Estoril Hotel
Peter Martin and took over Estoril Hotel in Penzance in 2004, after a career in the army and working as a project manager.
"The hotel is Victorian and it was run down when we took it over" says Peter. "As well as modernising the hotel, we knew we had to take a new approach to generating business. Although Penzance is cosmopolitan, it is still very tied to the traditional summer season."
Peter set about identifying new target markets – in particular, overseas visitors and the business markets.
"For both these target audiences, providing access to broadband was going to be an advantage" says Peter.
"We bought a router and put in a wireless network. We have a ‘dongle’ which is a small piece of kit about the size of an MP3 player. It just plugs into your computer and off you go – it means anyone can access broadband without wires from anywhere in the hotel.
"Our guests really appreciate being able to get broadband here. We had a couple over from California around the time of the fires out there and they were frantic to find out what was going on, so they used the Internet to find out.
"Business people who stay here often ask if we have broadband access before they make the booking. In fact, we had someone recently who has booked the same room for a repeat visit simply because he was so pleased with the broadband reception in his room.
"People think the fact that they can use broadband here is fantastic! It has definitely helped us build new business for the hotel."
