The long standing Managing Director of Rudding Park Hotel, Peter Banks, is to retire after 28 years at the helm.
During this time, Rudding Park has grown from £2m to £28m turnover and has won more than 60 awards.
Mr Banks has also been a contributor to The Stray Ferret – writing about the challenges faced by the hospitality industry – particularly during the covid pandemic.
Peter comments:
“There is no doubt, Rudding Park is my spiritual home and the owners, the Mackaness family and the Rudding Park team will remain lifelong friends. As such, I will not be a stranger as I will no doubt often be found on the golf course in a bid to reduce my handicap!”
Mr Banks plans to continue his career as an advisor, consultant and non-executive director within the hospitality industry.
“I do of course recognise there is an element of irony, having previously described hospitality consultants as being like someone who visits the field of battle after the battle is over and bayonets the wounded!
“However, I thrive on a challenge and am looking forward to helping hoteliers across Europe ensure their properties are profitable, successful and sustainable using the wealth of experience; including the successes (and failures) I have amassed over the years.”
Simon Mackaness, owner of Rudding Park paid tribute:
“Peter and I have been on a roller coaster journey together and Peter has been totally responsible for creating a popular, successful and commercially viable resort. On a personal and professional level, words cannot express my thanks for all he has achieved during his 28 years with Rudding Park.”
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The owners of the St George Hotel in Harrogate and the Spa Hotel in Ripon have confirmed the venues will be given new names and branding.
The properties, which are being refurbished, will be renamed The Harrogate Inn and The Ripon Inn.
The Harrogate Inn is due to re-open in early summer with 96 rooms — six more than previously. The Ripon Inn is expected to reopen in midsummer with 58 rooms — 15 more than previously.
The Harrogate Inn
The two hotels have also been given new coats of arms.
The new identities reflect the brand style of owners the Inn Collection Group, a Newcastle-based company that has historic venues across the north.
Inn Collection Group venues serve food and drink all day and are styled as pubs with rooms rather than hotels.
Its other venues include Knaresborough’s Dower House, which has been renamed The Knaresborough Inn.
Zoe Cooper, marketing manager for the Inn Collection Group, said:
“As with the new names we have unveiled for other sites recently, including The Knaresborough Inn, we have looked to embrace the history of the wider area and we hope the new look will create a talking point that serves as a link to the past while the site embarks on an exciting future.
“With both sites we have adopted the name of the locale for the property, which allows us to introduce its setting more easily for potential visitors who may be considering a stay, allowing them to look further into what all these fantastic places have to offer.”
The Ripon Inn
The refurbished guest accommodation at The Ripon Inn will provide a mix of double, twin and family bedrooms, accessible rooms, suites, and dog friendly rooms.
It will have an additional 15 en-suite rooms and the reconfigurated ground floor area will include a new bar and kitchen area.
The Harrogate Inn will see six new bedrooms added on the ground floor and a “complete transformation of the venue’s hospitality spaces”, according to the owners.
Coats of arms
The Ripon Inn, set in six acres of gardens, has been closed to guests since July 2020 for extensive internal and external works.
Its new coat of arms is made up of a shield flanked by a pair of stags, linking to the historical coat of arms of the Earl and Marquess or Ripon.
The left half of the shield contains a representation of the Ripon horn in recognition of the history of the city’s wakemen and hornblowers.
Sitting on a red background — a colour scheme and motif that appear in the city’s coat of arms – this is combined with a yellow chevron which is again informed by the Earl and Marquess of Ripon’s heraldry.
The right-hand side of the shield features a stylised illustration of the grade one listed Ripon Cathedral and its early English gothic west front, dating back to 1220 and regarded as one of the best examples of its type.
The Harrogate Inn closed in January for a 16-week refurbishment.
Its coat of arms sees the left half of the shield contain a red and white asymmetrical crossed pattern taken from the town’s original coat of arms, together with the white rose of Yorkshire.
The right-hand side of the shield features a lion ‘passant’ taken from the borough council’s arms, and this is bounded top and bottom by repeating wavy lines to represent the importance of springs in the town’s history.
Supporting the shield are a pair of griffins taken from the crest of the Slingsby family, who were instrumental in bringing prosperity to the town through Sir William Slingsby and his discovered of the first spring in Harrogate, the Tewitt Well, over three hundred years ago.
Read more:
- Harrogate hotel begins recruiting — three weeks after laying off 76 staff
- New name and coat of arms for Knaresborough hotel
- Stray Views: Memories of Harrogate’s St George Hotel
Harrogate hotelier says hospitality grew ‘fat and lazy’ on cheap foreign labour
A leading Harrogate hotelier has said the hospitality sector grew “fat and lazy” on cheap labour from Europe and has been forced to pay better.
Peter Banks, managing director of Rudding Park, said some bar and kitchen staff were now earning £13.70 an hour and could earn almost £29,000 a year for a 40-hour week if they were prepared to work anti-social hours.
Mr Banks’ comments came during a speech at Harrogate District Chamber of Commerce last night about the lessons of covid.
He said the sector had suffered from the impact of lockdowns and ‘furloughitis’, whereby staff that had spent eight months of the year being paid 80% of their wages by government had reappraised their lives and decided against a career in hospitality.
Staff recruitment and retention, he added, was now a “serious issue” and had forced pay increases. He said Rudding Park now paid an extra £1 an hour for working after 7pm and an extra £2 an our for working weekends.
The hotel has also introduced service charges for the first time, further boosting staff wages, he added. Mr Banks said:
“We have grown fat and lazy on cheap labour from Europe. Whether you are a Brexiteer or not, the rules have changed. We are not going back.
“It’s no good raging against covid. It’s no good raging against Brexit. We’ve just got to get on with it.”
Read more:
- Rudding Park named hotel spa of the year in global awards
- Harrogate Station Gateway set to be given go-ahead this month
‘Thrown under a bus’
Mr Banks said Prime Minister Boris Johnson “threw us under a bus” during the first lockdown in March 2020 as hotels were forced to close without any support.
Rudding Park came within weeks of closing, said Mr Banks, adding that he told all 320 staff the business might survive until July if they accepted a 40% pay cut.
Chancellor Rishi Sunak then “rode to the rescue’ by introducing the furlough scheme, Mr Banks added.
He said the two years since has been a rollercoaster ride of adaptation.
Mr Banks said Rudding Park no longer accepted cash, which required three person days a week to count. It had also centralised ordering food “because we had five different kitchens and five different chefs ordering their own stock”.
He advised others in hospitality to “stretch the rules a bit, don’t just sit their passively and be creative”. He added:
“Don’t waste a good crisis. there’s always something you can learn from it.”
