25 February 2013
The BEST WESTERN PLUS Castle Green Hotel.
Never mind Daniel Day-Lewis and Adele what about our triumph at the BEST WESTERN Annual Members’ Conference last month in winning the top conference venue as voted for by BEST WESTERN Venues, key conference booking agents and, of course, the customers.
As always I was at the conference and got very excited when our name was announced at the Gala Dinner Awards ceremony. So excited that I had to spend the next three hours dancing and of course have a couple more drinks.
And the PLUS descriptor
Following our latest programme of refurbishment in January we have just secured the PLUS accreditation placing us firmly amongst the 32 hotels in the GB brand within this category. This confirms our great customer care, quality product and design and enhanced standards.
What next? Maybe four star – watch this space…
By Liz Duncan, 25 February 2013 –
19 February 2013
. . . or so Wet Wet Wet sang in Four Weddings & a Funeral (The Troggs if you remember it first time!)
Well we've had such a weekend of love, we might have to lie down in a darkened room. Joe and his team in the restaurant set the bar with their decoration of The Greenhouse for the weekend. It looked fantastic and we spotted lots of hand holding from our guests and general smiley dispositions so it must have created the right atmosphere.
Rumour has it that we had a proposal in The Greenhouse on Thursday but Joe is keeping tight lipped, probably looking to get a wedding booking from the unsuspecting couple! As he himself got engaged to Abbie, our assistant banqueting manager before Christmas he knows a thing or to about popping the question so I'm sure they're in safe hands.
From this we had our Wedding Fair on Sunday, which saw over 100 brides through our doors. Armed with a goody bag and a glass of Prosecco they were let loose on our suppliers eager to help them plan their special day. We had some fantastic feedback on our newly refurbished Oak room, which we're extremely pleased about. All in all the day went extremely well, the weather held and we met some fantastic people!
Hope you all had a fantastic weekend.
By Liz Duncan, 19 February 2013 –
05 December 2012
It seemed like a good idea at the time…one of us was bound to be going down to The Pinewood from The Castle Green this week so could we take an order of biscuits from a Kendal supplier and save on the delivery charge.
So, 10 boxes of biscuits were packed into my boot ready for my visit this week. When I picked the kids up from Grannys they were:
1. Curious - ‘what’s that in the boot’ they said as the school bags went in
2. Excited - ‘wow, a boot full of biscuits…cool’
3. Intrigued - ‘isn’t it difficult when you have to deliver the chicken and peas?’
They enjoyed the trip home though – well with 480 packets in the car how could I say no.
Then my appointment was cancelled so the cargo has now been transferred to the Finance Director's car for her visit on Friday. The only thing is she also has to take down a load of Christmas hats. I would like to see her explain that to the Police if she gets stopped on the Motorway!
I think we will go back to getting the suppliers to do the deliveries…
By Tim Rumney, 05 December 2012 –
30 November 2012
We had a fantastic night on Tuesday at our first Charity & Events Showcase evening. Over 50 people joined us from various local charities and organisations to view our Kendal Suite & Function House rooms dressed to their best and enjoy a glass of bubbles and buffet.
Executive Chef Justin Woods did a great food demonstration for Christmas Pudding Chocolate Brownies - a perfect way to get rid of that excess Christmas Pudding. As you can imagine it went down a treat!
We had lots of local suppliers on hand to help with planning events, dressing tables, flowers, magician, balloons and of course our in house events team who have over 104 years experience, or so Julia said in her speech!
We're finalising a date for another event next year so if you're looking to book a charity event, fundraising ball or awards dinner let us know and we'll make sure we send you an invite to the next one.
In the meantime if you want to make the Christmas Pudding Chocolate Brownies for yourself here's the recipe!
Christmas Pudding Chocolate Brownie
- 370g Caster Sugar
- 80g Cocoa Powder
- 60g P Flour
- ½ tsp Baking Powder
- 4 Eggs
- Vanilla
- 250g Butter
- 200g Dark Choc
- Leftover Christmas pudding
Method
- Combine dry ingredients
- Whisk eggs
- Melt butter and choc
- Combine all.
- Bake @ 160’c for 25-30 mins
Serve with some marmalade cream and some poached vanilla cherries
By Liz Duncan, 30 November 2012 –
17 September 2012
As the summer draws to a close it is time to reflect on what have been a strange few months.
At Castle Green we followed up on our busiest June ever with our best accommodation month in August since we opened in 1997. July was okay but we were never going to beat last year which was also a record.
At The Pinewood it is getting busier all the time and well ahead of the first few months under our new ownership this time last year.
The Jubilee, Olympics and the Great British weather have all provided challenges and opportunities but we have tried to stick our most important job of looking after the customers.
The economy continues to be the default topic of conversation when there is nothing else to say (like talking about the children at a dinner party) but I can’t help thinking that having the media on another agenda for a few months might just have allowed people to get on with other things…including having a good time.
By Tim Rumney, 17 September 2012 –