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On train catering, Should Steam railways be doing it more ?

Discussion in 'Heritage Railways & Centres in the UK' started by toplight, Oct 17, 2022.

  1. Gladiator 5076

    Gladiator 5076 Part of the furniture

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    Do you mean £35 on top of the railways fare or for £35 for the whole thing? On many lines that would mean around £5 for the cream tea or even free.
     
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  2. 35B

    35B Nat Pres stalwart

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    Oh yes - and not forgetting Sunday...
     
  3. Pete Thornhill

    Pete Thornhill Resident of Nat Pres Staff Member Administrator Moderator Friend

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    On top, although it seems high for a cream tea, for comparison the SVR offers an afternoon tea for £55 pp all in, which when you take the rail fare off is roughly £35 pp.
     
  4. toplight

    toplight Well-Known Member

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    Writing a bit more about the talk. The guy said they looked at the number of bookings each day and decided on which coaches they would then need and they would then often just get added to any normal service train so not necessarily all of the train would be diners.

    If you look at the website too much of the food like fish and chips, curries, etc will be bought in from an Indian restaurant or fish and chip shop rather than be made themselves. He talked a lot about buying a generator which was in one of the coaches to provide mains power and the company which supplied it also maintained it.

    Another thing they had done was hire in already well restored Bulleid coach from the Vintage carriage trust on a yearly rolling contract which they still used, which made sense, get something in that you can use straight away rather than spend years first restoring one.

    I like that it was clearly part of their everyday operation with a range of different types of offerings to appeal to different people, not just a luxury train to use now and then charging very high prices and suitable only really for adults not children.
     
  5. WesternRegionHampshireman

    WesternRegionHampshireman Well-Known Member

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    Well in a way, that is kind of bad thing, not really producing your own meals, then again, could any railway squeeze in the budget "X" amounts of sacks of potatoes and/or rice? Or "X" amount of fresh fish, fresh curry ingredients (flour, tomatoes, spices, etc) or even things like mushy peas or poppadoms?

    If I may, there is alot of prep work that needs to be done to get the right amount of supplies and meals out to the public (I know this working in a cafe for a few years) and also, you then have to put people who run these through culinary training, which can take a while, THEN obviously you'll need chefs, waiters/waitresses, people to wash up etc...., even something as washing a few plates up costs, considering the amount of washing up liquid you'll need.

    Kitchen equipment like ovens, fryers, pots and pans plus boards for raw meat, fish, fruit and veg, dairy and cooked meats are needed which aren't cheap, then obviously people's diets are changing such as: Pesketarian, Vegetarian, Vegan, Gluten Free, Dairy Free, Wheat Free etc.....

    So, it is a hell of a lot easier to get local businesses to do all the catering as then you wouldn't need much staff to run these type of things, it's a good thing too, as the heritage railways help the local community and vice versa. :)
     
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  6. LC2

    LC2 Member

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    Whilst I wasn't volunteering on last Saturday's RAT, it would have been good stock control.
    With the reduced length of the train this year (5 rather than 6) it is even more important than ever to not waste a firkin or two of beer.
    We can judge pretty closely how much will be drunk of an evening (and and what point in the journey people slow down) - Unless we unexpectedly get a Rubgy Club outing !!!!
    The barrels are supplemented with sufficient bottles to allow us to run the barrels out and swap over to bottles, usually at some point during the last leg.
     
  7. MellishR

    MellishR Resident of Nat Pres Friend

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    That ignores the people who would come for the ride and cream tea but not for the ride alone.
     
  8. Old Kent Biker

    Old Kent Biker Member

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  9. martin1656

    martin1656 Nat Pres stalwart Friend

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    For a while i was one of the teams of chefs on the Watercress belle, luckily i was a fully trained chef, went to college, got my deplomas etc, and had worked in the trade, yes there is a lot of prep work, but then you control the quality,and everything is fresh, The good thing is you know roughly how many covers you have, and you order accordingly, with a little bit over to allow for eventualities, ( staff meal) Or my testers, if i was experimenting with new menu ideas, ;) The profit when your doing everything in house, stays in house, your not paying anyone elses margins, and theres the pride when you hear your customers remarking how good the meal was, the Belle used to book up a year in advance, and many were repeat bookings, we were doing something right,
     
    Last edited: Oct 22, 2022
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  10. WesternRegionHampshireman

    WesternRegionHampshireman Well-Known Member

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    Never doubted it. :)
    However, I do like the idea of a Quantock Belle-style service at events, serving different meals at different times of the day.
    Imagine how much money they could make serving both pre-booked AND walk-on diners?
    Although, the hoy paloy may not like the idea of mixing with the riff-raff. ;)
     
  11. 35B

    35B Nat Pres stalwart

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    What a brilliant way to undermine sales and, more importantly, profits. No need to prebook means people turn up on the day, and then the lack of pre booking means that there are either empty covers or people turned away disappointed.

    If I am going for any kind of special meal, I always book to be sure of getting a table.


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  12. martin1656

    martin1656 Nat Pres stalwart Friend

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    It has to be a prebook only service, because otherwise your overheads will go through the roof, along with your profit margins going in the other way, The only time you can offer it to turn up on the day, is if you have had last minute cancelations, and you have not been able to fill them, I have only known that happen a couple of times, when a couple turned up and enquired about the belle, and booking, during the day, the information office phoned Marie, and asked about a last minute booking and as it happened we did have a cancelation,
     
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  13. 35B

    35B Nat Pres stalwart

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    Well said. Right now, I’m looking at what’s left on the gin bar after a beer festival, and with little way to use surplus stock, it is dead money with no sale or return option. Great for visitors’ experience, but no use if it doesn’t contribute to profit.


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  14. Jamessquared

    Jamessquared Nat Pres stalwart

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    Communion lager?

    Tom
     
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  15. 35B

    35B Nat Pres stalwart

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    Heresy on several levels!


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  16. Bikermike

    Bikermike Well-Known Member

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    Does gin go off that quickly? Can it not be recycled through the other booze-serving outlets?
    (Or just soak the pseudo-coal in it and see what happens)
     
  17. 35B

    35B Nat Pres stalwart

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    We’re a church, and run the festival once a year, changing the range each time.

    But it’s not about my specific headache but the wider point that leftover stock is a problem if you don’t have the turnover to use it soon after.


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  18. Bikermike

    Bikermike Well-Known Member

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    Oh sorry, though you were Bluebell.

    I read somewhere that one of the cancer charities (MacMillan?) has a drinks trolley, and any unwanted booze is therefore available for those for whom it can't make anything worse.
     
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  19. 35B

    35B Nat Pres stalwart

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    Copied from the Spa Valley thread, as I think more relevant here:
    I think you also need to allow for the role of the loss leader - how many customers would you lose if you didn't provide a catering facility?

    Upthread, I've given the gin bar example. I'm still working out the numbers, but one of the factors I need to think about is how much footfall we get as an event that we would lose outright if it weren't there. A lot of our visitors focused on the real ales (rightly, that's the core of the event), but offering the gins gave those not interested in beer or cider a chance to do something different.

    I personally don't believe in running at a loss, but an overly narrow analysis of margins can mislead.
     
  20. WesternRegionHampshireman

    WesternRegionHampshireman Well-Known Member

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    I apologise. :Meh:
     

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