061: Day in the life of running an Italian Villa

In this episode, we try to give you a bit of behind the scenes look at what it’s like to run a villa, especially from the tour and vacation rental aspect.

We cover all sorts of topics, including:

•  Breakfasts, as far as what we serve and why a simple breakfast is never a simple breakfast

•  Laundry.  Again, while for most a load of laundry here and there during their week is a normal chore.  There’s nothing normal about it when you have 10 bedrooms of sheets and towels to wash each week.  Plus, you have to head down to hang them up to dry, which is another trip in and of itself.

•  Meals.  How we design meals and cook them, with and without guests.  If you’ve ever made a big holiday meal for your family, you probably have some idea the amount of work that goes into that.  So when are cooking for say 15 to 20 people each day, the chopping, cooking, and cleaning all add up.

• Touring.  Paul is the man who drives everyone around on tours.  So after breakfast, he’s driving everyone to the next site and leading the tour at that location.  He also sticks with everyone to order everything for each meal, and make sure everyone is taken care of at the restaurant.

• Shopping.  This is never a quick task when food shopping in Italy. You could just go to a supermarket, but we never do.  So you head to your butcher.  Then the local produce vendor (aka farm stand essentially).  The baker/breadman.  The local cheesemaker.  Etc. Etc. Etc.  We, of course, have our favorites spread all over town.  So Paul is either driving guests around to visit each store during our tour.  Or if we are making meals for guests, he is doing the shopping for that.

•  Cleaning.  This isn’t just about a turnover day, which is always a very long day, but also about during the week.  On the turnover day, you have to clean up the whole villa. Which meals cleaning 10 bedrooms, 2 common rooms, the kitchen, and all the outside spaces.  During the week, there’s just normal everyday cleaning, but also clean up after a meal with guests. Which if you are serving a four-course meal to 20 people means 80 plates alone, not counting pots, glasses, etc.

•  Entertaining.  Probably the most fun, but this would include handling happy hour drinks, taking guests on special outings, and at as a concierge. 

• Product work.  So when we don’t have guests, we switch to making products to sell to mainly the U.S.  So this includes, of course, harvesting olives, taking them to the mill, etc.  It includes catching up on inventory and maki