A FORMER senior BBC executive now running a semi-rural bed and breakfast has said his change of career has gone "miles better" than he expected.
Jim Duff and his partner Aoife Sheridan, a nurse, decided they wanted to run their own hospitality business at the start of this year and began hunting for the right opportunity.
After identifying Rosebank House in Blairgowrie, Perthshire, the pair initially struggled to secure the financing they needed, with one lender offering them an interest rate of 8.99 per cent.
In spite of being repeatedly told by financial advisers not to approach a high street bank, Mr Duff decided to walk into a Royal Bank of Scotland branch to see what they had to offer.
He said the staff there were stringent in their lending criteria but also helpful in suggesting ways to make the couple's business plan work.
Mr Duff said: "They actually had some interest in what we were trying to do."
A £160,000 loan to buy Rosebank was eventually secured, with Mr Duff and Ms Sheridan relocating from Edinburgh and opening the doors of their new venture in May.
Since then the pair have worked to enhance the business by setting up a website with online booking, putting in additional payment options and being more proactive in marketing their six rooms.
Mr Duff, who was once in charge of BBC Scotland's flagship Reporting Scotland bulletin and also held senior posts in radio and online as well as working for Sky, GMTV and Reuters, said things had progressed more quickly than expected, with August occupancy at about 90 per cent.
He said: "It has gone miles better than we ever thought. It hadn't been opening in the winter, there wasn't really a website and it didn't accept plastic. "It was a perfectly adequate [business] but it was old-fashioned. We have changed quite a lot of the linen and beds and I did a marketing drive.
"On TripAdvisor we have gone from 13th or 14th in Blairgowrie to fifth."
Mr Duff indicated the plan was to operate all year round, and said: "Where we are - just on the way out of Blairgowrie on the way to Glenshee - we can get some skiing interest. At the end of the day we have the six rooms sitting there, so what is the point of closing up?"
Allister Page, from RBS, said: "The business is thriving and the reviews are testament to that."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article