English Heritage scoops prestigious tourism awards

 North East historic attractions swept the board at the North East England Tourism Oscars last night when English Heritage took three prestigious tourism awards at the ceremony at the NewcastleGateshead Hilton last night.

Each year the North East England Tourism Awards showcases the best that tourism has to offer in our region. The wide range of categories reflect the quality, performance and innovation of the tourism sector in the North East, and gives businesses the chance to show how they stand out from the crowd.

English Heritage Tynemouth Priory and Castle won silver in the Small Visitor Attraction category, Belsay Hall, Castle and Gardens won Bronze in the Large Visitor Attraction of the Year award, and English Heritage employee Brian Collins took bronze for Outstanding Customer Service.

Lynne Rylance, visitor operations manager said: “We are thrilled with the awards and especially to have been named the silver winner for small visitor attraction.

“Our awards reflect that fact that we have invested heavily in our sites this year to give visitors the best value and good quality days out. With more people holidaying at home this year and new developments at key North East sites visitor numbers up by 25 per cent and membership up by 50 per cent across the board, compared with the same time period last year.”

Tynemouth Priory and Castle was named silver winner for Small Visitor Attraction of the year. This year Tynemouth Priory and Castle benefited from an £80,000 makeover with conservation work that was carried out on the gun battery and magazine. Since the new interpretation and exhibition was unveiled, Tynemouth has seen a significant increase in visitors, the site is currently attracting 19% more visitors versus the same period last year.

Lynne said: “Our investments have clearly paid off as we have seen a 19% increase in visitors at Tynemouth and since the re-introduction Stella McCartney’s crystal horse Lucky Spot at Belsay Hall - visitor numbers have rocketed by 80 per cent versus the same period last year.”

Built between 1810 and 1817 the Greek revival villa has been the host to a number of contemporary art exhibitions, the most recent being Picture House, which won two prizes at the Journal Culture Awards for best overall event and best event in Northumberland.

For outstanding customer service, four hopefuls were shortlisted for the award, and the bronze award was scooped up by star English Heritage employee Brian Collins. 

Brian Collins, 60, who lives in Swarland, Morpeth, is a visitor operations team member at Belsay Hall, Northumberland and Tynemouth Priory in North Tyneside. He has worked for English Heritage for the past three seasons after starting in 2007.  Brian’s daily role covers property presentation, customer service, local information provider, membership recruitment and retail operations. 

Brian was selected as the bronze by a panel of five judges, Geoff Hodgson, chair of the North East Tourism Advisory Board, Bill Clifford, an independent tourism consultant, Jeremy Brinkworth, head of industry services at VisitEngland, Alison Rice, travel journalist and broadcaster and David Simms, MD of NCJ Media.

The judges deemed Brian a worthy winner for having made a significant commitment to outstanding service within the regions tourism economy. Brian regularly goes above and beyond the call of duty and acts as an ambassador for both English Heritage and North East England.

Brian said: “I love working with history, and I enjoy meeting and talking to new people. Belsay and Tynemouth are both lovely locations to work in, but the best part of my job is making sure that visitors are enjoying themselves, because that’s what’s important at the end of the day.”

Brian has been known to take time out of his allocated break times on a regular to help visitors around the site and has a phenomenal membership recruitment record after recruiting more members in one month, than that of any other English Heritage site, ever. 
 
All regional gold winners will then go onto represent the North East of England at the next national Enjoy England Awards for Excellence.

Geoff Hodgson, Chair of the North East Tourism Advisory Board said: “I am delighted with the tremendous number of entries this year. It is a major achievement to be named a finalist in these prestigious awards. This region has a wide range of high quality tourism businesses and the North East England tourism awards are a fantastic way for a business to demonstrate that they are the best of the best.”