Christmas 2010 at Hotel La Rosa de America

Another year has come and gone at our San Jose Airport Hotel.

As always, the beginning of December was ushered in by the Hotel La Rosa Christmas decorating party. Most of the staff participated in this party and had a great time putting up decorations, the Christmas tree, having a party and listening to Christmas Carols.

This year was characterized by a number of new faces among the staff. Our receptionist, after performing excellent work for 18 months was promoted to Interior Hotel Manager. We created a new full time Cleaning/Food Prep position and rewarded our longest serving part time cleaner with the position. In the exterior areas, a recent gardener hire proved so good that after the retirement of our head groundskeeper, we promoted the new gardener directly into his empty position. So far, he is doing an admirable job of assisting the hotel in ensuring the hotel grounds survive the transition to the dry season - always a challenge when the rain stops falling in a jungle environment and hundreds of guests begin to arrive for Christmas! A forth hire has been in a bi-lingual evening concierge/receptionist with some basic maintenance skills! This jack of all trades has somewhat carved out his own position here by being useful in more areas than we have the ability to spare him in!

Unfortunately, this year we have had to say goodbye to a couple of staff members. Miguel, our gardener and groundskeeper of 15 years retired at the end of November. During his good-bye party, he indicated an imminent desire to move to Hawaii... an odd and unlikely choice indeed! Also, in mid December, we said good-bye to our former Hotel Manager. We wish him well, especially as he is our next door neighbour!!

Overall, our Costa Rica Airport Hotel is looking towards the future with high hopes. We used the second part of 2010 to complete a major hotel re-organization, launch a new marketing campaign (with upgraded/updated website) and conduct a comprehensive staff restructuring in preparation for the 2011 tourist season. This was necessary due to the increasing business at our airport hotel and for our desire to maintain and even improve upon our already famous customer service and attention to detail. Therefore, we feel confident that, with the new training and organization at the hotel, we will be even better able to ensure your satisfaction when you stay at our San Jose Airport Hotel!

Hotel La Rosa Restructures for the 2011 High Season

We have been very grateful for the increasing business at our San Jose Airport Hotel especially during these very difficult economic times. In the last three years Hotel La Rosa de America has gone from a quiet, barely heard of Costa Rica Aiport Hotel with an average of under 30% yearly occupancy to being the number one entry and exit point for over 8,000 guests last year. We have also recently expanded, adding two new large family suites which have been very successful and we are still finding that on many days we have limited or no space left! Naturally this has resulted in a need for employee and services restructuring at the Hotel. Thus, in a process that started in June 2010 and was finally completed 01 December 2010, we have completely overhauled all aspects of our customer service and redirected efforts towards improving and enhancing the overall guest experience. One of the main components of this task was to fully restructure and retrained our employees to meet the expanding needs of our Costa Rica Airport Hotel.

One of the cornerstones of our sucess at Hotel La Rosa has been our honest, individual style guest service. It is our policy to ensure that every guest has the opportunity to interact and talk with staff about their trip plans, or trip experiences and of course to ask any travel related questions they may have. We want to ensure you have as best as possible a Costa Rican experience here in our host country! Of course, this was much easier to do when we had half the guests coming to our hotel! Thus, we have had the pleasant task of being in a position to hire more staff during a recession. Due to the current difficulties in the Costa Rican Tourism economy, and the necessity of so many hotels needing to downsize, we have been able to access a very wide selection of trained workers needing employment in a stable position. Now as a result, we have five new employees, all of whom have completed Hotel La Rosa's training program and we feel are now well equipped to assist with guests needs.

Part of our new season's goals are to provide a better overall experience for our guests. Our guest's feedback, repeat business, and guest referrals provide the single largest component of our international marketing campaign. Thus ensuring guest happiness and loyalty is extremely important for us. We know we are one of over a hundred and fifty competing Costa Rica Airport Hotels! To that end, La Rosa staff will ensure that all guests will still feel like they have entered a Hotel that still provides Bed and Breakfast personalized service. Another major change for the 2011 year is our breakfast service. We have completely changed the way we present our breakfast. It is now in an all you can eat buffet style. Our kitchen staff now prepare almost double the options we provided for in the 2010 season including eggs and on certain days, the Costa Rican favorite, "Pinto". Returning guests can still enjoy our famous Banana Bread - the secret recipe that came all the way from Raffles in Singapore many years ago! If you like tropical fruit, you will have a feast at La Rosa! We offer a minimum of five different types of seasonal fruit including what we think is the "best pineapple in the world" - the Costa Rican Pina Dorada. This local variety of pineapple is much sweeter and less acidic than normal pineapple.

Completely restructuring our breakfast would be pointless without a complete remodelling of our Italian designed dining room area. New for 2011, the dining area now displays new curtains, a much warmer sandy paint colour on the walls, a greatly expanded buffet display area, new chairs, and all new table cloths. The tables have also been re-organized to offer greater privacy for guests during breakfast time. Just outside, we are re-doing the flowerbeds to the rear of the property to increase the beauty of the breakfast area view. We are planting the beautifully scented Gardenia Flower so guests coming to breakfast can smell the scent of this "purfume on a tree'. These changes are designed to increase the early morning enjoyment for our guests - especially those who have just arrived from long flights the night before and have yet to actually see the beauty of Costa Rica.

Another objective for the hotel is to become recognized as a 3 star hotel. To this end, we continue to upgrade hotel infrastructure services, using environmentally friendly solutions wherever possible. Also, we now have 24 hour, 7 days a week night concierge service. No matter when your flight arrives, we will be waiting for you! At this time our Reception area will still close at 10 pm however, this will not be a problem for late arrivals or early departures as our night staff are now fully trained to deal with most guest needs.

Hotel La Rosa de America has spent five months of the low season restructuring in preparation for the 2011 high season. Though we recognize this process never ends (nor should it!) we do feel that our Alajuela Airport Hotel is now in an even better position to provide great service to our guests, both repeat and new alike!

Our Alajuela Airport Hotel now has Two New Familiy Suites!

Here at Hotel La Rosa de America, we have received numerous requests for cost effective accommodations suitable for larger families. Recognizing the fact that not all families consist of two adults and two children (and maybe a pet...) we have recently completed two large family suites designed for larger families. Each suite can take a maximum of six and seven guests respectively.

This way, larger families can now relax in their very own suite - all at a price significantly less than the cost of two or even three separate rooms!

Beds in each room consist of a mixture of double bed, single bed and bunk bed and can be changed as required, depending on guest needs.

Each suite also has the same services as the other rooms at the hotel with the exception (currently) of safety boxes. Each suite has a private entrance, private porch, private bathrooms, beautiful garden views, hot water, cable TV, a sitting area and Suite One has a walk in closet whereas Suite Two has access to a large private deck.

These rooms are also designed with our groups in mind. Over the past three years, our Costa Rica Airport Hotel has seen significant increases in specialized group bookings. We are now hosting a large number of groups from Canada and the USA, as well as England, France, Cayman Islands, Panama and Costa Rica.

We very much enjoy and encourage these groups to stay with us at our La Garita Airport Hotel. Most of these groups are designed around principles of learning, donation, environmental awareness, or language study. In many cases these groups give back more to Costa Rica then they take. This is in keeping with the over-arching ideals of Hotel La Rosa de America and our personal hotel business ethic.

There have been a number of other changes that have been recently implemented at La Rosa. In part, due to the increased volume of guests, we have restructured our breakfast to be more like a buffet. This has allowed us to provide even more food options to our guests. Groups especially find our breakfast buffet to be faster and simpler now now that is no longer served. No worries though! Even if our breakfast is no longer served, we always have staff available to talk to our guests and answer any questions they may have about their trip planning or whatever they wish to talk about!

Another big change at the hotel is that it is now staffed 24 hours a day 7 days a week. We have permanent English and Spanish-speaking night Concierge staff at the hotel so there are no problems with late arriving or very early departing guests. Though Reception closes still at 10 pm, we understand that most of our travellers will at some point be arriving or departing via the San Jose International Airport (Juan Santamaria Airport) and that this means they may need taxi's or other assistance during the night. Our night staff are trained to handle all normal guest needs and if a situation arises where they need more assistance, they are trained in what to do!

So, along with a variety of other ongoing changes, including the installation of a new, more environmentally friendly laundry facility and hot water production system, we at Hotel La Rosa de America are gearing up for a new, and hopefully exciting high season. We are very thankful for the loyalty and support of our past guests, many of whom have returned year after year to our hotel. You, our guests, are the reason we have been able to succeed during the last 18 months of difficult times. We are now hoping for an even better future and a great year of prosperity here in Costa Rica! Pura Vida!!

Well, our San Jose Airport Hotel gets a New Mascot

Well, it is pretty likely that most businesses that receive thousands of guests from around the world end up with some pretty interesting, even unlikely stories from time to time. For us at La Rosa de America, one of the most bizarre stories commenced about four years ago.

The Gardens of Hotel La Rosa are a sanctuary for scores of birds, animals and interesting insects all busy trying to make a home away from the noise, pavement, cars and the excessive number of dogs owned by Costa Ricans in the populous San Jose Airport region.

One day, four years ago, a baby tree squirrel tried for the first time to hop from one mango tree to the next. (Costa Rican tree squirrels are aggressive jumpers and can easily jump from tree to tree) However, this poor fellow got all knotted up, missed his landing zone and fell to the ground. In doing so he broke his back and was now a paraplegic squirrel. Normally this is where the story would end as in the wild, the survival time of this squirrel would be measured at most in hours. However, the staff at La Rosa rescued the injured squirrel, bought a cage and cared for him.

Charlie the squirrel became the unofficial mascot of our Alajuela Airport Hotel.

Unfortunately, Mother Nature never really let up on Charlie and he slowly became sick and eventually died undoubtedly from complications resulting from his paralysis.

So, La Rosa was without a mascot (we have no dogs on the property unlike most hotels as it is too hard to keep them from barking when they hear another dog bark at 2 in the morning!) Therefore, we acquired a Guinea Pig in a moment of "weakness". :-) Chancha is now about six months old, more or less fully grown and sits/squeaks proudly outside the reception door happily greeting guests. More likely, we suspect she is mostly hoping for more food! Thus the name "Chancha"... which in Spanish is a common reference to coins destined for the "Piggy" Bank.

Chancha has already nosed her way into the hearts of many children who have recently visited our hotel - and more than a few adults too! If she is out surveying her domain when you arrive, do remember to say hi to her!

Hotel La Rosa Enters the 2010 Low Season

After too many months without a blog, we have finally found the time to start writing again!

So far 2010 is proving to be somewhat of a recovery year in Costa Rica. Though most hotels and tourist businesses have suffered significant declines in revenue, and some have been forced out of business entirely, we have been very fortunate. Year 2009 was an excellent one for us and was the year where we saw our hotel transition from being the second choice for many guests arriving at the San Jose International Airport to being the primary choice for thousands of travelers needing safe and beautiful accommodation in the Central Valley of Costa Rica.

We have now entered the 2010 Low Season in the Alajuela area (aka Green Season) and are continuing to meet with greater than hoped for success. This success has allowed us to make hundreds of improvements, both small and large to our hotel in the hopes of being able to offer even better service to both new and returning guests alike.

These changes have targeted every sector of our operations. Continuing improvements in hotel structural services have occupied much of our time and resources, however we have also completed renovations to two more of our triple/quad cabins. Also, and just in time for the Dry Season, our Garden Staff completed the underground sprinkler system and got it hooked up to our well cistern. The difference this new sprinkler system has made to the lawn and flowers over the Dry Season has been remarkable.

La Garita is recognized as having the sunniest weather in the entire San Jose region. Therefore without these new sprinklers, the Garden would suffer without water for weeks.

One of the most exciting (and demanding) projects was the development of a new, more modern and more secure website. As of 27 May 2010, Hotel La Rosa de America launched a brand new website using the same URL location. https://larosadeamerica.com/ Though not all sections are 100% complete yet, it is fully functional. Improvements include a better presentation, more modern style, 100% SSL security on all pages and updated pictures. Be sure to check out the new Picture Gallery set to the beautiful reed flute musical adaptation of the famous Con Te Partiro. We will next be concentrating on the Tourist Information and Book Donation Pages. As always, questions and comments are welcome!

Season Two of new Ownership at LA ROSA ends with great success despite Global Economic Recession...

Now that the rains have arrived and the guests have for the most part left Costa Rica until the next high season, the time has come for our San Jose Airport Hotel to start all the large maintenance and improvement projects that have been delayed throughout this busy year. Hotel La Rosa de America has started this maintenance period by going on a major hiring campaign with the result of more than doubling our existing staff! We are proud to be able to do our part in the La Garita community by hiring both skilled and unskilled labour in this time of economic hardship.

Tourism throughout Costa Rica is sharply down both in numbers and in dollars spent per guest. Local newspapers have reported the decrease in tourists as high as 40% and the overall loss in tourist dollars spent as high as 60% over the last year. As predicted, this has had a major impact in all sectors of the industry but especially at the many coastal hotels.

On a positive note, competition brings out many great human qualities and in our opinion, this is occurring throughout Costa Rica with respect to tourism. The result is an ongoing, and in our humble opinion, a much needed revolution in the quality of customer service, in reliability (less Pura Vida/Mañana and more action) and in more reasonable pricing throughout the industry. Though there is significant pain being felt throughout the tourism industry at this time, we feel that once tourism rebounds in Costa Rica, the remaining quality establishments will be in a position to offer vastly better service to guests from around the World.

At Hotel La Rosa de America, we have managed to avoid much of the economic downturn. We are fortunate due to our sunny La Garita, Alajuela location. We are convenient to the one major airport - San Jose's Juan Santa Maria International Airport, and to the many world class attractions all within easy day trips, and our hotel has experienced the busiest year in it's 13 year history. We have received over 50 highly positive guest reports on the popular internet travel site Tripadvisor alone, all of which we are very proud of. We are grateful for all the continued loyalty shown by our many returning guests and for our new guests without whom, we would not be able to consider these new improvement projects.

Not wanting to take our past success for granted, we at La Rosa have taken note of all our customer comments, both the positive and the suggestions for improvement (yes there have been a couple!!) and this Fall, we will be implementing major improvements to our rooms, continuing with our upgrading of electrical throughout the hotel. We will begin switching from electric hot water to gas as much as possible as it is more efficient and better for the environment in Costa Rica. Projects currently underway include upgrading of telephone lines, increasing our high speed internet bandwidth from 1 Meg to 2 Megs, and a complete rewiring of our Cable TV so as to provide a clearer television picture within the rooms.




As always, no maintenance period would be complete without large garden projects. We will be planting a large laurel hedge down the one partially exposed side of the property with the aim of both beautifying the western end of the garden and to provide an even greater sound and privacy barrier for the hotel guests.

A number of other projects are slated for this fall and we will keep everyone up to date through this blog as the projects are completed. For now, as Hotel La Rosa de America enters it's third year of new ownership, we would like to take the opportunity to thank everyone who has stayed with us in the past and to encourage future potential guests to give us a try!

Lush, Lush, LUSH La Rosa!!

With the onset of the spring rains and some well placed fertilizer, the gardens of Hotel La Rosa are looking better then ever. All the work from last year, all the decisions, and concerns of cutting five big trees down has now resulted in more light getting to the ground. Now we have lots of flowers, virtually no biting insects and a vastly improved lawn as well. The remaining trees still offer plenty of shade and are looking more healthy.

The last few months have been a bit of a roller coaster for the hotel in bookings. May and June were quiet, more so than last year, and we were becoming concerned for the remainder of the year, what with the global recession and all. Then July occurred! Fourth busiest month on record for the hotel and by far the busiest low season month we have ever had. Thank you to all our guests who made this happen!

As a result, we are now well set to enter the REAL low season starting at the end of August. September and October are normally very quiet months. Even though one is virtually guaranteed rain each day in these months, it is still a great time to travel. The best weather in the country can be found on the Caribbean during this time and minimal tourists mean better prices and no lineups!


Here at La Rosa, we will be using this time to modernize parts of our hotel. Slated are major upgrades to two of our cabins, a reconstruction of our existing lawn sprinkling system, necessary in order to cover all the areas which are not covered now, and a major painting/changing of colour scheme inside the hotel. This, plus some other "non-visual" improvements in essential services will be completed in time for the beginning of the new high season in December. For those guests planning to visit our hotel in these months, no interruptions or inconvenience is anticipated as most of the work is self contained and not noisy.

All in all we consider ourselves very fortunate to have escaped the troubles of this economic recession. Many other tourist establishments have not been so fortunate, especially those still recovering from the January earthquake.