‘I NEVER IMAGINED A TOURIST TRADE IN CITY’
Hotelier recalls when guest house was popular with stars
LEGENDARY hotelier Edie Hindmoor has experienced the changing face of Hanley – from her iconic guest house.
Verdon Guest House used to be the place to stay when celebrities were in town.
Famous faces over the years include entertainer Danny La Rue and actress Anna Karen, who was played Olive in late 60s/1970s sitcom On the Buses.
Eighty-four-year-old Edie, who opened the Charles Street guest house in the early 1970s, sold the business earlier this year.
Now she has written a book Memoirs of a Stokie Landlady.
Edie was married with four children and living just two streets away when she opened the guest house.
The property had belonged to her sister.
Edie said: “I did well from day one. People didn’t like to stay at hotels with the prices.
“Only business people stayed at hotels back then. There were a lot of guest houses around Stokeon-trent - they were preferred. Within the same week it opened, it was full of contractors.
“As well as contractors, tourists turned up. I had never imagined a tourist trade in Hanley.
“One day, an American couple were standing at the doorstep
with their cameras. I asked them what were they doing in Stokeon-trent? They said it was the Potteries they’d come to see. There was a lot in those days.
“As soon as the pottery industry declined, we didn’t see any more. That was a blow to Stoke-ontrent.”
Verdon Guest House started out with 11 rooms. It later expanded to 16 with bed and breakfast and the option of an evening meal.
Edie once charged £4-a-night bed and breakfast - it was £50-a-night when she finished.
It was 2020 when the Covid-19 pandemic struck and hotels were ordered to close - and instead house the homeless. It was the start of a decline.
Edie said: “We couldn’t afford to close down. When the government said can you take the homeless, I thought now is my chance to do something worthwhile.
“I belong to the Baptist church. I thought at the guest house we can offer some support and love.
For some of them it changed their lives - most of them it didn’t.
“It slowly went from a beautiful place and declined. They always argued, took drugs and drank.
“I couldn’t tell you how bad it was. They started stealing stuff in the rooms, TVS went missing.
“With the prices of stuff I couldn’t afford it. To pay the bills at the same time, it was a real problem and I began to get very nervous about what was happening.
“It was very hard to have decent people stay after that. We couldn’t take bookings after Covid because I was ashamed of what the house had become.
“The bills had gone so high. I was paying out so much in rates and tax. It took 40 per cent of the income alone.”
In 2023, Edie knew it was time to sell the business. In January this year it was bought by a businesswoman.
Edie said: “She’s invested an awful lot of money.
“When I went round the new owners had done it up beautifully. They’ve bought new beds, new heating, it’s lovely.”
Edie has nearly finished writing her book. She said: “It tells stories of running the guesthouse and the gradual decline of Stoke-ontrent since my childhood.
“How it went from people being honest and we could leave our doors open. Then all the crime started, the rise of the drugs epidemic. It was a different life.”