the direction we want to go.”
In other words, our award-winning reputation doesn’t come easily. We’re always striving to be better than we were the year before. And our closure is a huge part of that.
“The maintenance crew dives in a hundred percent. We’re all-hands-on-deck working with other staff members,” says Neil.
The Great Room is converted into a base of operations throughout the closure, with dry-erase boards mapping out tasks that need to be accomplished over the course of the month. And even though the lodge is closed to guests, our whole property’s still a hive of activity.
“We'll have half the cottages full on the one side of the road with tradespeople,” says Neil. “There's probably going to be 25 contractors working on various jobs: electrical upgrades, all our HVAC equipment on the roof, all our kitchen equipment. Everything is completely stripped, gone over, cleaned, retrofitted, upgraded, maintained. It's a once-a-year thing. All that stuff gets looked at. And it's all happening in a 30-day block.”
As we move into 2025, we need to make sure that we keep up with the evolution of our brand. We’re so grateful to Neil and his team for coordinating this massive effort. The lodge just wouldn’t be the same without the dedication of the people who make this place so special.
We will be closed between December 8th and January 7th. But we can’t wait to welcome guests back in the new year!
