Hospitality should not exist separately from the community surrounding it. It should help strengthen it.
The Narrative Impact & Initiative emerged during the development of The Narrative Hotel in Cabo San Lucas, but its roots began well before the hotel itself.
For many years, Frederick J. Runde quietly supported community organizations throughout Baja California Sur, particularly the Sarahuaro Foundation and its work surrounding child nutrition, education, and community support.
One example of this vision already in motion is the Kendrick Kitchen, which Fred helped fund alongside a close friend through the Sarahuaro Foundation. Today, the Kendrick Kitchen provides daily nourishment to 180 children at a school of roughly 1,240 students, serving tens of thousands of meals annually as part of Sarahuaro’s broader community support efforts.
The impact of a single kitchen can be profound, not only in providing immediate nourishment, but also in supporting education, stability, health, and long-term opportunity for families and communities.From the founding letter
As The Narrative Hotel evolved, those philanthropic efforts naturally became part of a much larger conversation about hospitality, responsibility, and long-term regional impact.
While the hotel experienced the realities and delays that often accompany large-scale development, the commitment to supporting these community initiatives never paused. Over time, it became increasingly clear: the vision did not need to wait until the hotel opened its doors.
What began as a hotel project evolved into something larger: a hospitality-led initiative designed to bring together hotels, chefs, developers, restaurants, artisans, festivals, and hospitality groups to support long-term regional wellbeing through education, nourishment, clean water access, workforce training, and community infrastructure.
A hospitality-led platform supporting long-term community impact throughout Baja California Sur, and a framework designed to scale wherever hospitality grows.
The initiative invests in both people and opportunity, strengthening the hospitality industry while creating meaningful pathways for local families and future generations.
Supporting child nutrition and school kitchen programs, expanding the long-term reach of community kitchens already doing meaningful work on the ground.
Helping expand access to clean water infrastructure within underserved communities and colonias, paired with awareness opportunities at every event we touch.
Supporting the expansion of educational facilities and community campuses, accelerating timelines through partnership with organizations already on the ground.
Developing training and certification pathways across culinary, housekeeping, wellness, guest services, administration, maintenance, security, and operations.
A stronger community creates a stronger hospitality industry. And a stronger hospitality industry reinvests directly into the wellbeing of the community around it.
The Narrative Hotel serves as the originating platform and proof of concept for the initiative. Rather than existing separately from the community surrounding it, the hotel is intended to demonstrate how hospitality can actively participate in regional impact.
That participation runs through financial contribution, awareness, training opportunities, culinary partnerships, events, collaborative fundraising, and workforce development.
As part of the hotel’s long-term commitment, a portion of proceeds from bookings will be pledged directly toward supporting the initiative and its programs.
The long-term goal is a model that other hotels and hospitality groups throughout Baja California Sur, and eventually around the world, can also participate in and support.
Fred's longstanding support of community organizations in Baja, particularly the Sarahuaro Foundation and the expansion of educational initiatives, helped inspire the creation of the initiative. His belief that hospitality can create broader regional impact became a foundational part of its vision.
Fred helped fund the Kendrick Kitchen alongside a close friend through Sarahuaro. Today it provides daily nourishment to 180 children, a firsthand view of the profound impact of a single kitchen on a community, and a catalyst for everything that followed.
Amy leads the creative direction, hospitality integration, partnership development, and long-term strategic vision of the initiative. Working across hospitality, design, branding, and community partnerships, her role focuses on building the connective tissue between hotels, restaurants, events, collaborators, and community organizations.
She has spent over a decade shaping brand and creative direction at the intersection of hospitality and design, bringing together the partners that make the initiative possible.
Chef Javier became a natural part of the initiative not only as the culinary partner behind Bermejo and The Narrative Hotel, but also because of his long history of supporting and feeding children and families throughout Baja California and Tijuana, where he was raised.
Javier brings a deep understanding of how to create nutritious, thoughtful meals at scale while working efficiently with available resources, an approach especially valuable within community kitchen and school nutrition programs.
“Raising strong children one mother at a time.” For more than twenty years, Sarahuaro has been transforming lives in Los Cabos. Their mission is woven into the foundation of this initiative.
Sarahuaro’s flagship program provides daily nourishment to children across four active community kitchens in Cabo San Lucas. Each kitchen is named in honor of the donors who made it possible, including the Kendrick Kitchen, funded with support from Fred Runde.
The Kendrick Kitchen serves a school of roughly 1,240 students, 620 in the morning session and 620 in the afternoon. Funding currently allows a daily meal for only 180 of them.
The school has already requested an expansion of the program. The kitchen has the capacity to serve more children; the only limit is funding. $260 USD feeds one child for an entire school year.
Donations are processed securely by Fundación Sarahuaro, our accredited partner foundation. Choose “Cocina de Kendrick” on their donation form to direct your gift to this kitchen.
Wherever hospitality grows, there is an opportunity, and a responsibility, to support the communities that make that growth possible.
While the initiative is rooted in Baja California Sur and deeply connected to the communities surrounding The Narrative Hotel, the long-term vision extends far beyond a single property or region.
It is designed as a scalable model capable of expanding alongside future hospitality projects, partnerships, and destinations around the world. It is a framework that can be adapted and implemented across future hotels, restaurants, hospitality developments, and collaborative partnerships internationally.
The long-term vision is a collaborative hospitality platform capable of supporting expanded educational infrastructure, workforce training programs, clean water initiatives, community kitchens, larger-scale educational and support facilities, hospitality apprenticeship pathways, and long-term regional partnerships.
While each region may have different needs, the core philosophy remains the same: hospitality should not exist separately from the community surrounding it. It should help strengthen it.
The Narrative Impact & Initiative is a collective effort. Hotels, chefs, restaurants, developers, artisans, festivals, and individuals are all part of the model. If you’d like to participate, partner, or contribute, we’d love to hear from you.
Direct inquiries · hello@thenarrativeimpact.org