Wartime in the Cotswolds

A great weekend with tremendous support from everyone at the railway,  but don't let me say any more - have a look at Tripadvisor
Colin Fewell

Annual assessment by "Visit England"

You may know we are annually assessd by "Visit England" before being allowed to display the rose emblem which states we are a "Quality Assured Visitor Attraction". The latest visit by one of their assessors was on Good Friday - the day the rains came and also 2807 failed!  I am awaiting their report which will be sirculated to all departments but I am told this will be very favourable, and in particular they will comment on how well we kept visitors aware of the loco failure situation.
Colin Fewell

Easter

On easter Monday, we had the largest number of visitors we have ever had on a non major special event day. The final tally was 905! Thanks to everyone who dealt with this number, to the Young Volunteers who organised the Easter Eggspress activities at Winchcombe, and to Alan and Dave for taking on a car parking role. Overall the weekend was slightly down on 2014 but this was entirely due to the poor weather on Good Friday.
Colin Fewell

Special Fish and Chips evening

The Directors had a great time last night serving over 100 volunteers on the special fish and chip train. This was the Board's way to thank everyone for all the tremendous effort  put in  to make this such a successful railway. And with drinks prices slashed and free fish and chips,  hopefully  all who came along for the evening  went away happy. I even saw a bottle of champagne being served! And we Directors weren't even allowed to drink as we were on duty
Colin Fewell.

The past three days

I amn sure all volunteers would have been involved one way or another on Saturday, Sunday and Monday and as you will have experienced,  the weekend certainly buzzed!
The recruitment fair organised by Philip Young was a great success with a large number of newcomers to the railway indicating an intention to volunteer - far more than we all expected. If they all follow this up and become fully fledged volunteers, we will be in a good position for the future.
Then on Monday we had our annual marketing day and this year over 170 people from b&b's, hotels, tourist offices, the media etc came along making this the largest such event we have ever held. Lots of good comments but to quote just one: "As a complete 'outsider' to the railway I was very impressed with this
well organised and successful day.  There was obviously a lot of strong local support & identification with the GWR which is well deserved.  Other organisations  could learn a lot from you!!"

Colin Fewell

Stories from the Race Trains

As usual the race trains provided some amusing anecdotes.

We heard of one punter who placed a £10 each way bet at rather short odds on horse number 15 but when he went to collect his winnings found he had specified the wrong race.  He let the bet stand and number 15 came in at very long odds on the next race giving him a very handsome win. We were able to help him with that.

Our Champagne was on sale for £38 a bottle, £8 a glass.  One passenger felt that £38 a bottle was ok but he objected to paying £8 each for the glasses to drink it from! He was happy when we explained that empty glasses were free.

An order for drinks from one compartment came to well over £100.  The size of the order was justified on the grounds that half of the drinks would be left in the carriage for the evening when it was probable they would have no money left to buy drinks with.  Makes sense to me.

Many of our volunteers feel that waistcoats are appropriate wear for stewards on these trains and the most sartorial match their bow ties as well. One volunteer appeared in the morning in a smart green waistcoat and bow tie in the colours of the Irish flag. By the evening he was in a normal GWSR tie having sold the bow tie to a passenger for £50.  Nothings too much trouble for our customers.

Finally one very “happy” punter said keep the change when offering £150 for an £80 order but our volunteer felt that that was just a little too generous given the condition of the customer. We hope no one is ripped off on our railway.

A big thanks to all our volunteers from every department that helped make these trains a great success again.

Richard Summers

Race week

Thanks to everyone for making this a highly successful race week. I think our Finance Director will be pleased! Lots of positive comments from visitors and the media which will set us up for a great season. More infrormation to follow
Colin Fewell