Twenty seven pubs have celebrated their success with Wadworth at the independent family brewer and regional pub operator’s annual Best of the Best Awards.
Held last night (Monday) in Devizes, the awards ceremony toasts the very best pubs and people from Wadworth’s managed and tenanted pub estates.
Pubs received the prestigious awards during the night from various sponsors in the industry.
Businessman Jon White has breathed life into an historic Wiltshire building by opening a new antique shop in Royal Wootton Bassett.
Old Bank Antiques, the former HSBC bank, was opened at 143 High Street on Saturday by TV presenter and antiques expert Paul Martin with town mayor Steve Watts. Town crier Owen Collier made the official announcement to all who passed by.
The shop has been a labour of love for Jon and it means the bank building is now open for business after being closed for several years.
Swindon’s only artisan ice cream producer, can now be tasted across the South of England thanks to a partnership with local company Heritage Fine Foods.
Hadi Brooks, managing director of Rays Ice Cream, is now working with the Devizes-based company to supply hotels, restaurants, pubs, tourist attractions, schools and cafes with fresh, high quality ice cream in multiple flavours.
“This is an exciting development for us,” Hadi said. “We’ve been wanting to grow and offer great ice cream to anyone providing good food across the south west of the country, however we were limited by our capacity to deliver.
A last-minute surge of PPI claims has hit profits at Swindon-based building society Nationwide, which have fallen by 33 percent for the first half of its financial year.
Increased investment also drove down pre-tax profits to £307 million said the mutual, which is not under the same pressure as major banks to deliver greater returns to shareholders and has prioritised its technology investment and expansion into business banking.
Costs rose from £1.10 billion to £1.13 billion as the company continued to "invest for the future."
In some good news, membership numbers rose from 3.4 million to 3.5 million.
Worldwide Estates has sold the freehold investment of Nursteed Trading Estate in Devizes for £3.46 million. The multi-let industrial estate was acquired by the private investment group Maybrook Properties.
Alder King and Strakers represented the vendor while Kenningtons acted for the purchaser.
Nursteed Trading Estate, located to the south east of Devizes, is arranged in three blocks and provides a total of 41,685 sq ft of accommodation on circa 3.86 acres. All 10 units are let to occupiers including Mole Valley Farmers, City Plumbing Supplies and Varivane Industries. The estate produces a passing rent of £237,500 per annum.
Networkers are being invited to hop on board a cocktail bus, for an evening of festive fun courtesy of Fig Offices, Swindon.
The bus will be calling at 3 Newbridge Square on Thursday, December 5 from 6pm for networking with prosecco and nibbles, and cocktail and mocktail masterclasses.
Entry is by invitation only. For more information, or to request a place, email Sharon Lewis at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Recruitment firm 24-7 Staffing has appointed three new directors as part of its strategy to widen its services in Wiltshire and Bristol.
Chippenham branch manager Carl Stenning becomes operations director, while Salisbury branch manager Shane Stevens also becomes a director of the company.
Dave Bullock joins the team as sales director. He first worked at the Chippenham-headquartered agency seven years ago, as branch manager and then business development manager.