Whale Cottage Portfolio Blog

Madame Zingara is dead!   The ‘Theatre of Dreams’ circus theatre restaurant, which was created as a result of a fire in the original Madame Zingara premises in Loop Street in Cape Town, went into final liquidation yesterday.

Madame Zingara owner and “ringmaster, Richard Griffin, appears to have over-extended himself, in taking his Madame Zingara to London in December, at the same time that he opened Mojolena, a sister theatre restaurant, but on a much smaller scale, in Cape Town, so that he could continue employing the staff that could not get visas to go to the UK.   His backers in the UK pulled out due to the credit crunch, while unpaid debts in Cape Town led to the liquidation.

Whilst Madame Zingara opened to sold-out nights at the Battersea Power Station in London in December, it was a fantastic “advertisement” for South African creativity, and the culinary and cultural marriage.    However, the marketing damage of the closure in London is bad for the country, as the Time Out website, which had featured a very favourable review, is filled with comments from persons who had booked and paid for the dinner and show, but who do not appear to be able to receive their money back.   Griffin’s South African origin is mentioned in the comments.

Griffin also has unpleasant culpable homicide and attempted murder charges hanging over his head, resulting from an accident in 2006, in which a pedestrian died and another was injured, with Griffin allegedly driving into them, reports the Cape Argus.

The Sweet Service Award goes to Theuns, Service Manager at Chrysler Jeep Dodge in Century City in Cape Town, the only person in the organisation who appears to understand the word “service”, and who saved his company from a Sour Service Award.    Annemarie, who books the services, is a very defensive and rude person.    Her colleague, Claudine, who is called the Service Advisor, is quick to interrupt the customer, without allowing the customer to finish a sentence, and does not call her customers about their cars’ service.   A car was left at the service company overnight after a routine service, without explanation or call.    The customer was told when the driver would deliver the vehicle.   Once the customer called the Service Manager to complain about the rudeness from the two ladies, he said the magic words: “when would it suit you to have the car delivered?”!    It is a shame for customers that Chrysler Jeep Dodge is a monopoly in Cape Town, as it is the only dealership and service station for these makes of vehicles.

The Sour Service Award goes to the Department of Home Affairs’ branch in Paarl, for its inefficiency.    A 93-year old South African resident wants to renew his German passport, but has to meet a new requirement from the German Consulate, i.e. he has to submit a written statement from the Department of Home Affairs, to prove to the German authorities that he has never applied for South African citizenship.   He applied for this statement in person at the Paarl offices of the Department of Home Affairs, and was told that it was sent by registered mail from Pretoria to Paarl three months ago.  When he phones the Pretoria offices of the Department, they confirm that the statement has been sent to the Paarl offices.  When he contacts the Paarl office of the Department, they say it has not yet arrived.   No amount of intervention at the highest levels possible has created any success for this elderly gentleman, who would like to make a visit to his country of birth.

The WhaleTales Sweet & Sour Service Awards are presented every Friday on the WhaleTales blog.  Nominations for the Sweet and Sour Service Awards can be sent to Chris von Ulmenstein at info@whalecottage.com.

Melbourne restaurant Rusk will be serving Cape Food for a dinner it is serving during the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival next month, reports the Australian Hospitality magazine.

Rusk owner, Lance Rosen, is a South African, who draws on the Cape Malay heritage of South African food, which he calls “Cape Food”.  He recently visited his mentor Cass Abrahams, who has a Cape Malay restaurant on the Seidelberg wine estate outside Paarl.

S A Tourism has appointed Rosen as a Food Ambassador for South Africa,  and he will cook for a S A Tourism cocktail party and lunch for travel media from Australia, New Zealand and South East Asia.    Rosen’s menu will include biltong, “boebotie”, ‘frikadelle”, “sosaties”, tipsy tart and “koeksusters”.

More than 200 000 FIFA 2010 World Cup tickets were sold within the first 24 hours of ticket sales going live on-line last Friday, and the majority were sold to South Africans, reports the Sunday Argus.    This figure excludes applications for tickets via branches of First National Bank.

Ticket applications came from 125 countries, and the highest number of applications, after those from South Africa, were from the UK, the USA, Germany, Brazil, Australia, Japan, Mexico, Canada, Switzerland, Ireland, the Netherlands, Spain and Argentina.

The ticket sales are by application, and the successful applicants for the first round of ticket sales until the end of March will be notified in April.

FIFA has expressed its satisfaction with the ticket application response.  It appears less happy with the low level of Confederations Cup ticket sales, given that the Cup will be contested in South Africa in four months from now.

One of the largest cruise liners, the Sun Princess, will dock in Cape Town in winter, reports The Star, giving the city a welcome boost in a period which is usually very quiet.  

The ship will also visit Richard’s Bay, Durban and Port Elizabeth on its trip to Fremantle in Australia, between May and June.

More than 2 000 passengers are on board, and they and the crew could be spending as much as R 358 000 per day on their port visits, according to a 2007 Cruise Liner International Association Economic Impact Study.

British Airways is expecting increased business to and from South Africa after the 2010 World Cup, having seen strong tourism interest in countries hosting big sport events such as the Olympics and soccer World Cup, says Business Report.

Quoting Richard Webb, a director of BA, the article says that  South Africa is one of the airline’s strongest markets, and that it has doubled its flights to Cape Town during summer, and that it would increase its flights to Johannesburg.

A mix of top chefs and French champagnes and Cap Classiques from Franschhoek are on the menu in Franschhoek for an indulgent “Chefs & Champagne” weekend from 27 - 29 March.  

Chefs and their restaurants have been matched with Champagne and Cap Classique brands, and will be offering private chef’s table dinners and lunches, reflecting the “lavish lifestyle” of Franschhoek, the ad for the event says.

So, for example, Le Franschhoek is serving a five course dinner with Pierre Jourdan for just 18 persons, at R 720 per head, on 27 March.   Mange Tout at Mont Rochelle is serving a 5 course dinner  for 20 persons with Billecart Salmon Champagne, the most expensive dinner of them all, at R 1 350 per head, on 27 March.   Ruebens is pairing with Graham Beck and serving a  6 course lunch on 29 March at R 940 per head, for 20 persons.

Bookings can be made by e-mailing Darielle at events@franschhoek.org.za

Media reports earlier this week have sown confusion about who is handling the marketing of Cape Town.

The Cape Times reported that the marketing of Cape Town had only been awarded to Cape Town Tourism (CTT) for a six month period, in a caretaking role, until “the city could find a permanent solution”, according to the City’s Theuns Vivian, of its Economic , Social Development and Tourism department.    The City acknowledged that it was unable to do the marketing of Cape Town internally.   Confusion was particularly created with the paragraph:”The consultants said that while there was some advantage in keeping CTT as the marketing agency, it could create confusion.  CTT was also not “currently geared” to act as destination marketing organisation.”

This paragraph reflects in part the criticsm of the City’s decision to withdraw its funding of Cape Town Routes Unlimited in July last year, as voiced by the province MEC Garth Strachan.

The Cape Argus wrote that the City was looking for an external body to market Cape Town.  It also referred to Cape Town Tourism conducting this task for the City “in the interim”.

Members of Cape Town Tourism voted last year to change the Constitution of Cape Town Tourism, to allow it to take on the marketing role for the City.  

Mariette du Toit-Helmbold, CEO of Cape Town Tourism, reacted to the Cape Times article by saying that “it is a misrepresentation by a journalist of the City’s public participation process undertaken to determine whether  marketing and visitor services must be outsourced or internalized in future.”    The City had approved the outsourcing of the marketing this week.   “I have double checked with Mansoor Mohammed (head of the City’s tourism department),  and he has put the story into perspective.  He has promised to address a letter of clarification to me for interested parties.  We will not respond to the media on this, although we know that bad reporting does a lot of damage to the industry and can create unnecessary confusion.’ she wrote.

Du Toit-Helmbold did indicate that Cape Town Tourism does have to apply, through an open tender, to be appointed the marketing agency for the City, in order to prevent any future questions about the legality of the appointment.  While this process is in place, the appointment of Cape Town Tourism is contractually agreed until 30 June 2009, with the view that the public participation process will have been completed, and Cape Town Tourism can then be appointed on a three year contract.

Cape Town Tourism is in full swing in offering Marketing services for Cape Town, according to its contract with the City and the mandate from its members to do so.

In the mean time, the City’s Economic Development and Tourism department has been found to ”not be up to its task”, reports the Cape Argus, and therefore a R 1,2 million review is to be undertaken of the department’s activities.   Called Project Rejuvenate, the organisation structure of the department is inadequate in allowing the Department to meet its mandate.   The project includes retraining existing staff and sourcing new staff.

The Sweet Service Award goes to Desmond Spangenberg at Allee Bleue, a wine estate outside Franschhoek.   The estate has undergone a transformation in keeping its boom open and being welcoming to visitors, after years of keeping it closed and questioning visitors as to what they want!    The restaurant on the estate serves lunches and breakfasts at the most reasonable prices, and the menu contains out of the ordinary dishes.   The latest and most welcome addition to the service range is a free wireless ADSL service, which unfortunately is not made known to the patrons of the restaurant. 

The Sour Service Award goes to the V & A Waterfront for their parking machines being out of order in the basement section underneath the Nu Metro cinema.  A first machine did not accept any notes, and the next one accepted a note, but then jammed and would not release the ticket after payment.   It took 10 minutes of ringing the service bell for someone to respond – he sits next to the parking machines, but is not immediately visible to customers.  Once the problem was explained to him, he said the customer should drive out, and press the button at the boom - it took 20 minutes for him to respond and open the boom! 

The WhaleTales Sweet & Sour Service Awards are presented every Friday on the WhaleTales blog.  Nominations for the Sweet and Sour Service Awards can be sent to Chris von Ulmenstein at info@whalecottage.com.

The first 740 000 tickets for World Cup 2010 go on sale globally at 12h00 tomorrow, reports the BBC.

South Africans are eligible to buy 15 % of the 3 million tickets via the www.fifa.com website, or to go to a branch of First National Bank, where they can fill in an application form.   The prices of tickets have been kept low for South Africans, and range from R 140 for category 4 matches to R 6 300 for the final.

The ticket sales are by application, chosen on a random ballot.  In Germany the World Cup 2006 ticket applications were oversubscribed more than 20-fold.    Each person may only apply for a maximum of four tickets per match, for a maximum of seven matches.

Further ticket sales open on 4 May, 5 December and 9 February 2010.

FIFA’s David Will, chairman of the ticketing committee, said that the impact of the global credit crunch on ticket sales for 2010 is uncertain.