Date Created: 07 February 2012
A new national food and drink project called Experiencing Scotland has helped leading Scottish tourism businesses and event organisers increase their turnover by eight percent and sales by seven percent per visitor over the last 12 months.
The project which is funded and delivered by Scottish Enterprise, was developed in October 2010 to encourage tourism businesses to work in partnership with food and drink producers to get more local Scottish produce onto their menus.
Promote Scottish produce
Since its launch, the project has worked with 25 high profile companies which collectively receive over 13 million visitors each year, including T in the Park, Glasgow Science Centre and the National Trust for Scotland.
Scottish Enterprise project manager, Nicola Watt, said: “In 2009, we undertook research which highlighted businesses and events providing locally sourced Scottish food.
“With increasing demand from visitors to sample local, distinctive food, tourism businesses and event organisers have a great opportunity to increase customer satisfaction, enhance their profile and improve their bottom line simply by offering good quality, authentic, Scottish produce.”
Tailored business advice
Experiencing Scotland provides companies with tailored business advice such as:
- an induction to business tools and support networks
- a review of menus
- service delivery
- purchasing
- marketing
- staff skills
- financial performance
- bespoke business action plans
- referrals to suppliers
In addition it has been instrumental in helping to create new business opportunities for Scottish food and drink producers keen to access premium tourism markets, with companies such as Thistly Cross Cider in East Lothian, Overlangshaw Ice Cream in the Scottish Borders, Anstruther Cheese Company in Fife and Thomson of Blairgowrie Fruits in Perthshire,all benefiting from new trading relationships.
"Extremely worthwhile exercise"
The National Trust for Scotland’s national catering development manager, Sue McCracken, said: “As a conservation charity, our core purpose is to protect and promote Scotland’s rich cultural and natural heritage for present and future generations.
“The one-to-one advice offered by Scottish Enterprise’s Experiencing Scotland project has enabled us to devise a series of targeted and practical action plans which are already helping our food and drink offer to become a more valuable part of the Trust’s overall operation. It was an extremely worthwhile exercise which is generating real results for us”.
Find out how Experiencing Scotland can help your business