Start-Up Accommodation With A Difference

Start-Up Accommodation With A Difference:

The Parkview Photo: The Parkview

Something Eventfull, specialist holiday accommodation where a sense of home is encapsulated, are now on Jumpstarter Crowdfunding.

Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, October, 12th, 2016 – New Start-up Company Something Eventfull announced today that it is raising funds via a rewards / equity crowdfunding campaign on Jumpstarter Crowdfunding to finish the interior design and refurbishment of their newly acquired Holiday letting apartment. The company set out to raise R35,000 on Jumpstarter Crowdfunding to finish refurbishment and produce the stylish 1920’s glamour themed apartment which will add to their ethos of providing beautiful, homely, yet affordable holiday accommodation.

The idea to establish an accommodation business was born in 2004 when Something Eventfull owner, Germaine started doing a lot of travelling around South Africa mainly using backpackers as this was the cheapest type of accommodation for a student. She thoroughly enjoyed seeing new places and meeting people from different cultures and distant places. Some of the backpackers that she stayed at were great while others not so much. This ignited Germaine’s passion to start her own accommodation business, borrowing ideas of backpacking, making traveling cheaper especially for young people and students but to make it more comfortable and aesthetically pleasing. So in 2013, she took the plunge, left her full time employment and headed to Cape Town. There she rented an eight bedroom house to operate as a guest house and in a matter of months the business took off. The accommodation was mainly advertised on Airbnb which shares the vision of “caring host”

With the success of the guest house Germaine decided it was time to purchase her own place. She purchased a large bachelor flat in a charming holiday letting block on Durban’s beach front. The building was previously a Hotel which had retained some of those features which worked well with Germaine’s type of accommodation idea. The accommodation offers the rental of a self-catering apartment but with the option of a restaurant serving breakfast, lunch and dinner. The apartment has been operating for two years now and after some initial hiccups it finally picked up with bookings being 60% South Africans and 40% Europeans. The business needed to grow because many of her guests required more than one apartment so after trying numerous avenues without any success she eventually saved up enough money from accommodation sales and selling of personal items to purchase another smaller bachelor apartment in the same block. Purchasing the second apartment has meant that Germaine does not have any available funds to refurbish the apartment to bring it up to accommodation status and start renting it out.

Germaine’s passion for travel and people has allowed her to pursue her dream of operating a unique accommodation business. This passion is what drives her to keep going even in the face of adversity. She values her guest feedback and the great reviews are testament to her commitment in providing caring and homely accommodation to tourist. According to Germaine, “Guest value a host who can give them advise on where to travel, how to get around and share knowledge about their country and culture. The small accommodation business is about giving guest the homely experience compared to the very cold formal hotel experience”.

Something Eventfull was set up in Durban on 1 January 2013 and is owned by Germaine Barnard. It has enjoyed success with its initial trial run holiday letting accommodation based in Camps Bay, Cape Town. This was the stepping stone in realising a vision of providing tourist with accommodation that was based on the idea of the caring host and homely hospitality. Within one month of renting the property for holiday letting the accommodation was 80% booked using mainly the Airbnb portal.