The Weston Hotel, Scarborough: ‘Business is booming’ for Yorkshire hotel since appearing on Channel 4 series Yorkshire By The Sea

The Weston Hotel, located in Scarborough South Bay, first opened its doors after a refurbishment in April this year.

After reading an article about the new owners, Steph and Luke Allen, taking over the business, True North approached them about featuring them in the Channel 4 series Yorkshire By The Sea.

Despite the season being very busy, the filming was successful and since the episode aired in August, the hotel has been packed with people as bookings increased.

“We've been in full steam since it aired,” Ms Allen said.

“The phone has been ringing off the hook and in truth we’ve still not caught up on emails. We didn’t really want to watch it ourselves but we knew that our friends and family were tuning in, so we thought we might as well see how we came across.

“It’s brilliant for bookings, it’s brought in a lot of business when we’re really quiet in October and November as well which is fab.

“It aired in August when we’re already quite busy, we’ve had a lovely summer, the sun has been out and when the sun’s out, the business is booming because everyone just books [holidays] at the last minute.

“We were absolutely thrilled with how it turned out. I think the programme really captured the beauty of the Yorkshire coast and Scarborough’s charm. It showcased it in a really positive light, it was a lovely show.”

Mr Allen was apprehensive about the filming, but has been very happy with the way it showcased the coastal town and the business.

“We’ve not done anything like this before,” he said.

“My family has been in the hotel [industry] for the last 20 years and we’ve always been approached about doing stuff and we’ve been very reluctant to do it.

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“I had no inclinations to do it but I thought it would just be a bit novel and something nice for us to watch back in a few years.

“It shows Scarborough in such a good light. So hopefully not just for Weston's benefit, all the hotels and guest houses around have also benefited from it.

“The people at True North were really good, they were very patient with us. Ideally we wanted to do it over a really quiet time, but they said ‘that makes terrible TV’.”

The filming was a bigger challenge due to how busy the town was at the time.

“It was June last year [we filmed the series], it was one of our busiest weekends, so it was definitely a challenge,” Ms Allen said.

“Rag n Bone Man was performing at the Open Air Theatre so the hotel was fully booked for the first time since we purchased it in April and generally we tried to focus on making sure the guests had the best experience.

“It was a great opportunity to showcase the hotel and everything that was going on in Scarborough, it was a great weekend.

“We were trying to make sure the filming didn’t impact the guests’ experience with us because obviously at the end of the day they are our top priority. I think we managed to keep everything on track.

“They filmed for four days, with two full days over the weekend. It probably should have taken them just one day but safe to say we were not naturals and very nervous.”