By Travel Writer Emma Wilson
BEING a hotel Genral Manager (GM) is not an easy job, you’ve got to balance all aspects of the hotel as well as keep staff and guests happy and not run the place into the red. One such GM is not only doing a wonderful job on all fronts but his progressive social initiatives are to be absolutely commended.
Quercy left Montmartre, Paris 14 years ago and is raising a family in Sydney as well as GM duties for Skye Suites Parramatta. In the mini- bar of the suites, hotel guests have the opportunity to purchase a pair of colourful ‘silly socks’ with funds helping to fund safe women’s shelters beds for victims of domestic violence.
Quercy’s eyes light up when he talks about this project and other ways he and his team, including right hand man, Ari Foo, involve their staff in. including getting them volunteering at the soup kitchen, donating pillows, sheets and other bedding to local homeless centres and collaboration with Ronald McDonald charities.
In this partnership Skye provides respite accommodation for families spending time at local hospital, also sourcing zoo and local attraction vouchers so the family can enjoy time off in between caring for an ill child.
Quercy and Ari are in talks with suppliers for sustainably packaged shampoo, conditioner and body wash and have partnered with Soap Aid, an organisation responsible for collecting barely used soap to be melted and repurposed for rural communities.
Meaningful ongoing partnerships are important to Quercy and below the hotel is a remarkable archaeological find discovered when digging the hotel car park began in 2005.
Unbelievably the site of Australia’s first Inn, the foundations of a convict hut, one of the earliest buildings dating back to the beginning of European settlement and 1000s of first nations and colonial artefacts was under a layer of soil.
As part of the committee reasonable for preserving this wonderful and important attraction, Quercy is in talks with the University of Western Sydney to catalogue hundreds of artefacts still in boxes to discuss the best way to preserve and display them.
The Skye Suites is an incredible place to hold a corporate conference with four natural light-filled rooms, capacity for 220 people, sliding glass doors that open to an outdoor terrace and day delegate packages.
It’s a central place to stay with your family or for a sporting event with numerous public transport options nearby, gorgeous parkside Misc restaurant close by for lunchtime dining and extensive rooftop drinking and dining above the hotel.
Contact skyeparramatta.com.au or call +61 2 7803 2388 for more.
