Hotel and training centre, Melksham, Wiltshire
High quality accommodation for course delegates, business travellers and the leisure visitor too.

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For 2023 (and 2024 ...) - we are now fully retired from IT training.
We have made many, many friends over 25 years of teaching about Python, Tcl, Perl, PHP, Lua, Java, C and C++ - and MySQL, Linux and Solaris/SunOS too. Our training notes are now very much out of date, but due to upward compatability most of our examples remain operational and even relevant ad you are welcome to make us if them "as seen" and at your own risk.

Lisa and I (Graham) now live in what was our training centre in Melksham - happy to meet with former delegates here - but do check ahead before coming round. We are far from inactive - rather, enjoying the times that we are retired but still healthy enough in mind and body to be active!

I am also active in many other area and still look after a lot of web sites - you can find an index ((here))
A contrast in room rates and facilities

This week is another great opportunity for me to see how others do it. Efficient, regular, reasonable-standard chain hotels usually 'do' me when I'm away training, with no need to research ahead, but here in Leek there aren't any of the 'regulars' so I've stayed at the Peak Weavers for one night, at 50 pounds, and I'm the Garden House, at 26 pounds a night, for the rest of the time as the PW was full. Both are 'bargain' compared to hotels in our neck of the woods; in Bath, the average price of a room is 114.00 per night and we're a bargain compared to that at 80.00 (£85.00 from January 2011) single, and 95.00 double.

So - what do you get for your money? What's best value?

At 26 pounds, my room is very new, very clean ... and very small. It's one of those rooms that's a single because you couldn't actually fit a double bed in, and that has a folding louvre door on the en-suite because there isn't actually the room for a regular door to open either in or out. The shower is a "60cm" tray not a "90cm", and I have to duck at all times. And yet whilst I might appear to be being slightly critical, I really don't mind; I expect to get, actually, less than I have at the rate I'm paying. Apart from the noise of the rain on the roof during the night (I'm in the attic), it's quiet, and there's enough parking for me have not yet been blocked in. I should add - I have seen one of the double rooms - lovely, and of good size and headroom

At 50 pounds, my room had also been redone since my last visit when I happened to have been in the same room. The bed was double, the place much more spacious and yet ... really the extra space hadn't been taken advantage of. "Help - where can I put my computer" thought I, and it turned out to be best-ish perched on the bedside table, with the coffee tray moved over to the top of the low chest of draws beside the TV. But - nicely don't and shouldn't grumble. The shower and bath, with a pathetic water flow, leave me wishing for something a little more vigorous.

At 85 pounds (price from 4th Jan 2011), all of our rooms are probably bigger that the 26 pound room and the 50 pound room put together. And - conscious of the business traveller they do have good desks, plenty of power points (no need to scrabble behind the bed, not to plug each thing that needs charging up in sequentially through the night). Showers / baths have fitted heads, excellent strong water flow, and the TVs are bigun's with 26" screens that your laptop can connect to.


The Garden House, Cheddleton


The Peak Weavers, Leek

If I'm back in Leek again, where would I stay? I have to say, irrespective of price and room size, at the Garden House. And it comes down to the welcome / the friendliness of mine host and hostess. The "Peak Weaver's" is probably the more technically correct, with the somewhat stand-offish approach that could easily be mistanken for snobbishness. But "The Garden House", where some people might find the more friendly approach over breakfast to be a little intrusive (yes, I could have given 'lay off' signals!) suited me, and I learnt all about my host and hostess's other jobs and how they have taken on and grown the place in the last couple of years.

I started talking about the week being an opportunity to sample and indeed it is. And a chance to learn. It convinces me that we have many things right (and a good job too as it would be too later to change certain things at this point). We have had discussions about how much / little we should interact with the customers at breakfast, and it leaves me convinced that the "join in" is right. The Garden House, where I am much happier, has a single long table just as we do, and I met with Tom who's a Geordie working at the local meat processing plant for the week; contrast that to the other three blokes at the Peak Weavers who - well - I haven't a clue what they were doing in Leek, I only know that they got down before me and had all the newspapers.

And - from our businees view point - I remain convinced that real coffee 24 hours a day, unlimited wired and wireless internet access, large screen TVs with freeview and a willingness to accept credit cards are all right. Paying a third of our rates, I naturally expect to get only a small proportion of what we offer; actually, I think I'm doing fine and well for my personal needs.
(written 2007-04-25, updated 2010-12-26)

 
Associated topics are indexed as below, or enter http://melksh.am/nnnn for individual articles
M400 - Well House Manor - The Hospitality Business
  [774] Bed and Breakfast, or Hotel? - (2006-06-22)
  [884] Drive time - (2006-10-02)
  [922] Staying at your own hotel - (2006-11-12)
  [988] You should think you're first in a hotel room - (2006-12-15)
  [1002] Meet the neighbours - (2006-12-20)
  [1046] Bounce, bounce, bounce - (2007-01-20)
  [1048] Getting rid of people - hotel techniques - (2007-01-21)
  [1084] Writing terms and conditions for conferences and other events - (2007-02-17)
  [1108] Express service - (2007-03-14)
  [1122] Hotel - online feedback forms compared - (2007-03-30)
  [1180] Conjugation - (2007-05-08)
  [1248] How NOT to oversell a hotel - (2007-06-27)
  [1284] An update on the West Wilts show ... - (2007-07-30)
  [1421] Castle Lodge Hotel, Ely, Cambridgeshire - (2007-11-04)
  [1422] Wiltshire - speaker / after dinner talker offer - (2007-11-05)
  [1445] Looking after you Christmas Customer Crowds - (2007-11-26)
  [1548] Hotelympia - show report - the lighter side - (2008-02-21)
  [1622] An extra step - victory from defeat - (2008-04-25)
  [1792] All the pieces fall into place - hotel and courses - (2008-09-10)
  [1877] Guests doing a bunk? - (2008-11-09)
  [2007] Launch of Melksham Food and Drink Festival - (2009-01-24)
  [2283] Everyone is in the customer relations business - (2009-07-12)
  [2303] Turning potential customers away - (2009-07-24)
  [2593] Food and drink launch - (2010-01-21)
  [2724] Escapee Grandparents welcome - Henfield and Melksham - (2010-04-15)
  [2879] Night Porter and reception - 24 hours a day? - (2010-07-20)
  [2936] The service that customers should receive - (2010-08-27)
  [3147] Hotel star ratings - towards a better system of review - (2011-01-25)
  [3164] Brown - or Mrs Sally Brown, accountant from Whitstable? - (2011-02-10)
  [3309] Tipping Policy - Well House Manor - (2011-05-29)
  [3660] A Pivotal Incident - learning how to welcome your guests - (2012-03-18)
  [3743] Sunday - no longer a day of rest - (2012-05-28)
  [3832] A busy day at Well House Manor - so come in and make it even busier! - (2012-08-10)
  [3838] Guest review - Well House Manor, Melksham - (2012-08-14)
  [3909] Every Customer Counts - (2012-11-01)
  [3988] Three cheers for the staff at Well House Manor - (2013-01-24)
  [4033] Official Star ratings for hotels - still worth having? - (2013-03-07)
  [4051] On reading a new hotel review - (2013-03-24)
  [4202] Excellent Railfuture conference, but some setup lessons - (2013-11-03)
  [4232] Not wanted here - hotel guests who will not be happy - (2013-12-30)
  [4321] Are administration / review charges on hotel guests acceptable? - (2014-11-20)
  [4521] Should we get an AA or Visit Wiltshire hotel assessment? - (2015-10-09)
  [4543] Saturday morning at Well House Manor - (2015-10-17)
  [4603] Happy New Year. Our customers are our ambassadors - (2016-01-01)
  [4613] Our best hotel customers help us ... to help them ... be our best customers. - (2016-01-04)

G999 - Well House Consultants - Keynote
  [164] Well House Consultants - review of 2004 - (2004-12-31)
  [225] 10 years and counting - (2005-02-23)
  [295] Pricing strategy - simple and fair - (2005-04-29)
  [360] Spring turns to Summer - (2005-06-26)
  [419] Most popular courses - (2005-08-19)
  [428] Swindon - Chippenham - Melksham - Trowbridge - Westbury train service - (2005-08-29)
  [452] Is enough enough? - (2005-09-27)
  [464] Technical Loneliness - (2005-10-14)
  [549] 2005 - Come as a student, leave as a friend - (2005-12-31)
  [626] Not just a pretty face to answer the phone. - (2006-02-26)
  [695] In the hospitality business - (2006-04-23)
  [845] Course scheduling and Geekmas - are they traditions yet? - (2006-08-26)
  [890] Open - (2006-10-09)
  [898] Courses at Well House Manor - (2006-10-19)
  [929] Presenting Melksham - for a weekend away in Wiltshire - (2006-11-17)
  [1079] Wilts and Berks - two conference / training rooms in Melksham - (2007-02-14)
  [1245] Ensuring that our tutor answers YOUR questions - (2007-06-25)
  [1317] 2008 course schedule - Perl, Python, PHP, Linux, Java Deployment, Ruby and more - (2007-08-23)
  [1319] Customer feedback - lifeblood of a business - (2007-08-25)
  [1414] What we teach - expained for the non-technical - (2007-10-28)
  [1481] The Christmas Letter - (2007-12-22)
  [1492] Well House Consultants Training and Hotel - 2008 news - (2008-01-01)
  [1555] Advanced Python, Perl, PHP and Tcl training courses / classes - (2008-02-25)
  [1615] PHP training courses every month - (2008-04-18)
  [1676] A warm welcome for visitors from the USA - (2008-06-14)
  [1748] Hotel room prices - Melksham, Wiltshire - (2008-08-11)
  [1773] The Longest Possible Day - (2008-08-26)
  [1857] November and December Public Course Schedule - (2008-10-27)
  [1859] Wiltshire at dawn - the tourist trail - (2008-10-29)
  [1929] 2009 - Hotel, Meeting, Training Course prices - (2008-12-07)
  [1955] How to avoid duplicating web page maintainance - (2008-12-20)
  [1975] Well House Manor Hotel - on plan for 2009 business guests - (2009-01-03)
  [2144] Looking for a career change - Physician to Web Site Designer - (2009-04-28)
  [2216] Past Delegate Offer - Summer Holiday / Weekend Break - (2009-06-03)
  [2228] Where do I start when writing a program? - (2009-06-11)
  [2326] Learn a new programming language this summer. - (2009-08-06)
  [2384] Looking ahead to the Autumn season of training and accommodation - (2009-08-28)
  [2483] Clustering on Tomcat - (2009-10-30)
  [2537] Faster network, but not faster browsing until ... - (2009-12-14)
  [4588] What teach you in a week stays with you for a decade - (2015-11-29)


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Some other Articles
Extended Credit request - train in June and be paid in September
Grand Central Station
A better alternative to cutting and pasting code
Cheddleton, Staffordshire
A contrast in room rates and facilities
HTML - example of a simple web page
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Two by One by Wiltshire
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This is a page archived from The Horse's Mouth at http://www.wellho.net/horse/ - the diary and writings of Graham Ellis. Every attempt was made to provide current information at the time the page was written, but things do move forward in our business - new software releases, price changes, new techniques. Please check back via our main site for current courses, prices, versions, etc - any mention of a price in "The Horse's Mouth" cannot be taken as an offer to supply at that price.

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