Rabbie's burns trail to Ireland to meet growing demand

In its first venture outside Scotland, the Edinburgh-based firm this year will offer five-day excursions from Dublin.

Robin Worsnop, the firm's managing director, also plans to offer tours in the north of England and London in 2012.

The firm will invest 1.5 million over the next three years on new buses and recruiting staff. This year the firm will buy eight coaches and hire 12 drivers, and Worsnop says he plans to hire 40 drivers over the next three years in total.

The mini-coach tour operator, which limits trips to a maximum of 16 people, said that it had had a "strong" year .

Worsnop estimates that despite a grim December due to the weather, the firm drove more than 35,000 tourists to various destinations around Scotland in 2010.

He said demand from the firm's loyal customers who want to see other destinations is driving the expansion.

"We have been growing our business organically in Scotland and it is going very well but our customers are asking us to take them elsewhere," said Worsnop.

"They try to find our type of product in other countries and they aren't finding it so they are asking us to do it."

Worsnop said the weakness of the pound relative to other currencies was proving attractive to international visitors for summer 2011, particularly from North America and Australia.

He also credited the social networking capabilities on the firm's website for helping the business succeed.

He said: "Our traveller's forum on the website has people uploading photographs and feedback. The advent of social media has allowed our reputation to grow faster and word of mouth to drive business."

Worsnop set the business up in 1993 with a 6,000 loan from his brother to buy a mini-coach after graduating with an MA in history from the University of Edinburgh. In 2009 the award-winning firm had a turnover of 2.5m.