At Parker, our staff are actively involved in several community projects. Some of these we support financially and some of these we work in ourselves.

School Scholarships: Parker sponsors two scholarships at Ntaba Maria Primary School in the Eastern Cape. This flagship primary school was originally where Phil taught for several years. The scholarships are anonymous and aimed at learners who have high potential but limited financial resources.  They cover fees, uniforms, transport and some books.

Sport Development: With a friend, Phil set up and runs Makana Spears, a basketball club aimed at closing the gap between advantaged and disadvantaged youth in the Eastern Cape. Every year, we select a team of 12 boys, six from advantaged schools and six from less advantaged and put them on the same team to play at national club level in Durban. Phil manages and Tisco Mati coaches the team in person.  To date, the club has had three players playing for the national side.

Youth Work: Both Phil and Liz also do voluntary work at Sentinel Boardriders, a Hout Bay NGO which works with youth through a skatepark and youth centre. Parker also sponsors the park financially.

We actively market and form links with tourism and hospitality related businesses in the Eastern Cape, a financially depressed area of the country. Our aim is to use the leverage of the Western Cape’s financial strength to divert business and clients to less affluent areas. In this regard, we:

• Have built links with Jenman Safaris, an environmentally conscious tour operator that offers guided tours for families along the Garden Route
• Set up links with craft and art markets and dealers in the Eastern Cape to bring more produce from the area to be sold in Parker or Cape Town.
• Actively buying Eastern Cape products to decorate the guesthouse (for example, a set of five wood prints from an art student at Rhodes University Grahamstown and also linen and toweling fromVolpes, Port Elizabeth.)
• Using Eastern Cape labour and skills in the Western Cape. We bring craftsmen (painters, tillers, carpenters) etc. from the Eastern Cape to maintain Parker as far as possible.
• Buy a lot of our furniture and decorative items from Funky Junk, a Port Alfred based antique shop.
• Buy all our fruit and veg from Pappi and his sons (see pciture on the left!) who deal in organic produce from local farms.

Wherever possible, we use supplies from local entrepreneurs and actively seek links with small organic suppliers, particularly from previously disadvantaged backgrounds. Typical examples are:

Flowers: we only buy our flowers from local street sellers not from chain stores

Fruit: as often as possible, our fruit is delivered daily by local tradesmen from the Woodstock community. The majority of this produce is organically grown.

Hygiene: we buy our soaps and shampoos from Ecoco, a Cape Town based company employing previously unemployed women to manufacture environmentally friendly products made from local plants and trees.

City Tours: we have a great relationship with Wanderlust, a company offering walking tours of central Cape Town.  You can find out more about them at www.wanderlust.co.za.

Other Tours and Transfers: we have built up a relationship with Yaseen and Tania from Discovery Tours over the past four years - Discovery only offer highly personalised, private tours of the Cape and have a totally inexhaustiable supply of information of every corner of the Cape.  One thing that sets them apart is that they don't offer township tours, because of their voyeuristic and paternalistic nature and focus on the natural environment in every tour they do.

We are always looking for more local suppliers for Parker, so please contact us.

Our three permanent staff at Parker Cottage all benefit from over three times the minimum wage for the industry.

They are actively encouraged to try their hand at new areas of the business, such as stock taking, linen control and so on. Our aim is to turn our maids into housekeepers with staff who work for them. When we find staff have strength in a particular area, we organise more training and build on their success.

We are starting the process of sourcing a night manager from the Eastern Cape too. This will be a previously disadvantaged black male who we hope to be able to train up to management level in two years.

We encourage our guests to walk to local restaurants and to spend locally. Particular links we’ve made are with:

Miller’s Thumb: a small family owned and operated restaurant less than two minutes walk from Parker Cottage, using fish caught by local fisherman.

Cape Town Walking Tour and Footsteps to Freedom: we promote these two walking tours of the city centre.

Zibonele Tours: a small tour operator specialising in the township tour market with a particular focus on walking through the township, not driving through.

Hoerikwaggo Trail: with a local tour operator, we actively promote 2, 5 and 7 day hikes across Table Mountain staying in lodges built from alien vegetation and supporting conservation efforts in the peninsula’s National Parks.

Downhill Adventures: we’ve made a link with this activity tour operator who specialise in cycling, abseiling and other natural environment activities in the Western Cape