Grenada’s tourism sector has marked a major milestone in workforce development, with more than 100 local hospitality professionals successfully completing the second level of the Caribbean Supercharged Training Series, a collaborative upskilling initiative led by the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association Education Foundation (CHTAEF) and the Tourism Enhancement Fund of the Grenada Hotel and Tourism Association (GHTA).
The industry-focused training program was designed to address core skill gaps across the regional hospitality sector, with coursework structured around three high-priority competency areas: supervisory and management leadership, Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) food safety protocols, and customer service excellence through the specialized “The Big Score: Service with a Difference” curriculum. All sessions were led by experienced industry facilitators Louise John and Suzanne Brooks, with on-the-ground support from two prominent local Grenadian hotels, Point Salines Hotel and True Blue Bay Hotel, which served as local program partners.
A formal closing ceremony to honor the graduating cohort was chaired by Arlene Friday, Chief Executive Officer of GHTA, who opened the event by welcoming participating learners, program partners, lead trainers, cross-sector tourism stakeholders, and media representatives. In her opening address, Friday praised the graduates for their consistent dedication to ongoing professional development and self-improvement, emphasizing that the collective upskilling effort directly elevates three critical pillars of the destination’s tourism industry: leadership capacity, standardized food safety, and customer service excellence. “To the participants: you came eager to learn, you engaged fully, and you committed to change,” Friday stated in her remarks. “That commitment matters — not just to your individual properties, but to the reputation and long-term future of our entire Grenadian destination.”
Elvis Lewis, President of GHTA, used his remarks to spotlight the critical role of the GHTA Tourism Enhancement Fund in enabling accessible, industry-aligned training for local hospitality workers, and urged graduates to translate their new knowledge and skills into tangible improvements in their daily work, rather than treating the certification as a final career milestone. “The certificate you receive today is not the destination; it is a passport to the next phase of your professional and personal growth,” Lewis told the graduating cohort.
A message of encouragement from CHTAEF Chair Karolyn Troubetzkoy was delivered on her behalf by Maxine Pierre, while official remarks from Senator the Honourable Adrian Thomas, Grenada’s Minister for Tourism, the Creative Economy and Culture, were presented by Chief Planning Officer Petra Fraser. The minister’s statement called on graduates to embrace the training as a starting point for transformative change across the sector. “Let this training be the beginning of a new attitude, a new confidence, a new standard, and a new commitment to excellence,” the statement read. “The tourism industry of tomorrow will not be built by buildings alone, beaches alone, or marketing slogans alone. It will be built by trained people, confident people, creative people, disciplined people, and patriotic people who understand that every visitor interaction is an opportunity to lift the image of Grenada.”
This second iteration of the Caribbean Supercharged Training Series underscores the shared, long-term commitment of CHTAEF, the GHTA Tourism Enhancement Fund, and local industry partners to investing in Grenada’s tourism workforce and raising the bar for the overall visitor experience on the island.