So then, what shall I talk about this time - well, lets start with business. Firstly, we have now started to see a drop off in the day time....... but evenings continue to be quite reasonable 30 - 40 covers most evenings and weekends pretty much fully booked, with 60/70 covers on a Sunday lunch hour still. Our Sunday roast stills seems to draw the customers in and we've decided to keep the price at £9.95 - that's a choice of 2 Roasts, usually Beef and 1 other - Lamb or Pork generally, homemade Onion pudding or Yorkshire pudding and a gravy that James starts to make about the middle of the week....everything goes in it and by the time Sunday comes it's just absolutely delicious!! As well as the roast we also do a selection from our 'ordinary' menu, and it's really interesting watching people decide what to have on the Sunday. We've also introduced a fabulous Carrot Cake and Coffee or Tea as an alternative drink / snack and blimey, that's going really well - hoorah!
This time of year bring is bringing really great customers....... many remember us coming to the pub last year and still being in the 'settling in phase' - needless to say I haven't remembered many of them, but they've been most gracious about that fact! Talking of which the new winter menu is doing really, really well - the Steak & Kidney pudding in particular selling very well....suspect James our Head Chef may be sick of them by Christmas..... :) But it proves all that I thought - customers like good traditional home cooked pub food - and our winter 'British Classics' reflect that.
The Victoria is still without it's huge roaring fire as the fan (draws the smoke up and out - means the pub stays a smoke free zone! lol) is still waiting to be fixed.... but as I sit here typing this afternoon, there are two chaps drilling and muttering, so I know that once that's fixed and the fire is up and running that will encourage visitors to come in and then stay in!
The Victoria Inn website has been re-vamped over the last couple of weeks for the Winter and the young man Daniel who has done this for me has certainly not found it to be straightforward, but with his perseverance and my nagging, he's done a great job. Do have a look at the dog friendly page - there is a video montage of some of our favourite dog visitors on the page. Talking of websites, I was thrilled to see we've had a couple of recent comments on the 'Beer in the Evening' site, saying we're their favourite pub in Salcombe......... all of those sorts of things are free advertising and help increase visitors to the Victoria.
We had a visit this week from Catherine of the wine department at St Austell - a fantastically enthusiastic lady, who certainly knew her business and was very complimentary on our wine list (SOH's choices - he knows his wines that's for sure!) and our back bar display, and she is going to do some training with us all before Christmas, and she had some great ideas for a couple of alternative wines which I think we'll use. Out of that meeting has come one of the few wines we sell by the bottle going to by the glass as well - a great New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, so it'll be interesting to see how that now sells, and although she liked our display we've just had a little change round, and also re-typed up the wine menu to reflect some of her comments regarding ease of reading. So a short meeting gave us a lot of food for thought!
Our very best friend Mark came to stay for a couple of nights - one of those nights he and I managed to do a fair bit of damage to a bottle of Gin - for which I paid the price for at least 2 days! Mark has very kindly agreed to give me away for our wedding next year (He reckons he could have got a good price though!?!) so naturally enough there was a lot of wedding talk - I'm now mildly panicked as I realise there is still a lot of organising to do.........although, we have booked our honeymoon - a few days in the Calvados region of France.
We are planning for Half Term starting the end of next week - we have a huge under 13 Rugby team booked in for 1 of the evenings, so that will be great for us and them - I love those sort of functions. Traditionally, this October half term is seen as being quite busy as many of the 2nd homeowners come down and it's the last big break before Christmas..... so staff rota's to do next today! In between then and now SOH and I have a dinner / dance to go to next week - and I'm really looking forward to that. It's in Plymouth at a nice hotel - so should be a good bash!
Before I finish this post - have a look at the photo here. Yet another water problem in Fore Street, just up from the Victoria, only a fortnight after the last burst - this time a water stop cock blew its top - literally, and we had our very own 10 foot high Trevi Fountain in the street............now then where did we put our wellies...????
1 comment:
I know what you mean about real people reading...kinda funny. I would kill for some roast beef right now!!!
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