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It’s not typical to highlight what’s traditionally known as a Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) report in story form, however, Sandals’ latest report, “Love Exceeds Expectations,” reads more like a quick-paced family biography. It begins in 1981, when a proud fifth-generation Jamaican, Gordon “Butch” Stewart, opened the first Sandals Resort while also welcoming into the world his son and future executive chairman, Adam Stewart. The Sandals family continued to grow, rooted in the only place they’ve ever called home: the Caribbean. Today, with over 20,000 team members — or as we call them, family, friends, and neighbors — across 19 resorts on nine islands, Sandals is proud to be the largest private employer in the region.

But what sets this CSR story apart is its inclusive spirit: every team member, guest, vendor, and partner has a seat at the table. Together, they imagine ways to protect the ocean, uplift local communities, support neighboring schools, and build a better future for the Caribbean. And then, they act. To date, those collective efforts have positively impacted more than 1.7 million lives. For the growing Sandals family, social responsibility isn’t just a duty; it’s a heartfelt expression of love for the places they call home, and for those yet to discover them.

More than 40 years into this story, and in honor of Caribbean Heritage Month, we celebrate some of the moments, milestones, projects, and initiatives that have keept our “why” front and center:

In a schoolyard with a distant view of the ocean near the southwest corner of Jamaica, children run on a playground, learn new computer skills and practice gardening fruits and herbs. This is one of 2,290 schools in the Caribbean that Sandals and Beaches have supported with more than 300,000 books, plus computers, sports equipment, small gardens and fruit trees, basketball courts, tutors, air conditioners, and beyond to elevate learning across the region. A way of operating since the start, when Stewart opened the brand’s flagship resort in Montego Bay, the first thing he and the staff did was adopt a local school in need of repairs, books, and supplies. Students from that school went on to become teachers, lawyers, social workers, and managers at Sandals and beyond.

Near a brilliant white sand beach in Turks and Caicos, students, teachers, and local farmers gather with Beaches Turks and Caicos employees around the resort’s compost mound. On an island where nature provides mostly sand, organic kitchen scraps are now treated like a treasure of nutrients for growing plants and crops, carefully layered and turned so home-grown food can flourish from the arid land. Through Sandals Resorts and the Sandals Foundation, the same lessons and techniques have spread to farmers, gardeners, and team members across the Caribbean. Now food security is rising and the region grows alongside its crops, exploring and learning new ways to preserve its natural produce and recipes that rely on local ingredients.

Forty feet below the ocean’s surface off St. Lucia, local divers and PADI-certified Sandals guests tend to another type of garden: coral reefs. Underwater nurseries like this are appearing in areas of the Caribbean where Sandals and its Foundation partner with marine experts to replenish underwater life, from Jamaica, to Grenada, Bahamas, Curaçao and Saint Lucia. The planting of coral fragments has already shown a 90% success rate thanks to guests and locals doing a world of good together. These programs shift the narrative for locals by giving them the knowledge, skills, and certifications that empower them to put change into their hands and sustain the underwater world that so closely impacts island life and culture.

In a hospital overlooking a lush Antigua hillside, a mother walks her young daughter in for a routine checkup. Five years ago, the young girl’s life was saved at this very site, thanks to a team of doctors and life-giving technology in the neonatal ward. The hospital is among many the Sandals Foundation has helped equip. Donations have also been directed to pediatric cancer research and to scholarships, so students can live out their dreams to become doctors. Many of them return home to fill medical voids, including Dr. Chantelle Browne, who studied through Sandals-supported SickKids Caribbean Initiative and is now one of only two pediatric oncologists in the Eastern Caribbean.

Beaming with joy in a neighborhood in Jamaica, four generations have come together for a family photo. Smiling ear to ear they show off healthy, happy smiles. Over the past 15 years, Sandals has partnered with Great Shape! Inc. to provide dental care through its 1,000 Smiles and Sealants initiative and eye care through its iCARE program for nearly 300,000 people in the Caribbean. The bright smiles and focused eyes bring newfound confidence, joy, and daily ease.

Up a mountainside an hour from Kingston, men and women craft baskets and hats with a reed plant that grows nearby. Meanwhile, down the mountainside, on a Trench Town street, two teenage boys walk into a home doubling as a stone artisan workshop. The homeowner and master artisan offers apprenticeships inspiring the teens to someday do the same for others. There are similar studios around the island, where the Sandals retail division provides business training and opens doors into markets, including resort gift shops, while working closely with artists to preserve the traditions of their crafts. Profits generated in gift shops are invested back into the program, which expands self-sustaining entrepreneurship across the region.

Before a Soca Dance Class at Sandals Royal Curaçao, a young woman arrives for work feeling inspired. She’s among the 20,000 Sandals and Beaches team members who have taken free courses through Sandals Corporate University since it was founded in 2012. The university opens pathways to long lasting careers and new skills from management to social media, culinary, wellness and beyond. Sandals Resorts has provided an extra bright beacon for women, as they make up 51.3% of the company’s entire workforce, more than half of them in management positions. Through assistance from the Sandals Foundation, Caribbean women are also being given access to more resources that allow them to practice and learn tech skills so they can enter higher-paying STEM fields.

At a school surrounded by banana trees and open farmland, a roof is being measured for the installation of solar panels. As part of the Sandals Foundation’s Power of 15 initiative, schools across the Caribbean will soon harness consistent power from the tropics’ most consistent source: the sun. Computers and wifi signals will be more reliable. Carbon footprints will be limited. And more children in the furthest reaches of the islands will have uninterrupted access to quality education.

After over 40 years of calling the Caribbean home, we know there’s only one way to operate while serving our communities and islands: by leading with love. That, to us, is more than our responsibility. It’s who we are, it’s a celebration of our heritage, and it’s our why.