Town End Farm, holiday accommodation in Yorkshire

A luxurious escape to the North York Moors

Tel: 01751 417960 Email: relax@townendfarm.org.uk

Our small business

by | Apr 8, 2025 | Village Life

Woman and Man standing in sunshine next to a barn
Aerial shot of courtyard garden in autumn sunshine surrounded by stone barn buildings. Long Barn, North York Moors
Woman and man smiling at each other, standing in front of a stone barn.

A midlife crisis

It’s 12 years since what we like to call, our midlife crisis and our escape to the North York Moors.

We’re Ian and Jackie, and we decided to swap corporate life for the fresh air and big skies of the North York Moors. We poured every bit of our hearts, souls and cash into renovating the Long Barn at Town End Farm.

Our dream was a gorgeous space where large groups of friends and family could meet up in style and comfort. For celebrations, gatherings and reunions.

Fast forward to now, and we couldn’t be happier or prouder. It was always our dream to run our own business and take control of our lives, outside of the corporate world.

As a small business, it has had its challenges. Being closed for almost 2 years during Covid and offering to refund everyone’s money was scary. But our loyal guests were incredible, many telling us to keep the cash and roll their booking forward for a future date.

We’re now coming up to our 10th year of the Long Barn being open, and we are so lucky that over 65% of our bookings come from repeat guests. We’ve welcoming guests here from just a few weeks old, to sprightly 90 year olds.

Woman and man with snow on their faces, wearing hats.
Man drinking a beer at bar in pub, filled with happy locals.
Mand and woman smiling at the camera

What have we learned along the way?

    • That we love what we do, and nothing gives us greater pleasure than seeing the excitement on people’s faces as they arrive.
    • That working together challenges our natural working styles. Jackie has chilled on planning everything on a spreadsheet to an inch of its life. And Ian sometimes writes a list of things to do.
    • That trying to see everything from our guests’ eyes, means we can continue to make improvements and tweeks to the Long Barn.
    • That we work amongst an amazing group of talented local people who run their own business, and like us, care passionately about the beautiful North York Moors. The support that we’ve had from them and the national park has been incredible. We feel very blessed to live and work in such a wondeful place. A special thank you to Susan Briggs for her help, support and challenge.
    • That we love living as part of a vibrant village community in our wonderful village, Appleton le Moors. They put up with our renovations including the first temporary traffic lights in village living memory. And they’ve welcomed us and all our guests to the community. They put up with our renovations, including the first temporary traffic lights in village living memory. And they’ve welcomed us and all our guests to the community.

We feel very lucky and proud of Town End Farm. We are all too well aware that we live in uncertain times, and don’t take any of our business for granted

Thank you to all of our guests, supporters and friends who’ve encouraged and supported us over the last 12 years. We know some of you thought we were completely mad to do what we were doing, but you supported us anyway.

And we look forward to welcoming guests new and returning to the Long Barn in the coming years.