In Conversation With Le Haus Founder Ronald Ndoro Mind

Please can you tell us more about Le Haus and what prompted you to set it up in the first place?

There are four modes of regular travel. When you go on holiday, you tend to either stay in a hotel, stay in an Airbnb, maybe your family owns a timeshare or you own a holiday home or someone else in your family has a holiday home… When people are going on holiday, they’re usually doing one of those four things in terms of accommodation options. So I was just thinking about them, and all of them have some complexities around them. So for example, hotels are amazing, but they're a little bit soulless. If you’re solo travelling, the chances of meeting people [aren’t certain], you’re basically taking a risk, and Airbnb’s are great, but you’re also going in with uncertainty and sometimes there are hidden costs like cleaning fees, and sometimes you’ll see a property online, you turn up, and it looks completely different to what you saw online, or it’s in a really weird location…

Then, if you have a timeshare, it’s predictable but you’re quite restricted in what you can do and when you can do it. Then, if you’re lucky enough to own a holiday home, that’s great, but you own one property in one location which means that that’s the only place you can go to. Plus, you also have the management headaches that come with running that property. 

So what I try to do with Le Haus is basically take out all the good parts of all of those four modes of travel. Le Haus is effectively a travel solution that has the services of a hotel, the charm of the Airbnb, the predictability of a timeshare, and the ownership of home ownership… We’ve taken away all of the downsides. You get the certainty, you get the value, you get the community, you get the concierge… This was the starting point of the idea.

Can you talk us through the different memberships?

They’re all founding memberships, but within that you have four categories. You have the individual membership, which is for a person who has a partner or a young family. Basic caters for one person, plus a partner and two children under 12. Then you have the joint membership, which is for two individual people - it’s the same as the individual membership in terms of number of people that can access it, but the days are 15 each rather than 30 in total. Then you have the corporate and the family membership, which is basically up to six people.

Apart from getting access to these amazing properties, do members get access to certain experiences?

Every location will be anchored by a beach club... That’s your social space, it’s like a typical member’s club. [It's] where all your activities and dinners are, or [where you'll go] if you want to do water sports. But in addition to that, you also have a dedicated concierge - a dedicated person who will help you plan your trip. So if you wanted to book excursions, or you wanted to go to dinners, that would all be included. And on top of that, we also offer airport transfers and fast track at the airport, so you would get all of those elements as part of the membership. And the beauty of the membership is that it is a one-time payment forever. You pay once, and you never pay ever again, and you have this membership for the rest of your life.

Who would you say is your typical client?

[It’s] people who are looking for ease, or people who don’t have a lot of time - people who are really busy. I think our typical client is someone who goes on two to three holidays a year, and spends at least £10,000 per trip. So they’re spending 20-30,000 dollars or pounds per year on holidays, whether it’s with a partner, with family… it doesn’t really matter, the point is they’re spending money every single year.

Our logic is, ‘Well, if you’re spending £30,000 or £25,000 every single year, if you buy a one-time membership forever, then within the first three years, you’ve recovered all the money that you would have spent every single year... Your membership is static because once you pay for it, that’s it. That’s the beauty of it. 

You currently have properties in Antigua and Barbuda - how do you see Le Haus expanding? Which other destinations would you like to add?

The whole of the Caribbean as a starting point would be key to what we’re doing. We’ll do Antigua first. The idea is that for every 100 members we sign up, we will open up a new location… I don’t know where the next destination will be exactly, but it’s probably going to be somewhere close to Antigua, somewhere like St. Kitts. But the idea is to do the whole of the Caribbean as quickly as possible.

How would you say luxury travel has changed in recent years? Are there any key trends that you’re noticing?

I think in the past, it was all about your amenities, your marble, your finishes… how pretty a place is etc. but I think quite a lot of that has become quite standardised and has become commoditised, so you can’t really tell the difference between a five-star and a four-star [hotel]. The lines are quite blurry because there isn’t that much of a big difference.

However, I think what people are looking for is places that are welcoming, give them a sense of belonging, places that are unique in terms of experiences and in terms of the offering. I think people just want to get a greater sense of belonging. I think the pandemic affected some of that as well in terms of people’s perception of what they want to do, which is why farmhouses are starting to do really well. Farmhouses are the complete opposite of marbled, glossy finishes with gold, but they are luxury experiences because you get all the amenities and all the facilities that are just in more of a rustic setting. 

Can you tell us more about your career arc? How have you got to where you are now?

My background is hospitality. I had two member’s clubs in London. I was in the process of opening up a third one in South Africa, and looking at an option in New York and then the pandemic happened and all of that just came to a standstill. During the pandemic, I set up a company called WorkMango which was facilitating digital nomads travelling across from Europe and America to the Caribbean basically as an escape from lockdown.

So if you were in a tiny apartment in the city, it was a great way to come out and live in paradise. We facilitated everything from accommodation to whatever arrangements someone needed to settle in - options of where to stay, what to do, where to go… Part of that was also building a community as well. We had a hiking club and a golf club which gave it meaning, so I think where I’ve ended up with Le Haus is really kind of like an evolution of my private member’s club experience with the concierge that I did during the pandemic, and then just seeing an opportunity to create something that creates ease and really adds value to the travel experience and to the Caribbean.

What would you say is the most rewarding aspect of working in hospitality?

The obvious answer is the people. So it’s creating experiences that leave a lasting impression on people, [experiences] that are memorable, that people talk about years after the thing happened… It is a service industry, so you feel like you’re always giving something when you’re doing something which is an important component of being a person… service to others is a really important touch, because it makes you feel better about yourself.

On the flip side, what would you say is the most challenging aspect of working in this industry?

Also the people! Obviously, when things don’t quite go as well as we want them to go. I think ideas are really easy, execution is execution, but I think we all come from different backgrounds and cultures, and our expectations are not always the same.

Do you have anything exciting in the pipeline for next year?

I’m in the process of doing two really exciting things. So thing one is that we’re launching a retreat in March 2026 - this will be a Le Haus wellness retreat and we’re going to have some experts fly out, and we’re going to have a lot of excursions, activities, and opportunities for people to reset themselves.

Number two is that I’m working on a chef series - I’ve got a friend called Daniel Galmiche, he’s a Michelin-starred chef. So it will be one celebrity or Michelin-starred chef once a month, every month for the next 12 months. So the first one is on the 31 January which is a Saturday, and then we’ll do one on the last Saturday of every month for the rest of the year. Daniel will do the first one, and we’ll add additional names as we build up to it.