First HopTrip in UK: Abbey Guest House

3 days, 2 nights in a cozy guest house from which we had so much to learn… and we did! Terry, the owner, is a wonderful person who welcomed us so nicely. This first HopTrip in UK was a success for us, and we do hope for her as well. Here is the story of our stay in Abingdon-on-Thames.
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11am, East London. We leave our AirBnB apartment of Cambridge Heath Road for Victoria Coach Station. The connected people we are bought the ticket for the X90 bus to Oxford on the X90 app, but once you have activated them, you only have an hour to get in the bus. Oops, too short. But the lucky people we are are waiting for the bus to arrive with… the driver, so he finally can check our tickets on time.

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An hour and a half to Oxford in a double deck bus with a WIFI access so we could work, two sandwiches at Le Croissant Beurré and an X13 bus to Abindgon later, here we are, in front of the Abbey Guest House. Terry, who we have already met at the Independent Hotel Show four days earlier, is here to welcome us and install us in a very nice double room, room n°6, after a super nice welcome café with homemade biscuits.

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We found this guest house after many researches on internet and were really interested by its accessibility part. Indeed, Terry has really at heart that her place is accessible to as many people as possible; so there is a room on the ground floor, accessible for wheelchairs, but also an elevator (!) to get to the other rooms. She also has a bunch of equipment for hearing impaired people, for visual impaired people, for people with learning difficulties, etc.

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One of the first thing she told us was that “by the end of the day, we are all humans”, and that’s all that matters. We couldn’t agree more.

Despite her kindness, her efforts to make every person feels at home, her very nice rooms, her amazingly complete and good breakfast, Terry is actually facing some financial difficulties. She definitely need more time, and more money. Who doesn’t will you say.

 

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The purpose of this HopTrip will then be: how to attract more guest, and how to cut costs (2 full days being too short to help her optimize her time).

So Justine worked on cut energy and water costs, saving (a lot!) of money by making natural cleaning products, and what HopSolutions she could implement; since Mahery worked on the marketing strategy and how to efficiently use social medias.

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Here are the results:

• Save money: water, energy, HopSolutions
• Make your own cleaning products
• Marketing strategy for Abbey Guest House

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Sunday, 2pm. Crazy life Terry has, she always has many things to do. But she managed to have the afternoon free so we could talk about all this. Except in the “save money” part where she already had implemented many things, she seems satisfied about the documents we made. She now has to take action, and convince her staff about cleaning products (no, the house will not smell vinegar for the rest of your life). But this is another story, that doesn’t belong to us…

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We were really happy to meet such a good person, we enjoyed to learn so many things about accessibility, and even started to get along with the British accent 😉 ! First HopTrip in UK, check! We are now back in London, in a flat a friend of ours was kind enough to let us while she is in France (we even have very nice roomates!), and the next step: the World Travel Market, beginning on November 2^nd.

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Cheers, as we say here in UK.