Hospitality Heroes: Justine Bedford, owner and landlady at Burnley's The Royal Dyche

Burnley Express

Once known for race riots and football hooliganism, Justine Bedford has transformed the fortunes of the former Princess Royal pub into the award winning The Royal Dyche

Transcript

00:00I've been at the Royal Dash since 2013. It was originally called the Princess Royal.

00:06I originally took on the pub just as a temporary favour for my dad's friend Terry Grogan.

00:10He was the one who took a chance on me. I just wanted to get some extra money for travelling.

00:14It was always my dream to go travelling after university. I was actually in my final year at the time

00:18and I still wanted to be a PE teacher and that was my dream and what I wanted to do.

00:22Ended up not wanting to give up the pub. I had two years, got a manager in.

00:26I still went travelling for six months but that six months for me was a realisation of how special the pub was,

00:32how much potential it had and how much I could grow my own business.

00:35It was also a realisation of how great Burnley is, how lucky we are. We're surrounded by beautiful greenery.

00:40We've got links to all the major cities and we have a community spirit in the town that a lot of other towns and cities don't have.

00:46Fast forward to 2018 which is when I changed the name to the Royal Dash.

00:50Again, it was just a chalkboard, joke on an airboard saying Sean get us into Europe.

00:56We'll rename this pub The Dash.

00:58But every Burnley fan at the time, come on, it's November in the season.

01:01No one thought we was going to do it. We're sitting forth comfortably but still everyone thought we were going to drop off.

01:06No one thought we were going to do it. I had Sean's blessing as well and things started to come true.

01:10And I had Terry Grogan's backing as well. He said, as long as I pay for the signage, I can do what I want.

01:15I bought the pub a few months later as well. I was looking up to become a free house.

01:18So for me, that was when the shackles were off. We were the Royal Dash.

01:21I knew what their identity was going to be. It was going to be Burnley FC's number one pub for fans, sports pub, community hub.

01:29And I feel like I've really transitioned the pub now into we've gone from like racism, riots, football, violence.

01:34And we're now an award winning, world famous pub in Burnley. And yeah, I'm really proud of what I've achieved.

01:40I've got a great team behind me as well. And I feel like the sky's the limit for us.

01:45I feel like we're really flying the flag for Burnley. We're flying the flag for the north and Lancashire.

01:49And I just hope I keep making everybody proud.

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