# Ideally, you will bring...
- strong experience in tailor-made travel, tourism, hospitality or consultative sales;
- a strong understanding of scheduled departure group tours is a big advantage
- excellent knowledge of Southern Africa;
- Eastern Africa and Indian Ocean knowledge would be a huge plus;
- a proven ability to convert enquiries into bookings;
- excellent written and spoken English;
- spoken/written knowledge of French is a major bonus
- strong organisational and administrative skills;
- experience leading, mentoring or training others;
- excellent guest and supplier communication;
- strong commercial awareness;
- excellent computer literacy;
- Wetu or similar itinerary software experience would be a strong advantage;
- and, importantly, a genuine love of travel.
# You might love working here if...
You like being trusted with real responsibility, enjoy figuring things out and care about doing things properly.
You notice details, take ownership when something goes wrong and genuinely enjoy helping other people become better at what they do.
You are comfortable working in a small business where roles sometimes overlap and people help where needed.
If your default response to something outside your exact job description is “How can I help?” rather than “That isn't my job,” we will probably get along.
Cape Town | Full-time
The Travel Café is a boutique, founder-led travel company creating thoughtful journeys through Southern and Eastern Africa. We believe travel, when done well, can be a genuine force for good — connecting people, supporting local communities and conservation, and leaving both travellers and the places they visit better than before.
Our work includes both tailor-made travel and a growing portfolio of scheduled-departure mini-groups. We also operate Starry Starry Night Route 62, our eco-lodge in the Klein Karoo, and Starry Starry Night Cape Town Seaside House.
We are now looking for an experienced *Senior Travel Designer & Operations Lead* to become the senior operational presence within our Cape Town team, based in the Waterfront precinct.
This is not simply a senior travel-consultant role. You will design and sell exceptional journeys, but you will also help lead the team, solve day-to-day operational issues, help grow the team, maintain standards and act as an effective layer between the Cape Town operation and the founders.
We are looking for someone who enjoys responsibility and can confidently answer the question: “Is everything under control?”
#The role
You will manage your own portfolio of enquiries and guests, from first contact through to travel and post-trip follow-up. This includes calls and Zoom meetings, itinerary design, quotations, supplier communication, invoicing, payments, restaurant and activity bookings, and supporting guests while they are travelling.
You will work across both our tailor-made business and our growing scheduled-departure mini-groups, helping us develop this side of The Travel Café further.
Alongside your own travel work, you will help oversee the day-to-day operation of the Cape Town team. You will support colleagues when they are stuck, help prioritise when things get busy, resolve routine guest and supplier issues, spot problems before they grow, and make sure important things do not fall through the cracks.
When something genuinely needs founder involvement, we expect you to escalate it clearly: what happened, what has already been done, what the risks are and what you recommend.
You will also provide operational support across our wider group of businesses, including Starry Starry Night Route 62 and Starry Starry Night Cape Town Seaside House, where needed.
#Who we are looking for
You are obsessed with detail in the best possible way, and notice the things other people miss.
You are independent and resourceful. If you encounter something you do not know, your instinct is to investigate, think and try to solve it rather than immediately asking someone else for the answer. Equally, you have the judgement to know when something does need to be escalated.
You are ambitious in the right way. You may not be chasing titles or the top job, but you do want to be the best you can be. You are hungry to learn, improve and achieve, and you take real pride in doing excellent work. Coasting does not come naturally to you.
You are also a good human to work with: personable, respectful, emotionally mature and supportive of others.
And you can lead. That means helping people become stronger and more capable, rather than simply taking problems away from them. You should be comfortable giving feedback, setting expectations and stepping in when standards are not where they need to be.
Travel is unpredictable, so you also need to enjoy a fast-moving environment where priorities change, guests occasionally need urgent help and excellent work is both expected and celebrated.
#About us
We are small by choice and ambitious about what we are building.
We care deeply about thoughtful travel, genuine hospitality, strong relationships and getting the details right. We want to grow without becoming generic, and we believe warm, human workplaces can still have very high standards.
Because we are founder-led, decisions happen close to the work and people are trusted with meaningful responsibility.
#How to apply
Please send us your CV, a short introduction explaining why the role interests you, your salary expectations and notice period.
We would also like you to answer the following:
Tell us about something important at work that you had to figure out largely by yourself. How did you approach it?
Tell us about someone you have trained, mentored or managed. How did you help them become more independent?
Tell us about a time you spotted an important detail someone else had missed. Why did it matter?
Please answer in your own voice. We are much more interested in how you think than in perfectly polished answers.