A life serving the privileged

Wednesday 11 Apr, 2007

If you think the notion of a butler went out the window as long ago as flared trousers, then think again! Magnums, a provider of professionally rained staff for the service industry, have been eyeing up Dubai for a while now and come this October, they plan to open the doors to their every own training institute right here in the UAE. 7DAYS caught up with Magnums founder Josephine Ive (pictured right) to find out a bit more about what being a 'butler' involves.

Forever the professional butler

BY SUCHITRA STEVEN SAMUEL (Food talk)
18 May 2007

JOSEPHINE Ive trained as a chef and was running her own catering business in England when she was asked to work as a butler. This came as a real surprise. “I asked my father what was to be done and he gave me the right guidance. I enjoyed it so much that I started working full time as a butler,” she says, in an interview with Weekend.
There are many aspects of the job that she liked. “Firstly, the attention to detail. Secondly, I enjoyed working at a more formal level, which was what this job involved. I was always interested in the legal profession and decided I liked the formal style of living and working. There was the job satisfaction of catering to very high standards and not being worried about the cost.”

Old fashioned gold-plated service training

21st February 2005

Use the term butler and it immediately invokes old-fashioned quintessentially English images.

But surprisingly, the butler industry is booming in many parts of the world and training will soon start in Queensland by Josephine Ive, one of the world’s most respected butlers and educators.

Since she began her business in 1975, Magnums Butlers, Josephine has written five bestselling books on service and contributed to magazines in the US, Europe and Australia.

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