The Cumberland has demonstrated its commitment to the county’s hospitality sector emerging from the pandemic with its support for a couple’s purchase of a Lake District bed & breakfast.
Where many people may have considered leaving the industry since 2020, Steve and Hayley Hallsworth have made the opposite move.
They took over Jericho’s boutique guest house in Windermere at the start of the year. Three months on and Steve says there are no regrets about this major life change.
He ran an events and exhibitions business in the Midlands for more than 20 years while his wife was a teacher and lecturer. But, with their children Jennifer and Daniel now grown up, they took the decision to swap Staffordshire for Cumbria.
"Our idea," said Steve, "was always to semi-retire to the Lake District so we just decided to do it much earlier in life.
“We're still both spring chickens, only 40 years old, but decided that lifestyle and time were far more important than working 12-hour-plus days.”
It offers 10 bespoke rooms with planning permission for another eight, and the Hallsworths plan to improve the outdoor space to offer guests a seating area.
Having explored options around England they settled on Jericho’s, a Victorian property which has been a hotel / guest house dating back to the 1870s.
Steve says: “We met the previous owners who had set Jericho's up in a way that was akin to our values. They'd gone for the boutique marketplace rather than a straightforward standard bed & breakfast. So it was quality over quantity.
“We only completed on it at the end of January. Just shy of 10 days later we opened. We came in, did what we'd got to do and have been pretty much between 80 and 100 per cent occupancy since.
“We’ve modernised it but still keeping it very traditional. At the end of the day, it's an 1870s building so we had to make sure everything was very sympathetically done.”
Jericho’s is only a few minutes’ walk from the town centre and a 15-minute stroll to Bowness and the lake.
All produce for breakfasts is locally sourced.
Steve says even the prospect of a lockdown when they were completing the deal didn’t put them off.
“People were saying, Steve, are you really sure this is what you want to do? And I was, absolutely.
“Even if we go into a lockdown, we'll come out of it. We've fallen in love with the Lake District, we know the opportunity exists there, it's a great area, it will be a great business.”
And he describes The Cumberland’s role as “pivotal” with a predicted three-to-four month process completed in just over eight weeks.
“We acquired it for £1.1m. While we had cash reserves ourselves, we still have a small mortgage that we needed to get from the Cumberland.
“They made everything happen very quickly with very little pain and great communication.”
Grant Seaton, Senior Commercial Manager at The Cumberland, said: “We are always pleased to support businesses like Jericho's. The Lake District's hospitality sector has proved to be remarkably resilient with all that it has been through over the years.
"Bookings for staycations have been strong over Easter which will only encourage more to invest in the sector. Jericho’s is exactly the sort of business we want to be supporting as the hospitality industry recovers from the pandemic. It's a good business, with a strong reputation and a quality offer.
“We’re very impressed by Steve and Hayley’s decision to change career and move to Cumbria, and wish them every success with the business.”