Cape Town's five-star pet hotel has appointed a black cat as its chief feline officer.
AtFrits, a five-star pet hotel in Cape Town, opened its doors on Monday.
Founder and owner Yanic Klue has appointed Mr Sailor Brown as the chief feline officer (CFO) of the pet hotel to “change the perceptions about black cats”.
“They are always associated with evil and witchcraft, so they are the least adopted of all rescue cats,” Yanic said.
When asked whether the cat will be involved in the finances of the company, Dante Ludolf de Koker said:
“Yes, Sailor will be running his nails through our invoices and statements to make sure everything is up to scratch.”
Mr Sailor Brown hopes that his success will inspire other black kitties to know that there is a seat for them at the boardroom table, and that they are capable of just as much as any Ginger, Persian or Burmese.
About his professional journey, he says:
“The most important professional lesson I’ve learned is the value of saying ‘neow’. Know when an idea is purrfect and when it’s better left in the litterbox.”
And when CFO South Africa asked Sailor how he keeps busy, he replied:
“When I’m not reading Furbes or the Furnancial Times, I’m roaming around and being inquisitive, which I always find is a great quality in a CFO, especially when those annual budget assessments come around!”
AtFrits opened in 2015 as a luxury dog hotel. They recently moved to a more expansive venue and added their cat hotel to their offering. The hotel includes a grooming parlour, salon, overnight deluxe and platinum suites, babysitting services, hydrotherapy, physiotherapy and a pet shop.
“I’ve been a dog lover all my life, and as soon as I saw this one dog hotel in the States, I knew that I had to do this in Mzansi,” says Yanic.
The hotel, which occupies 2,400 square metres on Bree Street, has 56 dog rooms and 32 cat rooms, starting at R285 per night and topping out at R1,500 per night for the presidential suite. All the rooms are already fully booked for December. They've had about 87 716 stays at the hotel and 9213 shelter animals have stayed for free since inception in the dog hotel.
