North Yorkshire Moors Railway General Discussion

If you are not talking about a prebooked option be that fish and chips, highly unlikely to work on the NYMR I suspect due to timings but an on train catering option that is "special" or at least up market have you any idea how much cost and effort that will be to achieve. Airlines, who lets face it grossly oversell the quality of their food and drink offerings even in first class, have whole departments working on trying to produce. Trying to produce even the sort of coffee that @35B mentions is going to be very difficult using potable water and you will probably have to modify some commercial machine to work onboard. Nothing is impossible probably, it will all come with a cost and you have no guarantee of a return. But I am sure if you put together a business case and submit it the FD and the rest of the board would consider it.
As an aside, and I accept there are far more certification issues, but when we wanted a toaster in First Class it ended up being over £2500 for a model you could by for £80 in John Lewis at the time, and that is in 2010 pounds, god knows what they cost now.
What do LNER do for coffee I read they have the best on train catering offer.

 

The psychology of ticket prices is key. If we take the post Christmas trains as an example. £49.50 for an adult, so for a couple that is near enough to £100 as makes no difference, that will make a lot of people take a sharp intake of breath and say no thank you. Yet a child is £12.15, approx a quarter of the adult fare, so a family of four would be £123.30, which to them will seem not unreasonable hopefully. If these trains sell out all is well and good. But if not, what fare would generate the best income? Knocking £5 off the adult fare and adding it to the child fare, would not impact the typical family of four, would slightly benefit couples and smaller families and slightly penalise large families but more importantly change the optics of the headline adult fare. Although I think the target fare for an adult should be below £45 to see the best psychological impact with child fares at just under £18 and dogs up to £4.50.
A question are unsold tickets for trains such as these sold on the day on a turn up and go, first come, first served basis? If not why not? As long as the risk of possible disappointment is made clear in advance, it is no different to turning up at a restaurant on speck in the hope of getting a table.

Sawdust.

 

It's very expensive for what it is, and even more so at the time of year when people are strapped for cash. 3 hours in Whitby in December doesn't appeal, unless I know the weather is going to be good. If it's cold, wet and windy, I'd be staying well away from a seaside town! My wife would be happy to go for a train ride for a couple of hours, cup of tea and a bit of cake on the journey, nice steam heated stock. But signing up for 4 hours on the train then 3 hours in Whitby, not a chance.

The fares are expensive for what they are, a simple out and back. Yes, that's what the majority of passengers will do during the summer anyway, but they have the option of getting off en route, having a wander round Goathland, etc. A round trip from. Pickering to Grosmont with 60007 earlier in the year was £30. Is the extra £19.50 to go to Whitby really value for money? Would they have been better off running a couple of Pickering - Grosmont return services per day at £25/30 each?

Looking at the website, there are around 405 seats (not including disabled seating) available each day, so 3645 seats for the week. Total ticket sales over the 9 days? 86.

Other lines are advertising mince pie specials. The NYMR are once again advertising themselves as a bloody park and ride for Whitby!

 

I think I'd pay to escape Whitby in December!

Sawdust.

 

Indeed, booking a weekend away in November Whitby was on our list for a short time before we decided on the Lake District.

 

To be honest the same really applies for end seaside town.
I would not be suggesting to folks to come to Swanage in the middle of winter unless they had some other reason, lots of stuff will be shut or only open a few days a week. It's the sort of place you may come down to bird watch on Poole Harbour, or go walking if you are into that sort of thing, but otherwise the appeal is limited.

 

I’m with Mrs 35B there. The smell of a burger would be quite annoying to me, as would coffee as I don’t drink the stuff. Fish & chips can be tempting but I have an unwritten rule shared by others in my family that you can’t get decent fish & chips at the seaside so anything produced in Whitby is off the menu. You can get decent fish & chips in Pickering, though.
In terms of on train catering for the masses, I’m unlikely to get up and go to the buffet on my journey but I will often buy a cuppa and snack from a trolley dolly going up and down the train.
I don’t say that I’m the archetypal person that you should base your business plan on, though.

 

Nor am I, or Mrs 35B. But the point is that each one of these anecdotes suggests a complex pattern of data that none of us should underestimate.

 

And there lies the issue in trying to plan an on train catering option, especially an upmarket one. Now I like coffee but refuse to pay the sort of prices most people think is the norm these days, I would rather just go without.
As an example of how you never really know what will work & sometimes you stumble on things by mistake, when BA started the Raid the Larder Product (help yourself to snacks in Club World between meals) it became a roaring success. Things like Mars, Twix biscuits etc. So much so they had to stop First Class pax going back and helping themselves. The First Class between meals offering being things like sandwiches that nobody wanted.

 

The real point here is that an analysis needs to be at least undertaken! Or, to put it another way "that's the way we've always done it" doesn't necessarily mean that the "always" way is still the best. For example, afaik the coffee on the NYMR is still of an instant variety, and there may be more than person who prefers something better! But you'll never know for sure without some research - and whilst the smell of burgers e (other fried food options are possible!) may be anathema to some, burger vans still seem to do a roaring trade. Analysis is not easy, but we do have quite a few buffet car and trolley stewards to ask in the first instance!

 

I quite agree - and also suggest discussion with other railways on their experiences (e.g. GCR/griddle car).

 

With respect, I'd suggest that airline catering provides a poor comparison. The last time I flew was with Ryanair and even their coffee tasted better than instant - maybe it was an upmarket instant. But in any case, airline food always tastes poor because olfactory and other senses are degraded at altitude. Airlines may need "specially selected" water but I very much doubt that happens in 99% of terrestrial cafes (or the LNER for that matter) - and that's who the NYMR would be competing with! If the problem of supplying an adequate and lasting power supply can be solved, I don't think finding a coffee machine that grinds up a portion of bean to make the coffee will be too much of an issue.

 

You wouldn't believe how many KitKat's the NYMR used to sell in a season.

Sawdust.

 

Have you drunk any coffee on a mainline tour? Not sure the water for that could be classed as excellent.

 

And the coffee added to that water?

 

If we're talking pre-booked on train catering then surely the F&WHR model is the way to go. There is a very detailed section on their website outlining the catering options. Food and Drink - Ffestiniog & Welsh Highland Railways

 

Yes worth a thought, even on standard services.

 

Again, this sounds like a classic 'business school' analysis. It is an improvement over some prior posts, in that it at least seems to acknowledge that the market the line is in is the 'entertainment' market, not the 'transport' market - but I'm still dubious about a mindset which thinks that the line is primarily in any market. (This is not about making income balance expenses: the RSPCA, I'm sure, knows it needs to make the books balance - but I doubt very much that they think they are a business.)

I'm not saying I have the answer (a different kind of answer) to the NYMR's problems - this is more about the heritage rail world generally. Do many lines think they are businesses in the 'entertainment' market? If so, I suspect they might be in trouble at some point. Heritage rail lines are all to some degree constrained in how far they can morph their offerings to that market - because they are, after all, heritage rail lines. I rather think that in the long run, they won't be able to keep up with less-constrained competitors in that market. If so, heritage rail lines that think they are businesses in the 'entertainment' market might wind up in trouble. Do they need to have a re-think?

Noel

 

Maybe seeing what the WSR does would be an idea. Long journey, very tidal traffic flow, seaside destination. I've not been for a while but they certainly used to offer hot snacks on board - pasties, sausage rolls, etc.

 

We thought the availability of (not sure what you would call it, picnic basket sounds too formal and packed lunch too prosaic) "lunch bags" was a major plus on the FR and we had a very enjoyable round trip in the observation car to Blaenau and back last year, picking up our lunch bags at Blaenau and being served with a bottle of fizz from the onboard catering to go with the food on the run back. Another advantage over the lunch offering on the NYMR (apart from the usual NYMR problem of things being in the wrong place e.g. having to drive to Grosmont to get on) is that you can get out at Blaenau and wander around town (cue jokes of anything more than five minutes being too long in Blaenau), but it gives time for instance to visit the Model Bakery to sample a Kurdish pasty. On the NYMR one seems to be confined to the train in Pickering station. Since Covid, the FR has become rather like Wallace Arnold in that it no longer encourages the traditional turn up and go but the service is rather limited these days and one is almost forced to book ahead. (cf. the draft timetable for the WHR submitted to the public enquiry of eight trains a day each way between Port and Caernarfon). I think these days it is one on three days a week(?). The sort of check-in arrangement outside the main station entrance at Portmadoc is also a bit unusual but it feels welcoming. I suppose all the railways envy the Snowdon Railway where there is a frantic scramble (at 18.00 I think) among aspiring travellers, a bit like making an appointment to see a GP, when more seats are released via an announcement on facebook every few days. I guess this provides an opportunity for entrepreneurs to organise group tours to take the hassle out of the process.