Mark Godfrey is one of three co-founders and directors of South West 660, a scenic road trip route designed to showcase the beauty and highlights (food, drink and hospitality included!) of the South West. He is also a Director of Deer Park Country House, having previously held the role of Managing Director for both Deer Park, Dart Marina Hotel & Spa and the Harbour Hotels Group. He has had a varied and exciting career and is well know in the South West as a pillar of the hospitality industry. I thoroughly enjoyed my chat with him!
What does your Monday morning routine look like?
The beauty of what I do now is that I don’t have a routine anymore. My work is more project-based, so my Monday morning really depends on how fabulous the weekend was!! and what is going on in the week ahead. We spend many a weekend eating and drinking in South West 660’s partners beautiful establishments.
For example, recently I was picking grapes at my neighbour’s vineyard, Lily Farm Vineyard who won a gold in previous years English Wine Awards for their Bacchus. We produced a blog last year on the 22 vineyards along the South West 660 route, and Lily Farm was one of them. It’s a community pick, and we had a great time engaging with one of our partners. Faye, one of the owners, makes us a fabulous lunch, and we all get a bottle of wine to take away as a thank you.
What did you want to be when you were young?
When I was young, I wrote a letter to the presenter of a TV programme who I won’t name, but there was a big red chair. I asked if I could work as a waiter on the QE2. I was only about 12 or 13 at the time. Thankfully, he didn’t respond!
I think from a young age I had a sense of what my career was going to be. Weirdly, none of my family are from a hospitality background, so I have no idea where the idea came from.
What was your first full-time job?
My very first job was a part-time job in a chip shop. My first full-time job, however, was as a gardener on a Youth Training Scheme for the Bournemouth Parks Department in the late 80s. To top up my salary, I also worked as a kitchen porter at Ferndown Golf Club as I had to pay my dad back for the motorbike he bought me to get to work.
I loved the camaraderie in the kitchen, it was great! I compared it with sweeping leaves in the rain and thought, ‘Why am I doing this? I like washing up in the warm and being fed!’ The guy I was working for at the Golf Club then asked if I’d be able to help in the restaurant for Sunday Lunch, and there was no turning back. They didn’t let me go back to washing up! I just loved the interaction with the customers. He then suggested I go to college, and before I knew it, I had signed up for a two-year diploma in Hospitality Management at Bournemouth College.
It was a really hands-on course and the middle summer of that course they sent every student doing that diploma to a Relais & Châteaux or a Michelin star property in France for four months! I was sent to a restaurant in Paris. The owner was a complete ogre who didn’t speak to me that first month. I was a ‘stagiaire’ (intern) which is the lowest of the low in the restaurant and I spent the first month polishing glasses and learning how to describe bread. Then I was set loose to serve the bread! By the end of the four months, they didn’t want me to leave, but I had to go and do my second year of college. It was a fabulous start to a career in what I would say is the luxury end of hospitality.
What has been the best moment in your career?
I’ve had so many great moments, but the most humbling part of my career was to be made a Master Innholder from the Worshipful Company of Innkeepers. The Master Innholders are a subsection of the Worshipful Company of Innkeepers of the Old London Court of Innkeepers. There are only about 130 Master Innholders in the UK, and it’s a great organisation to be part of. It’s all about promoting the industry, giving back, and really representing it. I’m also a Freeman of the City of London as part of that.
Other highlights were when I was the General Manager of Stoke Park Club in Buckinghamshire. It was a fantastic two years, it’s a beautiful Grade 1 Palladian mansion and was used for films, including Bridget Jones’s Diary & Tomorrow never dies. I had to look after a big operation, with hotel guests, golfers, conferences, and sometimes filming all happening at the same time! After that, my wife and I decided we wanted a slightly calmer life, so we moved to Devon in 2001. I became the General Manager of the Dart Marina Hotel in Dartmouth.
This was an incredible experience; the owner invested a huge amount of money in the property, and we took it from a three-star to a four-star hotel. We built a new spa and a bistro, bought the pub next door, and I was part of a major project to build over 40 residential properties on-site. It was a massive three-year transition that was so rewarding, satisfying, and a lot of fun. I was at Dart Marina for eight years and we had a great team. I was also on the Dartmouth Food Festival Committee and part of the original team that started the South Hams Food and Drink Association, which later became the Devon Food Association. The vibrancy of the food scene in Dartmouth at the time was just incredible. We were very lucky to be there at exactly the right time.
What has been the worst moment in your career?
Such a hard question as I’ve had such an amazing career, but of course hospitality management isn’t for the faint hearted and there are often very challenging days! Like the day before a large wedding at Stoke Park when part of the ceiling collapsed and fell down crushing three of the beautifully laid tables. It was too unsafe to hold the wedding in the room, so we had to act really fast to hire a marquee and move the entire wedding. A tricky phone call to the bride that’s for sure!!!
If you could invite any two people for dinner, who would they be and why would you invite them?
This is a tough one, but I’m really into growing my own veg. My dad was a very keen gardener, so it’s in my genes, so it would have to be Monty Don the horticulturist. would also need a foodie to sit down with me and talk to Monty. It would probably be Marcus Wareing. Marcus had a programme during COVID where he cooked from his garden, and it really resonated with me because I’ve been cooking outside since I was a Boy Scout. I have a vegetable garden that feeds the entire neighbourhood and, in my garden, I have a huge pizza oven and a South African braai. So, I’m sat at a table, eating my veg, cooked in my oven and on my braai, with Monty Don and Marcus Wareing.
What’s a hidden talent or skill that most people don’t know you possess?
I can ride a unicycle and juggle pretty much three things at the same time whilst on the unicycle! I bought it when I was 14 or 15 with Christmas tips from my paper round. My parents had a long hallway in our house, and I would use the wall for balance while learning to ride. My mum would go mad and make me wear gloves! I cracked it after about six weeks and would then ride it to school.
What is your most memorable foodie memory from your childhood?
It would be my dad’s fish and chips. Back then, every household had a chip pan that just stayed on the hob for its entire life and on a Saturday night, after watching ‘The two Ronnies ‘ my dad would sometimes say “who fancies some chips.” So tasty. He nailed it.
I could also mention my mum’s ‘Candelabra’ – actually Carbonara, but she’s a bit old and now calls it ‘Candelabra’!
Share a quote or motto that inspires you or by which you live your life.
It’s getting emotional now. I used to help an old guy in his garden on a Saturday morning. He used to grow tomatoes, veg and this, that and the other. I had to make the decision about continuing with my gardening career or change to hospitality: “Mark, you’ll only ever succeed at what you enjoy doing.” It’s been with me ever since and I think it’s such a good sentiment. If you don’t enjoy what you’re doing, how are you ever going to succeed at it? “If you don’t enjoy sweeping leaves, then go wash up.”
What job is the favourite you’ve ever had and what made it so special?
I’ve had some amazing jobs and done some wonderful things. I’ve been all over the world with my job but when you’re in a relaxed environment, making fabulous food for people… I recently had a share in a mobile pizza company called Dough Bros. It was owned by me and a couple of great friends and the pizza’s just looked absolutely fabulous. It was great fun – we had a team of five and would often do three hundred pizza’s in a night! Everyone in hospitality talks about ‘The Buzz’ – when you’re on the hot plate on a busy Saturday night, or you deliver an amazing wedding or a great party – We had that with the pizza van! So much fun!
What’s the most adventurous thing you’ve ever done?
I would say the most adventurous thing I’ve ever done was trekking to Everest Base Camp about ten years ago with three good friends. The adventure started on the plane itself; after flying into Kathmandu, we took a very small plane to Lukla, which is known as the most dangerous airport in the world. The plane lands uphill to stop it from crashing into the side of the mountain. A Buddhist monk sat behind me and prayed for the entire 40-minute flight! There were a few moments on the trek when I genuinely thought it would be the end of me, like when we had to cross a collapsed path with a sheer drop of a thousand metres. My guide just pulled me over with my walking pole. It was an incredible experience, but it also had its risks—a woman in a French group was hit by a piece of granite falling down the mountain and had to be helicoptered out. Between the altitude and the freezing cold in those little wooden tea houses—my water bottle froze solid one night—it was a challenging three weeks.
It will be 10 years ago this November. We’ll be having a little reunion dinner!
What are you currently listening to?
I like to listen to audible books and annoyingly, I’ve just come to the end of a book. I was listening to The Trading Game – a true story about trader; Gary Stevenson who grew up in South London, incredibly switched on in terms of maths, starts selling sweets and stuff at school and ends up as one of City Banks top traders. He reads the book himself and has a great voice!
I once tried learning Spanish whilst driving, but that didn’t go well…
I like listening to books in the car, otherwise to me it’s kind of wasted time.
Where is your favourite holiday destination?
The last time Sharon and I had a two-week holiday was in 2017 before COVID. We went to Pollença in Majorca then and now we’re finally going back. We’ve been a few times and we love it there. In December we are off to New York for a week which is really exciting and in February we are travelling to Southern India. We’re doing a bit of a catch up on holidays !
When I was 40, we took a year off and travelled the world. We spent a long time in Asia – Vietnam and Cambodia and Thailand and we just had the most amazing time. We also went to Australia and New Zealand and California. We had the travel bug and to stop me, Sharon bought me my little Westie, Hugo. He grounded me for 15 years and sadly passed away a year ago, so now we’re using travel as a distraction.
What inspires you?
I’m inspired by working in a team and by go-getting people who enjoy what they do. That passion, drive and energy inspire me. All those ideas bouncing around and the creative environment gets me very excitable. I always try and think big and layer things up – we can do this, and this and let’s do this and that… I always get told off by my wife when I get over excited like that!
There’s always something new in hospitality. A new way to do something, a reinvention of XYZ. I love that about the industry. We get knocked down, but we rebuild faster than any other industry. You see the young blood coming through, as hungry as you were when you did it back then.
What would you like to be doing in 5 years’ time?
Sitting on a beach!! No, seriously… lots of beaches! I love doing big walks. Next year, my walking buddies and I are doing the Matterhorn to Mont Blanc trek, which is a massive trip. I want to continue doing those. I have the travel bug again. I want to spend more time in Japan. I just love their way of life and the flavours and freshness of their food. So, in short, more traveling!
What is happening in your life that you would like a shout-out about?
I’d like to tell you more about South West 660. We founded it during COVID off the back of a TV program called ‘Beyond the Lobby’, which focussed on the Torridon in Scotland. They talked about the North Coast 500 and Ruud (Jansen Venneboer), my co-founder said: “Hang on a minute. How come there isn’t something like that in the South West? We have fabulous scenery, beaches, views, roads…” So we agreed to try and create a route. We got out a big map and a highlighter onto the kitchen table and mapped out the route from Poole in Dorset, all the way around the South Coast peninsula, down to Lands End and all the way back up the North Coast to Watchet in Somerset. We calculated that it was about 660 miles, and it flowed off the tongue – as in Route66. That was South West 660 born and Chris (Jackson), our other founder came on board. He does all the admin side of the business – the invoicing, accounts and web site work. Ruud and I do all the partnership sales and relationship building – working with the fabulous hotels, restaurants, cafes and activities around the route.
St Austell Brewery have partnered with us as one of our Trusted Partners since we launched and are great. More recently, Rockfish with Mitch Tonks, have come on board as Trusted Partners. They’re opening amazing places along the route which is really great! We have a whole range of different levels of partners to suit every budget, from Lympstone Manor to the inns of St Austell – we even got to see The Winking Prawn in the movie The Roses!
We’ve sold memberships to the general public in over 14 countries – A basic membership doesn’t cost anything. A premium membership is just £20 for 12 months and you gain access to partner hotel offers etc. You get a membership card that you can share when checking in for upgrades or a glass of champagne and you get the detailed route maps and notes.
It’s a fun project to work on and we have been featured in over 50 media publications including the Sunday Times, Olive Magazine, National Geographic and Vogue on the Road.
Please check out the website for all the details and to get your membership!
You can contact Mark through LinkedIn and follow South West 660 on Facebook and Instagram for up to date news.
