London calling.
London Walks connecting.
This… is London.
This is London Walks.
Streets ahead.
Story time. History time.
—————————————
Top of the morning to you, London Walkers. Wherever you are.
It’s May 2nd, 2025.
We’ve got several criteria that help us to get the measure of a great guide. One is, are they fun to be with? Are they warm, friendly, outgoing? Are they somebody you’d like to spend a couple of hours with?
Another is, are they born story-tellers? Do they have a great voice? And audience awareness? Do they have a sense of humour? And flawless timing? And just generally a great delivery? Are they able to get the material across in a pleasing fashion?
And finally, are they really knowledgeable? And not just adequately knowledgeable – do they know things other people don’t know?
And where’s this going? Who do I have in mind here?
Ann of course. Ann who chips in and takes up some of the slack – makes quite a few guest appearances on the London Calling podcast. Every single one of those criteria she passes with flying colours. She’s a great guide. And a wonderful colleague and friend. And the genesis of this podcast? I’m glad you asked. On a whim I said to her a few weeks ago, “Ann, you’re the resident London Walks foodies expert – you do all those delightful foodies walks – the anniversary of VE Day is coming up – could I talk you into a doing a little podcast for us about culinary matters during the war. I know there were some food shortages and there was rationing. But how about getting down and dirty with the subject. Getting up close to it. Setting the table as it were for how your forbears got by, what they were eating during the war?
It was just a passing suggestion. Sent along to Ann because I was curious. And I would have completely understood if she had demurred, “that’s a good suggestion, David, but I’m afraid I just don’t have time. Maybe next year. But that’s not Ann. With Ann, ask and thou shalt receive. Sure enough, she whipped up this little dish for us.
Here’s Ann, shedding lots of light on the subject. It’s so Ann, this. She knows things other people don’t know. It’s a treat of a listen. But I’m glad we don’t have to eat parsnips masquerading as bananas.
[Ann’s podcast about what was on the menu during World War II and on VE Day follows]
You’ve been listening to This… is London, the London Walks podcast. Emanating from www.walks.com –
home of London Walks,
London’s signature walking tour company.
London’s local, time-honoured, fiercely independent, family-owned, just-the-right-size walking tour company.
And as long as we’re at it, London’s multi-award-winning walking tour company. Indeed, London’s only award-winning walking tour company.
And here’s the secret: London Walks is essentially run as a guides’ cooperative.
That’s the key to everything.
It’s the reason we’re able to attract and keep the best guides in London. You can get schlubbers to do this for £20 a walk. But you cannot get world-class guides – let alone accomplished professionals.
It’s not rocket science: you get what you pay for.
And just as surely, you also get what you don’t pay for.
Back in 1968 when we got started we quickly came to a fork in the road. We had to answer a searching question: Do we want to make the most money? Or do we want to be the best walking tour company in the world?
You want to make the most money you go the schlubbers route. You want to be the best walking tour company in the world you do whatever you have to do
to attract and keep the best guides in London –
you want them guiding for you, not for somebody else.
Bears repeating:
the way we’re structured – a guides’ cooperative –
is the key to the whole thing.
It’s the reason for all those awards, it’s the reason people who know go with London Walks, it’s the reason we’ve got a big following, a lively, loyal, discerning following – quality attracts quality.
It’s the reason we’re able – uniquely – to front our walks with accomplished, in many cases distinguished professionals:
By way of example, Stewart Purvis, the former Editor
(and subsequently CEO) of Independent Television News.
And Lisa Honan, who had a distinguished career as a diplomat (Lisa was the Governor of St Helena, the island where Napoleon breathed his last and, some say, had his penis amputated – Napoleon didn’t feel a thing – if thing’s the mot juste – he was dead.)
Stewart and Lisa – both of them CBEs – are just a couple of our headline acts.
Or take our Ripper Walk. It’s the creation of the world’s leading expert on Jack the Ripper, Donald Rumbelow, the author of the definitive book on the subject. Britain’s most distinguished crime historian, Donald is, in the words of The Jack the Ripper A to Z, “internationally recognised as the leading authority on Jack the Ripper.” Donald’s emeritus now but he’s still the guiding light on our Ripper Walk. He curates the walk. He trains up and mentors our Ripper Walk guides. Fields any and all questions they throw at him.
The London Walks Aristocracy of Talent – its All-Star Team of Guides – includes a former London Mayor. It includes the former Chief Music Critic for the Evening Standard. It includes the Chair of the Association of Professional Tour Guides. And the former chair of the Guild of Guides.
It includes barristers, doctors, geologists, museum curators, a former London Museum archaeologist, historians,
university professors (one of them a distinguished Cambridge University paleontologist); it includes a criminal defence lawyer, Royal Shakespeare Company and National Theatre actors, a bevy of MVPs, Oscar winners (people who’ve won the big one, the Guide of the Year Award)…
well, you get the idea.
As that travel writer famously put it, “if this were a golf tournament, every name on the Leader Board would be a London Walks guide.”
And as we put it: London Walks Guides make the new familiar
and the familiar new.
And on that agreeable note…
come then, let us go forward together on some great London Walks.
And that’s by way of saying, Good walking and Good Londoning one and all. See ya next time.