About
I've spent more than a decade on hotel and bar floors in Ireland.
I started at fifteen, saving for a Honda Varadero, and took my first waiter's job at the Ambassador Hotel in Cork, working weddings and functions. At eighteen I joined Fota Island Resort, where I learned how a five-star operation holds its standards under pressure, at winter events of up to 3,000 covers a day. I went from waiter to food and beverage supervisor in two years.
Since then I've:
- run shifts in a 50-table bar-restaurant and beer garden in Ballincollig
- been assistant bar manager in a high-volume Dublin city-centre bar
- managed the bar, floor and outdoor trade at Brick Lane in Cork, where I built the cocktail list from scratch and held wet gross profit at 70–75%
- this year, returned to five-star at Aghadoe Heights above the Lakes of Killarney
In late November I move to the Highlands. My father always said the Murrays came over from Scotland; part of the move is finding out how much of that is true. The rest is the plan: a room, a team and a trade, somewhere with the hills out the window, and to stay.
What this site is
Twice a week, Monday and Thursday mornings, I write about Highland hospitality from the floor up. Each essay starts with a real place or a real night. Then it makes one argument about the sector, from staffing and housing to the visitor levy, VAT, heritage and the craft of service, and backs it with sources you can check. Where the evidence cuts against me, I say so.
How I write
- Sources. Every figure is referenced at the foot of the essay, with the date I checked it.
- People. I name people only with their agreement, or when they've spoken publicly. I don't invent quotes or composite "guests". If a scene is reconstructed, I say so.
- Corrections. If I get something wrong, email me and I'll correct it in the essay with a dated note.
Declared interests
I'm looking for a food and beverage management role in a Highland hotel, resort or rural estate. I'm not paid by, and don't hold shares in, any business I write about. If that ever changes, I'll say so in the essay concerned.