We've Been Shortlisted for a Thistle Award 2023

Our Cafe has been shortlisted for a Visit Scotland Regional (Central & East) Thistle Award 2023 in the 'Celebrating Thriving Communities' category, how exciting!

Thistle Awards are a prestigious accolade in the Scottish tourism industry. The Thistle Awards are organized by VisitScotland, the national tourism organization for Scotland, to recognize and celebrate excellence in tourism and hospitality.

The 'Celebrating Thriving Communities' category showcases the best best of Scotland’s tourism and events sector, helping to ensure that tourism, and the individuals who work in the industry, are recognised for the positive impact they bring to the country and our communities.

According to Visit Scotland "there have been a significant number of exceptionally high quality applications" and our entry has been recognised as an outstanding candidate for the award. 

This is a fantastic recognition of our efforts to use our business as a platform to serve our customers & our community, to contribute to the industry and preserve the beauty of our natural environment.

Our founder and director, Sarah Heward said: "To me personally, this is a hugely important category. When I set the business up, back in 2005, I always hoped that one day we'd be in a position to use the business as a platform for the greater good and serve our community, industry and environment, as well as our customers.
In the bigger picture, we all need thriving communities because none of us can exist sustainably in isolation."

This achievement recognises the following campaigns and projects that our Cafe leads or is involved in:

• Our growing programme of community litterpicks - Pick N Chips litterpicking

• The Cafe's support of Tyndrum Infrastructure Group and the charity's Spend a Penny Scotland campaign to build a Changing Places Toilet in Tyndrum.
  

• Our Gluten Free Fortnight marketing campaign delivered in collaboration with Forth Valley Food and Drink C.I.C. aims to help develop food tourism in our region specifically targeting individuals who follow a gluten free diet.

• Our fundraising efforts for Toilet Twinning with whom we've already built 135 toilets. 

We are very excited to meet all of the other finalists at the awards ceremony in Edinburgh on 21 September. 

This is not our first Thistle Awards rodeo. In 2020 we were awarded the 'Best Informal Eating Experience'. This award was given to us for our great food & customer service and it recognises that we put a great deal of effort into sourcing our food responsibly and using Scottish ingredients wherever possible while promoting Scottish suppliers.

Find out more about Visit Scotland's Thistle Awards 2023.