The Royal Yacht Britannia, announced yesterday that, for the 12th year in a row, it has been rated as Scotland’s Best Visitor Attraction by Scotland’s national tourism agency, VisitScotland.

The Queen’s former floating palace, now a popular visitor attraction in Edinburgh, takes great pride in delivering an exceptional customer experience to every visitor who steps aboard.

VisitScotland’s Quality Assurance Scheme is the official measure of quality for tourism businesses in Scotland, benchmarking visitor attractions, accommodation providers, and catering establishments across Scotland. Tourism businesses are assessed based on the welcome, attitude, knowledge and efficiency of staff, as well as audience level, interpretation, maintenance and cleanliness of the attraction.

The Royal Yacht is also celebrating its most successful year to date, since opening 19 years ago, with visitor numbers running 13% up on last year. To date, over 5 million people from across the world have visited The Queen’s former floating palace, since it opened in 1998. The iconic attraction has also featured in TripAdvisor’s UK Top 10 for the last 5 years, with over 16,500 reviews and the highest percentage of ‘Excellent’ reviews (72%).

Commenting on this outstanding success, Britannia’s Chief Executive, Bob Downie said, “To be the best in Scotland once is a fantastic achievement, but to do this for twelve consecutive years is a phenomenal tribute to our staff who go the extra mile to ensure that all our visitors have a great experience when they visit Britannia. The true test of any great organisation is consistency of performance, delivering great value for time and money, year in year out, and there is no doubt that our pioneering approach to providing great customer experiences has underpinned our success.”

Lord Thurso, Chairman of VisitScotland said: “This is a remarkable achievement for The Royal Yacht Britannia. To retain the accolade of Scotland’s best attraction for the 12th year running is no mean feat and very well deserved for such an iconic attraction. We need to think bigger about Scotland as a tourism destination to ensure we fulfil our potential – every visitor must get a quality experience every single time – and Britannia is leading by example and setting the bar high for excellence.”

Musselburgh Racecourse has put in another five-star performance and has been awarded VisitScotland’s highest visitor experience rating for the 11th consecutive year.

VisitScotland has revised its Quality Assurance scheme with a new method of grading visitor attractions and in awarding Musselburgh a 5 Star award said: “The new system has seen some scores fall to a greater or lesser degree amongst many visitor attractions, but no such loss has in fact occurred here.”

Gaining an overall score of 89%, Musselburgh obtained a 93% rating for its pre-arrival services for visitors, 91% for Core Experience and 90% each for Staff Service and Efficiency, Cleanliness and Toilets, while Hospitality and Friendliness and Arrival was awarded 86% and 85% respectively.

Staff working across the racecourse were singled out for praise with inspectors stating they were “friendly and attentive, knowledgeable and never less than amiable and efficient.”

On arrival at Musselburgh, external black and gold signage was “stylish and effective”, directional signage inside the course was prominent, and well-designed lay-out maps around the site helped with orientation, making it unlikely visitors would not be aware of all onsite features.

Across Musselburgh’s multiple catering options, from the a la carte Epperston restaurant, to the Harris Tweed bistro and concessionary food stands “it was evident that high standards are being maintained”, said the report. Judges said they were very impressed with the standards of cleanliness around the whole grounds, which “contributed to the overall impression of high quality within the racecourse”.

In addition to the 5-star rating Musselburgh was also accredited with VisitScotland’s Taste Our Best quality assurance rating, which is awarded to attractions which use quality Scottish ingredients, fresh, seasonal produce, local food with food miles kept to a minimum, and friendly staff who are knowledge about the food served.

VisitScotland also requires businesses to undertake a number of sustainability actions in areas such as use of energy, water, waste, transport, natural heritage and customer and community engagement. The racecourse was required to fulfil 11 sustainability actions out of 36 options but overdelivered by completing 27 actions.

Musselburgh Racecourse senior operations and commercial manager, Sarah Montgomery, said: “We were the first Scottish racecourse to be awarded a VisitScotland five star rating in 2006 and we are delighted to have maintained that very high standard for the 11th consecutive year.

“This accreditation does not happen by accident but is the result of planning, strategy and careful execution of a wide range of policies by our very hard working team. Credit is due to everyone involved, from our small executive team to our highly professional operational and ground staff, to the casual race day employees who work in customer care, bars, restaurants, betting facilities, merchandise and security.

“On the back of a highly successful summer Flat season with record attendances for Stobo Castle Ladies Day and the Edinburgh Gin Edinburgh Cup, we are preparing for an equally successful jumps season over the autumn and winter season. This 5-star award confirms Musselburgh’s position at Scotland’s most stylish and enterprising racecourse and a place where visitors can expect the highest levels of service.”