A sober business retreat, and why that is the point rather than a rule

What alcohol does to a retreat

Every founders' weekend has the same arc. A good session, a good dinner, drinks, a late night, a soft morning, and a second day that is half wasted. The networking becomes noise. The conversation you needed to have happens at one in the morning and nobody remembers it properly.

That is not a moral problem. It is a design problem. You have paid for the mentors' attention and your own, and then spent a third of both on recovering.

What happens without it

You sleep, properly, from the first week. You swim at seven because you can. The workshops land because you are there for them. The off-the-record evenings with the mentors work because everyone in the room is actually in the room, and honesty that is said sober is honesty you can act on the next morning.

Dinner at one long table, cooked by a chef, turns out to be more interesting without wine, not less. People talk about the business, and about the rest, because they are not waiting for the second glass to do it for them.

You don't have to be sober to come

Sojourns is not a recovery retreat. Some people who come will be sober, some sober-curious, and some simply not drinking for a month because it makes the month better. Nobody will ask which you are, and nobody counts anything. The month is alcohol-free in the house and out of it, and that is the whole of the rule.

Savi has written at length about sober coliving for people who want to live this way for longer than a month.

What Savi learnt from an alcohol-free house

Savi's house near Valencia has been alcohol-free for guests and staff since it opened in July 2025. It has sixteen rooms, has run at 95 to 98 per cent full without advertising, and won Destination Coliving at the 2026 Coliving Awards. The thing people said would kill it is the thing people come for: a house where everyone is clear-headed, the mornings are used and the evenings are real.

The month

Twenty-eight nights in spring 2027, twelve people, one house somewhere worth the flight. Three business mentors, one a week. A wellness facilitator and a holistic and mental wellbeing coach for the whole month. A chef. Your business running from a desk in the house. The full shape of it is in the founder retreat note, and the wellbeing side in the wellness retreat note.

Questions

Do I need to be sober to apply?

No. The month is alcohol-free for everyone, in the house and out of it. Whether you are sober, sober-curious or just not drinking for the month is your business, and nobody asks.

Is it a recovery or rehab retreat?

No. It is a business and wellbeing retreat for owners that happens to be alcohol-free. It is not treatment and does not claim to be.

Is alcohol-free enforced outside the house?

Yes. The month is alcohol-free in the house and out of it. It is the deal everyone signs up to, and it is what makes the rest of it work.