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Robin and Marion Jones, Croque-en-Bouche,
Grooms Cottage - Underdown, Gloucester Rd., Ledbury, Herefordshire HR8 2JE. UK
t. 01531 636400 f. 0870 7066282
We don’t just have hotel and restaurant clients, some great, some aspiring. There’s also two B&B’s, a publisher, a food manufacturer, an international charity,
a telecoms company, outside caterers, patisserie, lawyers, a fencing company and mobile fridge hire operations.
Thanks for visiting. The best way to judge us is to judge the work. So...
We were restaurateurs who became wine merchants, and then got into websites and design. And this is our own site, where we display our wares, and play around a bit! And this time round it’s crumpled paper!
Croque-en-Bouche used to be a quite famous, small restaurant! Michelin star - 22 years, Good Food Guide 8/10. Just my wife, Marion and me, Robin. Read more about the restaurant. But we’ve done with that. Since 2002 we have done websites and design for a small number of select(?) clients. The slant has been towards food/wine-based companies, where we have expertise and experience. We are respected Internet traders ourselves, selling our wines mail-order. More on e-commerce.
Developing a site usually raises related design issues, concerning promotional stuff and logos; and often menus and wine lists for restaurants and hotels. The work all overlaps, so that total costs are never crazy. And once set up, a site needs hosting. We have a top quality server online for hosting. More about hosting.
If you want the world to find you on the web, then technically, you better look nice to the search engines, and the few unfortunates not on broadband. This means not too much flashy stuff and graphic images, and lots of nice relevant basic text.
See search-engine info. You can also see some web tips.
Style matters, but not over substance!
Our latest websites have included The Walnut Tree, an icon in the restaurant trade and open again with great acclaim. Plus a whole new direction... an international charity, Children of Peace. Not only is this a large site but it needed to be ‘code-compliant’ and ‘accessible’. I test all our sites for W3C compliancy but there was very little ‘bending the rules’ for this one. And ‘accessible’ means the site shows well on odd browsers, you can navigate without the mouse, and if you increase the text sizes the site stays useable. All sites are legally obliged to follow the guidelines of the Disabilities Act 1995, but most only nod to it (severely cramps style!). I learnt a lot of new stuff!
With an eye to the future, the Angel Hotel now has a ‘mobile’ (.mobi) website. Surfing the net on your phone is in its infancy, but watch it grow! These sites need to be simple and 100% code compliant. And you need short domain names to fit the small screen! You can see how a .mobi site looks by going to http://mtld.mobi/emulator.php
Enter angelhotel.mobi, but don’t get too excited! These are very simple ‘starter’ sites. If you think a .mobi is a good idea then I can get you a domain now (more pricey than .co’s at £60/two years tho’). We got angelhotel.mobi. How many other Angel hotels in the world are going to want that sometime soon? See all about our sites.
Re. wines and wine lists, The Angel Hotel in Abergavenny has Awards of Excellence 2005 - 2008 for its wine list - my work, 95 of my wines - from the world’s top wine magazine, ‘Wine Spectator’. 24 UK winners, only one in Wales! Since 2002, this hotel has been transformed.
I looked after the now-retired Merchant House wine list in Ludlow for Shaun Hill. I added some wines and gave the list style. It won an AA Wine list of the Year. Pretty good for a list of under 90 wines. Now Shaun is running The Walnut Tree near Abergavenny, and I work on that list. Read about my wine list work. You can also see some wine list and menu tips.
And lastly, I think we offer value-for-money. If you want to ask any of our existing customers, I’m sure they will give you frank opinions! You can check our charges here.
WEBSITES AND DESIGN
