One of Scotland’s oldest hotels is moving with the times by ensuring its guests arrive in comfort and style – with a little help from Mercedes-Benz.
The 30-bedroom Drover’s Inn, at Inverarnan, near Loch Lomond, has been welcoming weary travellers for three centuries and is renowned for its historic atmosphere, live weekend music sessions and the quality of its locally-sourced food.
The hotel’s owners have just replaced their previous, ageing vehicle with a stylish Mercedes Vito 111CDI Traveliner minibus, which is now ferrying guests between Inverarnan and Glasgow Airport, 50 minutes’ drive away, as well as collecting them from and returning them to the local railway station at Ardlui.
Supplied by Govan dealer Western Commercial, the Vito seats eight passengers plus a driver, and wears an eye-catching vinyl body wrap designed by Midgibyte Creations, of Glasgow.
“Our old minibus was becoming unreliable and we wanted a vehicle we could trust not to leave our guests stranded,” explains Ernest Strang, who has owned The Drover’s Inn for the past six years.
“My wife and I have driven Mercedes cars for many years and they’ve never let us down, so it seemed logical to turn to the same manufacturer when we were looking for a new minibus.”
Mr Strang continues: “I have a friend with a taxi business who has a few Vitos that have clocked-up huge mileages with no problems. Ours is unlikely to cover more than 10,000 miles a year, but I’m reassured by the fact that it’s clearly capable of much more.”
Comfortable and car-like to drive, the Vito Traveliner is also extremely safe. All seats have three-point inertia reel seatbelts, while its arsenal of active and passive safety features includes the remarkable Adaptive ESP® anti-skid program.
“We’ll also be using our new Mercedes for social purposes,” continues Mr Strang.
“It will be ideal for our annual family holiday to France, when we’ll be taking two friends and their son, as well as our two godchildren. The Vito Traveliner is very comfortable and will swallow all seven of us and the luggage with ease.”
The Mercedes Vito is also available as a panel van with one or – in Dualiner variant form – two rows of seats. Like all new Vitos, The Drover’s Inn’s Traveliner came with a three-year, unlimited mileage warranty.
“That’s a useful bonus but we’d expect nothing less from Mercedes-Benz,” adds Mr Strang. “We know from driving their cars how excellent is their after sales support. I have nothing but praise for Western Commercial and particularly their sales executive Ian Wylie, who was fabulous to deal with.” |
