So you want to be a yacht stew? Did you know stews have more responsibilities onboard than just providing awesome holidays for charter guests and nailing table settings? 

There’s more to being a stew… we’re a bunch of multi-taskers, some would say professional housewives in the making?! Well at least my partner thinks so haha I will say your stew OCD will never leave you and often when you return home your family and friends may notice your new ‘habits’

I was replacing a bin liner in  my house the other day and I don’t even think about this its like its a normal way of doing it for me… to always create a little whirlpool in the bin liner so it looks pretty and have no more than a 1cm lip on the liner of the bin showing. I can guarantee no one else in my household notices this except me. See I told you your stew traits will never leave you. But hey I have so many new skills… How to iron a collared shirt, how to make a bed (correctly), how to serve wine and read the labels. The list could go on.

So you are i’m sure aware of the main responsibilities of a yacht stew… however I think thre are some responsiblities that are not common knowledge so let’s run thorugh the list 

So here are the main responsibilities of a yacht stew:

✨ Providng 5-star service to all guests… at all times.

✨ Silver service and bartending skills – you’ll need to know a variety of service styles, and have bartending skills. All of which you can learn!

✨ Laundry, housekeeping and wardrobe management for both guests and… yacht crew. Yes, we look after all the crew linen, uniform and personal clothes too!

✨ Professional luggage packer and unpackers, yes we unpack all superyacht guests luggage and pack it all back up in the correct way to protect their clothing and items during transit.

✨ Floral arrangements and decorations- we need to learn how to look after plants and create floral bouquets and use these within our table decorations.

✨ Knowledge of fine dining, wines and cocktails- superyacht guests are used to fine dining, you need to have a good understanding of cuisines, how fine dining works, old and new world wines and how to make cocktails with beautiful garnishes.

✨ Maintenance of the interior and detailed cleaning- We look after all the cleaning so this includes what products to use on what surfaces, how to clean when doing turn up and turn down cabins on charter and to the highest standard.

✨ Stews looking after inventories and restocking provisions (You want to know how many bottles of vodka we have onboard? How many Tampons in guest cabins? How many dishwashing detergents we have left? We know. Because we organise everything by inventories. Some inventories are really imporatn like the alcohol and cigaratte and cigars ones as these need to be submmitted to customs when entering new coutnries so they need to be up to date. The other inventories help to keep everything very organised and make it easy to reorder. 

✨ Watchkeeping: Your will be watching security cameras, answering door phones, and following procedures for potential safety threats onboard. You will often have 1-2 shifts per week when you are on watch depending on how many crew there are onboard. This involves staying on the boat and maintaining the vessel (usually just off charter for the stews on larger boats the deck crew usually do the anchor watches when on charter). You have to be vigilant do rounds of the boat and check it every few hours until you go to bed with the watch phone and your essentially on call for that shift until the next morning.

✨ Stowage for sea: You will get really good at stuffing cupboards, unstuffing them carefully, and wrapping things in drop towels. You need to be bale to protect the interior and this involves preventing any breakages or damages to items when the sea state changes.

✨ Keep an eye out for everything onbaord!  You will develop a supersonic vision and smell… fluffball on the carpet, got it! Watermark on the tapware.. wiped!  Slight burning smell? Check the electrical cupboard and notify the chief engineer ASAP.

✨ To maintain a safe and secure environment: you get to know how many life rafts you have onboard, where fire extinguishers are and what the different types are used for.

You also may be Cooking when there’s no chef on board.  

Were there some responsibilities you weren’t aware for a yacht stew? Let me know.

Jess
The Seaworthy Stew