’20th Anniversary Celebrations'

In November we celebrated our 20th year in the business with an open day for local businesses and regular guests of the hotel. We are all a little older and a little greyer than when we started in 1987. Now into the second generation, the business is still going strong with the help of our extended family (the team).

However we do remember that none of it would have been possible without the support of our guests past and present and we would like to take this opportunity to say thank you!

Johansens 'Best English Wine List 2008'

The Cottage in the Wood was awarded the Johansens Special Award for Best English Wine List.  Just seven special awards were given this year with others going to world famous names such as Raymond Blanc's Le Manoir aux Quat's Saisons. We've had English wines on our list for 20 years and now have twelve really good ones.  We offer a money back guarantee on English Wines!

’The Pinnacles‘ – Massive Investment

Our new £1m+ development which saw the replacement of the Coach House with a completely new nineteen bedroom building, has just seen it’s 4th anniversary.  How time flies!

The bedrooms have received very favourable comments and many guests have returned because the comfort of the new rooms has enhanced the experience of staying at ‘The Cottage’.

Needless to say there were teething problems and we were not helped by both the main contractor and the main sub-contractor going into liquidation. John used to be a ‘ginger top’ and is now grey!

Water
Despite the handicap, the water situation has been resolved by installing a cold water reservoir and by increasing the hot water storage.

It’s interesting to observe that increasingly people shower nowadays but whilst staying here, tend to bath.  Perhaps it’s all part and parcel of relaxing.

An average bath takes three times the water of an average shower so no doubt this is what gave rise to the plumbers’ miscalculations.  As client, I distinctly remember posing the question during the building phase and being told the calculations were correct! Wrong!

We’ve also suffered a technical problem with the floors causing cracking sounds through the structural walls of the room beneath.  It’s more complicated than just shrinkage but to save boring you with technicalities we have, after many attempts at a remedy, six in all seem to have solved it and the successful template for the remedy is being quickly extended throughout the building.

Oh, the joys of builders!

Training
‘The Team is the hotel’ John often says and the enjoyment and satisfaction our team get from what they do, shines through to our guests.  Friendly but respectful, backed by professionalism is our aim.

Training is an ongoing part of what we do as a progressive organisation.
Recent activity has included First Aid, Fire Evacuation procedures, Wine Foundation Certificate, Computer Skills and Business Economics.

Much effort has been put into training the management team of Nick Webb (General Manager) and Sîan Alexander (GM Front of House and Housekeeping) to actually run the company as opposed to running the operation of their own departments.

Changing of the Guard
John and Sue have entered their twenty first year of running ‘The Cottage’and it’s now time to stop working 100 hours or more a week and up the ‘quality time’ of life.  Not that we’re disappearing but our working days will be fewer so the day to day running of the hotel will fall upon the valued key members of our team, Sian Alexander, Lukasz Krysiak , Coralie Beattie, Melanie Davies and our children Dominic and Maria, and our son-in-law Nick.

So as rare as it seems to be in this country in the hotel industry, we’re on to the second generation.

Refurbishments
For our guests we have refurbished room 4, 9, and 10 in Beech Cottage and others are planned over the next year, we have also replaced many of our bathroom carpets with tiles which I must say look far better and much more practical..

We have just refurbished our dining room, it now has a light airy feel with large mirrors, new lighting and stripped wood tables. We have also adapted our lunch menu to reflect this!

New Televisions/DVD Players
We have just had new flat screen televisions and DVD/video players put into our rooms.  We are starting to get together a library of DVD's so if you have any ideas about which ones you think we should have, just let us know!

Free use of local leisure facilities

We have a membership with Malvern Splash Leisure Centre for our guests to use the facilities which include a gym, sauna and swimming pool, free of charge. You can also play squash at our local club for just £1. Golf is also available with considerably reduced green fees (conditions apply, please ask).  Call us on 01684 588860 for more information.