We always get asked about our BnB in Blackpool as to why we did it and what made us do it, so we thought we would give a little insight into how we started.

It all began in January 2001 when we met in a place called Yeadon about 8 or so miles outside Leeds. I myself Steve lived in Newbury Berkshire and was working for an air conditioning company in Leeds and Dawn who lived in Leeds was working for a supermarket chain. We met whilst I was out on a works Christmas do and promptly started seeing each other which involved me driving from Newbury or where ever I had just finished work to Leeds on a Friday night usually taking a minimum of five hours. This went on for around seven years and during that time we both enjoyed coming over to Blackpool for a weekend stay, and we have stayed in many a B&B. So normally over breakfast we would talk about running a bed and breakfast ourselves and convincing each other that we could do this it can’t be that hard surely all you have to do is cook a breakfast and make some beds. If only this were true. We started to look into it and it started to look like a possible venture and before we knew it we were looking at places and then just bought one, bearing in mind we had never lived together before and never ran a business together so what could be a better recipe for disaster than take on this and we took over the then named Trianon Guest House on September 1^st 2017. It was also the fact that we were at that time in our lives that if we didn’t do something different then we never would.

Once we moved in, we had one week to get organised as there were bookings waiting for us and all of a sudden this was now reality and to be fair, we were like rabbits caught in head lights. Some of the bookings even required evening meals which is something we didn’t really want to do, but we were thrown in at the deep end and had to start learning to swim fast. We even had to put on Christmas for some guests that first year.

As part of the Guest house we bought we were supposed to have the Rotary club using our premises through fifteen weeks of the summer which we thought would be great for the first year to help us on our way with some steady income. However, we found out in the January of 2018 that this was not to be so with a year of empty books it was panic stations, help what are we going to do. The only answer at the time was to put the hotel on the online travel agent sites (OTAs) as they are known. So, armed with the camera on the phone we quickly took pictures of rooms etc and I was able to get the place online and visible to the general public. This is something that the place has never really been on as no one really knew we existed even though the previous owners had the place for about 30 years they relied on the Rotary club and spin offs from that so really, we were actually starting from scratch.

Once the place was online bookings started to slowly come through and we did have some regulars from the previous owner that still gave us a try and slowly but surely the books started to look better. Then one day we were approached by a Chinese lady looking for rooms for a dance school from Beijing for the annual dance festival held at the winter gardens. We were able to house 12 of them for the junior competition the only trouble being is that it is over Easter and they arrive on the Easter Sunday albeit for the whole week. We then found out that they also return for the senior competitions at the end of May but over the bank holiday and by this time we were full for that weekend. During there stay with us we did get to know the leader and we also gave the young juniors what we called a Chinese breakfast which proved to be very popular. During the visit from them over the senior competition which we could not house any of them one morning about 6.30am we had there leader knocking at our door pleading with us to help him as where some of them were staying there were issues that they could not stay there and he needed to find places for 23 of them. Well Steve and Dawn to the rescue as it was a few days after the bank holiday and we were able to house 12 and we found places for the rest over two other properties and we saved the day becoming even more friendly with the leader who then promptly booked all of our bed and breakfasts for the following year.

The Chinese was a good financial help at the start of the year and bookings started to flow in more, the reviews we were getting were all good and business was starting to build quite nicely as we were able to keep our heads above water and we had managed to make it through two winters when believe me it is quiet. We do have a full house in the middle of January thanks to the Pidgeon fanciers weekend held in Blackpool every year and to this day they have remained loyal to us.

So all in all things were looking not to bad were we surviving and getting on as doing this job can be lonely at times when it is quiet and spending time with your other half 24/7 can prove to be very testing at times but the harder we battled on the stronger we got and the stronger the business got. So, every one told us if you can make it through the first two years then you will be OK. Well just coming out of our second winter bookings starting to build the Chinese booked in for the dance festivals even some early spring bookings what could possibly go wrong.

Well it did and yes you guessed it LOCKDOWN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!BOOK NOW