If you run your own Irish B&B business you will have noticed that your guests are asking more often for more than a bed at night and a meal in the morning. Travellers want to stay in touch with their home country by following the news from abroad and they want to communicate with their friends and colleagues while being away for many days or even weeks.
That's why they expect appropriate television channels (not only internet access) when looking for accommodation and for an internet connection to get business information or drop a holiday report for their family. So it will quickly pay off for you investing in some small technology to provide some more television choises and broadband internet services.
Right now is the time of year to re-organise your house and install some antenne equipment or to prepare an internet connection point. Have everything ready when your business season begins - we tell you how:

Getting foreign TV:

It is possible to receive a number of tv channels from most European countries for no
more cost than a initial installation. If you have a B&B house with more than 4 rooms it
may be an advantage to feed a few selected channels into your antenna cable network.
You can keep your existing local channels and add four digital stations.
If you have 1 to 4 guest rooms it might be more effective to put new cables to each room
and install a set top box (STB) for each tv set. The advantage is that you can provide
dozens of channels to each room. The disadvantage is that you will keep an eye on your
equipment, so that nothing gets lost when your guests leave. In both situations you can
provide cost free channels from France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Poland or even
North Africa.

What's the costs?

The examples above will cost around 500€ for the version feeding 4 channels into the existing
cable network of your house. The version with 4 STBs for four rooms is at 600€. To these
equipment costs the installation must be added. Depending on the conditions of the house,
cable length and numbers of holes that must be drilled, you must add 200€ for installing
the 4-channels setup. The 4-STB version will need more cable and holes so that it costs
around additional 400€.