Under a slightly overcast sky, Asiz and Patrice and Lily and other Club Med staff members ring the swimming pool overlooking the ocean, urging assorted guests reclining on chaise longues to clamber to their feet.
“Let’s go for a sun dance!” shouts Asiz, his hips and arms swaying as the loudspeakers blast Caribbean-inspired disco music. “C’mon, it’s free!”
Slowly, guests join them, at first a little sheepishly, but soon clapping and dancing with enthusiasm, warming up for the beach games that are to follow.
Yes, Club Med is still Club Med, still something of a summer camp for adults, with lots of sports, games and camaraderie, designed for the vacationer who plays well with others.
Yet Club Med has reinvented itself for the ’90s. At some clubs, like this nearly 3-year-old resort called Columbus Isle on isolated San Salvador, luxury and elegance–and solitude if you so desire–are the draws.
Other clubs have targeted the family market, with special activities, meals and caretakers for the kiddies and privacy for their parents.
And still others have revamped attitudes to appeal to vacationers other than just the pleasure-seeking young singles that the original Club Meds courted a generation ago. These clubs organize special weeks around golf, gourmet food, family reunions, soccer or even TV soap opera stars.
In other words, Club Med has to keep up with the competition. In fact, last week, Club Med announced plans to open a club next in Cuba by the end of this year.
Having pioneered the idea of all-inclusive resorts, in which guests pay one upfront charge for lodging, meals and most activities, Club Med has perhaps been too successful for its own good. At least six other major companies, including Jack Tar Villages and Sandals, now offer all-inclusive beach vacations. Many are narrowly targeted, with some resorts reserved for couples only, some aimed at the luxury traveler, others at sports nuts.
Meanwhile, Club Med had made its name with a one-style-for-all type of resort, which didn’t fit as well with the specialized travel market that has grown up during the last decade.
For instance, the first Club Meds featured basic, almost rustic accommodations (no TVs, no phones, no fancy decor and, originally, no deadbolts on the guest rooms). Meals were taken at communal tables. Sports, both water and land, were the draw.
Some newer clubs, however, have gone upscale in recent years. Thirteen of the more than 100 villages in 35 countries are now classified as Club Med’s Finest, with fancier rooms, the option of private meal times and more-pampered service. (The in-room mini-bar, for instance, can be filled merely by calling the desk.)
The San Salvador club, which opened in 1992 to coincide with the island’s 500th anniversary of its discovery by Christopher Columbus, is perhaps the flagship in this category.
Guests are housed in two-story bungalows, painted in bright pinks, blues, greens and yellows, fanned out along the beach so that each double room has an ocean view. Rooms have walk-in closets, color TVs, push-button phones, built-in hair dryers, refrigerators and private balconies. They’re decorated with furnishings and artwork from around the world–decidedly chic and expensive-looking. The technology is so sophisticated, the air-conditioning shuts off the second a door or window is opened.
The three restaurants, including two specialty restaurants with waiter service and tables for two, the lobby, the two bars and several smaller lounges are furnished in the same fashion. “Burmese rain drums by the bar! Carved Buddhas in the TV lounge!” (The artwork, collected from more than 35 countries, gets star treatment with its own weekly guided tour.)
Four years ago, Club Med also began planning a small number of special “theme weeks” around sports, food and celebrity guests. Two years ago, the program was expanded, with some 20 events planned this year.
Already concluded are weeklong food and wine festivals at San Salvador, Sandpiper in Florida and Huatulco in Mexico; a comedy festival at Cancun, during which pros taught improvisational skills to guests; and tennis week at Paradise Island in the Bahamas, where such former stars as Roscoe Tanner held court.
The Hobie Cat sailing championships took place in May at Huatulco, and soccer stars put on a soccer clinic the same month at Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. At Sonoma Bay in Mexico, marine biologists led ocean-awareness workshops in June.
Most clubs also offer special rates for family reunions, with a family party thrown in. Families, indeed, have been the focus of some of the most intense marketing.
Some clubs–among them Sandpiper in Florida, Eleuthera in the Bahamas and Ixtapa in Mexico–now include Mini-Clubs, just for kids. Sandpiper takes infants as young as 4 months; St. Lucia in the West Indies prefers toddlers 2 years and older. And the Huatulco Club Med this year opened a Teen Club, with sports, activities and meals for teens 12 to 17. These Mini-Clubs offer traditional beach sports, plus kid-friendly activities such as circus workshops, pony rides and go-cart tracks.
The main constant among all the clubs is the staff, an international group of mostly twentysomething sports enthusiasts called Gentle Organizers (G.O.s for short).
The G.O.s have, shall we say, a multifaceted job description. The one leading the bike tour at 8 a.m. may also organize the table-tennis tournament after lunch, lead the trivia contest during happy hour, chat with guests at dinner, then perform a song-and-dance routine during the nightly 10 p.m. show.
Although most of the G.O.s are unfailingly polite and friendly, even perky–they almost have to be to endure that schedule–an encounter with the occasional rude one leaves a sour taste. And when things don’t work quite right, there is a tendency, in a sometimes-subtle but classically French way, to blame problems on the guests. None of that U.S.-style “the customer is always right” philosophy here.
For instance, I tried to call home for three days, carefully using the code supplied in my room. Unsuccessful, I finally dialed the front desk.
“You must be doing it wrong,” barked the attendant.
No, I followed your instructions exactly.
“You must have the wrong number,” she said.
No, I think I know my own number.
“Well, it should work,” she said haughtily, ending the conversation.
Well, yes, it should have–but I never did get a call through, and no one ever seemed to care.
To be fair, however, most perform even the silliest tasks with enthusiasm. One afternoon, three G.O.s dressed in 1920s-style striped bathing suits, complete with knickers, roamed among sunbathers, passing trays of chilled melon and pineapple slices. Daily, dozens gather in a clapping, singing mass in the lobby to welcome the new guests, hand out fruit punch and escort them personally to their rooms.
Other G.O.s patiently teach guests, even the ones with minimal hand-eye coordination, how to sail, water-ski, wind-surf, play tennis or do step aerobics. They want guests to have a good time. That’s their job. And mostly they succeed.
After all, even the San Salvador sun dance worked. Barely half an hour after its conclusion, the remaining clouds melted away. The rest of the week was beautiful.
