THE ORIGINAL ROSSLYN INN - WHERE FAMILY & HISTORY LEAD THE WAY

The Original Rosslyn Inn is a family run business since 1837. The building and the village have a rich fascinating history. As the current custodians of the property since 1973, we the Harris family are now in our third generation of service to the community. The Inn has enjoyed centuries of culture defining guests including Robert Burns, William Wordsworth and Sir Walter Scott. Whether you need some nourishment, a refreshment, or a place to lay your heed we invite you to be a part of our story. Join our list of “well kent folk”.

We are a third generation family independent business since March 1973. Last year we celebrated 50 years serving the local and global community. My parents Maureen and Grahame moved here with my grandparents Tom and Sheila. I grew up in the business fascinated by delivering a fantastic customer experience, serving the community building relationships and playing a part in our customers’ most special family moments.

I worked my early 20s in America coaching “Soccer” (Apologies) most notably in Beverly Hills including coaching Tom Cruises Daughter and meeting the man himself but that’s another story. At that time Dan Browns DaVinci Code rose to fame and my parents found the business speeding up as they were looking to slow down. I returned home and slowly relieved them of daily stresses brining us to today where they can enjoy continuing the positions of landlord and landlady without the burden of traversing the challenge of operating in red tape engulfed hospitality industry.

My dad Grahame is still our head breakfast chef as meeting people and sharing stories is what he truly loves doing and the relaxed pace of breakfast is the perfect shift for him. It makes him very popular with the team so there are less early shifts following late nights.

I run the business with the unwavering support and patience from my wife Amy supported by a wonderful team of hospitality professionals.

A positive hospitality venue delivering excellent guest experience. Welcoming an local, international and multigenerational audience, leaving a lasting impact that exceeds customer expectations. A place for chapters, memories and bookends.

We are where you take your grandparents or your grandchildren. We focus on our environment over everything. Operating the business I am very aware of the family heritage we must continue to develop. A local familiar business like us must walk the tightrope of staying the same while also be on the cutting edge of the industry.

We attract guests who enjoy an inclusive venue for everyone. We are a family business where you come with your family.

We serve a mix of traditional proper pub food balanced with more modern dishes for our more adventurous guests. We offer classic drinks in accordance to their perfect serve we also have exciting new cocktails or “Cocktales” as each one comes with its own little anecdote of local history.

We have around five main parts of the business. The most prominent is our family lounge bar and conservatory. The lounge bar a traditional area and the reason we changed signage on building in 2014 from hotel to inn. This area with its stone walls, rafters open fire place and comfy seating very much delivers on guest preconceived expectations of an inn. The Conservatory area is more traditional restaurant with more normal table and chairs, it is also dog friendly.

The Snug bar is the hub of the village where you will find welcoming local worthies, more dogs than crufts, a cold drink and a warm welcome. We also have two outside areas not that the weather has permitted the use of them in the last 12 months. A front restaurant garden and a rear family garden away from traffic and with a woodland trail for kids to enjoy.

The Crypt Cocktail Lounge is the oldest part of the Inn and where we serve our afternoon tea and host our piano bar nights. A sophisticated venue for the local glitterati who want that big smoke experience with an easier commute. The crypt is decorated with quotes of the famous writers that have visited the village and been moved to pen a poem about their experience. Including the full poem written by Robert Burns about the landlady when he stayed at the Original Inn and was moved by his experience in 1787. Arguably thew first ever review!

We have 7 En suite bedrooms, we are currently just in final throws of completing green energy upgrades making us more environmentally efficient, and improving our offering for our visitors. Focusing on two main drivers, the creature comforts of the modern traveller and protect and maintain the history and heritage of the property. We are excited to be part of the Midlothian council net zero accelerator cohort working towards sustainable business practices. We also have a private events space for tribute acts, family events, festive celebrations, weddings, funerals and corporate functions. Or as my dad fondly says “we specialise in hatches, matches and dispatches”

When we celebrated out 50 years we created “hospiTALEity” for years tourism has done hospitality and it was my view that Hospitality should do a bit of tourism. After all if you want to know some local history, who better to ask than your local purveyor of libations and regular raconteur inn keeper. We made just over 50 videos celebrating the local area while engaging our team and customers to share their story. Some bluring the lines of fact and fiction, gossip and news. We recruited Tam Murray our regular who just tuned 80 who is a village man and actually worked in the Inn when he was 10 years old. We had to capture his story and he even has a “Cocktale” named after him, “The Oracle”. However Tam isn’t in to “Cocktales” so the oracle is just a pint of lager.

The videos are up around the inn in form of QR codes informing the guests of all the questions we are asked. Best example is why is there two spellings of Roslin/Rosslyn? If you want to know got to our You tube channel TORI Team. We try to stay as politicly neutral as possible the term “TORI” is not a political statement as some have asked. It is just an abbreviation of The Original Rosslyn Inn.

The chapel has always been special and had historic significance. Previously is was visitors with a historical, architectural interest. It was very open anyone could walk in. Around the early 2000s when Dan Browns book Da Vinci Code was launched the volume of guests increased dramatically. We would suddenly have queues of guests from the bar our the door. It was great but changed our operation. Back then we held lots of wedding but hosting the weddings and the increased trade was probably damaging our guest experience just down to sheer volume. Since that time our business has changed. In order to protect our operation we decided to focus on what we wanted to be and direct trade to that. We now do less weddings and actively on occasion have to refuse them to prevent over stretching the team and damaging guest experience.

We work closely with the chapel and are currently working on a Roslin Experience to attract people in Scotland to visit Roslin in quieter time of year to experience the chapel, the area and its first class hospitality offering. The increased summer tourist trade from the chapel does give us a platform to invest in passion projects and community initiatives.

These include sponsoring and hosting the primary school Halloween discos. Halloween haunted house at my wife’s business Dollys Tea Room. Easter bunny village easter egg hunt. TORI Santa visiting the school nursery and primary before Christmas break. Host age specific races for the children at the Roslin Village Fete with sweets and medals for participants.

We also do family parties where the team hosts a party for local children once a quarter where we entertain the children for three hours so the parents can come to the local pub enjoy a drink in peace. I am passionate about making the local licensed venue part of the family routine. I have friends who live in England and there is a social community that revolves around going to the local. Not to consume excess alcohol but to spend time together relaxed away from stresses of home and work life. This is something I feel has been diminished north of the border. There is an element that if you bring your children to pub its irresponsible. I am not saying every venue is suitable for children but some are. That’s the beauty of the rich tapestry of hospitality, every venue is different and speaks to a different guest values. More often than not there’s not bad venue just a venue that’s not for you.

Increased costs the lack of help from government and our guests, the people of Scotland have all suffered from reduced money for leisure activities. These will be no different to the challenges our colleagues in the industry have faced. We have reviewed all our costs and overheads and made savings where we can without damaging our guest experience.

Recruiting the best talent is always a challenge but even more so recently. To combat that I conducted a hospitality academy in partnership with Capital City Partnership where we ran a 5 day course with candidates interested in leaning about hospitality. Three of the students were ladies from Ukraine who were amazing. I offered them all a role and I still have Iryna with us and she is an incredible and brave person.

We have a successful mailing list and loyalty programme that rewards guest that visit most frequently with discounts and money of vouchers. We have removed paid sport from our TVs something I valued personally but found the removal of live sport has attracted more families, dog walkers, cyclists. However the six nations has proven popular and we have used our events space for a family zone to welcome larger groups and families. We have also jumped on the competitive socialising trend and introduced puzzles and games to the crypt along with more premium snacks which has delivered increased dwell time I have found engaging with industry bodies and collaborating with colleagues has helped. There are steps we can take to help our businesses but true change and support for the industry will come from uniting as one voice and forcing government to value and support us. I am a great believer in that it takes each of us to help all of us. We have a regular bus service something our guests benefit from. Especially during the festival when visitors want to visit the vibrant city centre and escape to the country on an evening. Speaking to friends and colleagues the LEZ is unhelpful, unnecessary and comes at the worst time for our sector. We have been fighting for survival since covid, been ignored by our government. My hope that the break down of the coalition that the tail will stop wagging the dog. I have been watching how Glasgow has suffered and the fallout from the ill-conceived policy. I have supported the calls to abandon, review and amend but as has been familiar they have doubled down. It looks like Edinburgh is destined for the same fate.

Unity for the industry just now is imperative.

I am a huge advocate for network and collaboration. I always recommend getting out from your venue meet other operators and experience what others are doing. It’s a creative process you might develop a new iteration of something that exists for your venue. You might experience something be disappointed by it and realise you are doing the same. We can get lost in our own properties and can become blind a change of space and company is incredibly valuable. Each operator has a duty to their colleagues to provide the highest level of hospitality to their customers. Every time guests have positive hospitality experience it will encourage them to try another venue or revisit. We all have a vested interest in all of us succeeding.

This season I am the Captain of the Edinburgh and Leith Licensed Victuallers Golf Club established in 1890. I know convincing going golfing as work is a hard sell to anyone. The club bring members from across the industry were we play outings and matches against other areas of Scotland. The club has some real rockstars of the industry and to get the opportunity to spend time with them and share wins and challenges has been inspirational.

We work incredibly hard to create an excellent experience for all our guests, they trust us as professionals in our space. With the right training and support the team can guide a guest to different products. When working with brands we are looking for partnership and investment. This can take many forms and we endeavour to have a a personal relationship to the representatives of all the brands we carry.

When reflecting like this there is no metric for success but there is a record I am very proud off. The longevity of some of my major team members is something I draw on. It helps me reflect on my mantra of the most important people in the business are my team.

My guests can initially be shocked by this statement. However I go on to explain, I cant welcome every guest, cook every dish, serve every meal, make every bed. I need a team of hospitality professionals to deliver these services. I need to look after them so they look after my guests.

I have my Inn manager Stuart who has been with us for 22 years, My Assistant Inn Manager Freya who has been with me 10 years, my bar manager Aidan who has worked with me for 8 years, my head chef has worked with us for over 20 years now and one of my chefs over 10 years for a small hospitality venue these lengths of service are phenomenal and they are phenomenal people.

We are in process of creating a benefits package to show my appreciation offering Health care, Income protection, life insurance and use of private gym facilities.

It is up to Hospitality to start treating hospitality as a career and focus on the people that deliver the service, their skills and their security.