Last night, Anglian Country Inns celebrated being one of the happiest places to work in the UK as they were named in the top 25 businesses in CODE Hospitality’s Happiest Place to Work 2026 awards.
Out of over 500 hospitality businesses, ACI made the top 25 after a rigorous judging panel and feedback from the teams across the business.
The CODE Hospitality awards, operated by the owners of The Good Food Guide, were announced last night at Belgravia's 'Wild By Tart'. They recognise the hospitality businesses that are the most people focused and progressive, creating excellent working environments for employees including comprehensive training, strong staff motivation and benefits, and a clear and meaningful career path for their employees.
The judges were impressed by its strong internal communications, its own recognition schemes, including Happy Cheques for staff and MAD awards to celebrate success. Judges said, "The business clearly takes a hands-on, people-centred approach that recognises different employees value, different forms of support, backed by a wide range of benefits and wellbeing initiatives."
This recognition for Anglian Country Inns comes off the back of winning Best Employer at the Publican Awards in 2025 and being in Code's list of 25 happiest companies last year too.
Will Chew, Head of People and Culture, Anglian Country Inns said: “Our company goal is literally to ‘make people happy’, so it’s great to have the internal focus of that goal recognised and our culture endorsed by a third party in this way.”
James Nye, Managing Director, Anglian Country Inns said: “Happiness is so integral to running a successful business, if your team are happy, then it’s much more likely your customers will be happy too. For ACI to sit amidst the best in hospitality is testament to how hard, everyone in the ACI family works.”
Howard Nye, Operations Director, Anglian Country Inns said: “As a people business, this award is really special for us, the ultimate accolade that we are doing right by our people as well as our customers.”
