TFC News Archive

TFC Food Services has completed a project to assist top regional eating out establishments to achieve recognition from UK restaurant guides.

The approach was based on objective mystery visits to evaluate each establishment before working with the kitchen and management teams to raise culinary standards and take advantage of opportunities identified.

Catherine Tuff used her extensive experience as former chief inspector of the Taste of Scotland guide to help clients refine and improve their dishes and menus.

Catherine said "Its very important for a restaurant to remain competitive and contemporary in its approach. Consistency of quality is one of the hardest things to achieve in this business. One way to do this is to objectively review what the kitchen is putting out on a regular basis. With the trend towards increasing use of quality home produced ingredients, provenance is proving to be a real selling point."

A key aim was to attract the attention of Michelin guide inspectors and to this end, correspondence with the guide editors was initiated. The project results proved to be the basis for persuading the guide that a visit to the area would be beneficial.

The Shop Local, Eat Local campaign, co-ordinated annually by Scottish Borders Council and Radio Borders proved as popular as ever.
This year, to help locals plan and shop for their festive food, Catherine Tuff of TFC Food Services co-ordinated weekly on-air radio interviews with a series of local food producers. The live discussions discovered fascinating facts about Borders food production - much of it hand made and artisan. Better still, the producers invariably brought along excellent samples for tasting so that all the delicious flavours could be shared with the listeners.

Catherine then compiled an original recipe for each interview, using the featured produce and this was posted on the radio's website. From smoked salmon starters, pastrami rarebit, spicy turkey risotto and tasty vegetable dishes to traditional Christmas goose, it certainly tempted the tastebuds. To see the recipes click here.

Each of the producers offered seasonal goodies for the Shop Local, Eat Local Christmas Hamper, which proved tempting for many Radio Borders listeners. More than 1,200 responses were received to the questions presented weekly for the competition. The lucky winner of the £300 food hamper came from Peebles.

Alasdair Hutton, Convener of the Council, presented the winner with the hamper just before Christmas, along with Catherine Tuff of TFC Food Services. Councillor Hutton commented: "I am delighted to present the Shop Local, Eat Local Christmas Hamper to Elizabeth. We have always had an impressively wide range of high quality food producers in the Scottish Borders and I am very pleased to see their produce is now more widely available. With the delicious recipes provided by Catherine Tuff, I hope more people will be inspired to try them and buy all their ingredients locally."

Borders Tourism Training Group launched its new programme of training courses at Drumlanrig's Tower, Hawick on 23rd May. The meeting, organised by Ann McAvoy of Corporate Training and Catherine Tuff of TFC Food Services, marked the re-instatement of an informal tourism network set up to deliver specialised seminars to everyone in the Borders tourism industry. The group has initiated a wide range of open training courses covering many topics.

The informal group offers competitively priced training for both open & in-house short courses & will work with you to find the most cost effective way for you to develop your team. Whatever your tourism training needs, we can customise a highly effective course to suit you and your staff. Choose from:

Key Findings from the last festival managed by TFC:

· economic impact across the Borders region = £560,000.00, despite reduced public funding
· business activity boosted by average of 40%
· 1 in 3 Customers were trying a new establishment, two thirds were new to the Banquet
· total establishment sales of £76,000
· major sponsors Scottish Enterprise Borders, also Glenfiddich, VisitScotland and media partner Southern Reporter
· Customers were 50% visitors - 50% local residents, (13% from central belt, nearly 30% from NE     England and 5% rest of Scotland)
· emphasis on quality Borders produce and cooking
· 153 original meal events
· Over 3100 covers served
· 37 eating out establishments participated in the promotion
· fifth Borders Banquet ran concurrently with special deals offer Dine Around Borders 05
· 98% of customers very satisfied

The Borders Banquet was a Food Tourism initiative in partnership with Scottish Enterprise Borders & VisitScotland. TFC Food Services project originated and managed the event on their behalf for 5 years.

The fifth Borders Banquet took place from 28th October to 6 November 2005 and this year's ten day feast of entertainment, local culture and fine food has been the best yet.

New events for 2005 included an opening Banquet Gala Dinner in the spectacular setting of the state dining room at Thirlestane Castle in Lauder which dates back to the thirteenth century. Also new this year was a fabulous Dine Around the Borders initiative which will enabled locals and visitors to eat out at over 16 of the Borders' finest restaurants for just £15 for three courses - with a complimentary dram of Glenfiddich single malt thrown in. Over 150 Banquet events also included a special appearance by Glasgow playwright Liz Lochhead as well as a mix of themed menus, whisky, beer and wine tastings, meet the chef events, music and theatrical performances.

The entire programme continues to showcase the very best of Borders produce from seafood freshly caught off the Berwickshire coast and fish from the region's majestic salmon and trout rivers to locally reared meats, fresh Borders vegetables and speciality beers.

 

VisitScotland's new food grading scheme was launched to members of the tourism trade on Burns Night. TFC Food Services have assisted in developing some elements of the new scheme, drawing on our experience as Chief Inspector at the old Taste of Scotland scheme. The new scheme is to be tested in pilot form until the middle of the year, when following a review, wider participation will be encouraged. First results show promising feedback.

The TFC Food Services website has been radically redesigned and now features many new items. Its easier to navigate and the signature logo appears on all pages, so you always know where you are and can easily retrace your steps if you need to. The new contact form makes sure that your enquiry is carefully logged and the recipe pages will offer updated inspiration and tempting food photographs as the months unfold.

Highlights from 2004's event prove it continues to build on its previous success:

The Borders Banquet 2003, project managed and originated by TFC was a huge success in the event's third year. The Banquet is now established as a valued festival in the Borders annual calendar. In partnership with SE Borders, 37 local businesses participated over ten days in early November. They included inns, restaurants, hotels, visitor attractions and cafés. The programme listed nearly 130 meal events and over 6000 covers were served..

Income Generation
Total sales generated in participating establishments in ten days grew by 138% in 2003 (a 200+% increase on the first year's event in 2001). The economic impact to the region of the event is estimated to have increased to £370,000.00 (£37,000 per day during the festival).

The number of covers served was trebled over the previous year's Banquet. The average number of bednights sold per establishment also increased. A wide variety of original and quality events were offered in each participating establishment.

In 2003 food and drink sales were up 123% to £3650 per establishment with total sales up by 120% and 26% of all customer query cards carried comments using the word 'excellent'.

Comments from Participants
* Generates business at a quieter time of the year - (Burts Hotel) several businesses commented on the effectiveness of the event
* Great opportunity for businesses to work together to improve profits for all (Selkirk Glass)
* Our event was a huge success and feedback suggests the participants thoroughly enjoyed the food, service and atmosphere (Oblo Bar)
* The local PR was good and would make me want to be involved again. (Wheatsheaf Restaurant)
* Everybody thoroughly enjoyed our event and have asked us to do it again - we already have bookings! (Black Bull)
* Good promotion for the hotel - generates business even after the event has finished (Philipburn House Hotel)
* Excellent tool to promote the Scottish Borders (Peebles Hotel Hydro)
* A good way to promote our business (Mayfield Bar; Oscars Wine Bar)
* Great for business. The Banquet is a very popular and well run event (Caddy Mann)

Conclusion
Business was improved by an average of at least 28% for the time of year. Total sales generated were up massively over the previous year. Overall, the number of people taking part in Banquet events grew by nearly three times the number in 2002.

TFC Food Services were contracted to compile the 2001 Buyers Guide to Food and Drink in the Scottish Borders for Scottish Borders Council.

A fully printed guide was produced in a few weeks and was successfully distributed at IFE in London last spring.

The enlarged guide is a valuable resource listing all the local producers of food and drink, ideal for anyone seeking to purchase quality local supplies.