Chestnutt Holiday Parks

Geoff Chestnutt is Director of the family owned and run, Chestnutt Holiday Parks in a beautiful corner of Northern Ireland at the foot of the Mourne Mountain range…

Chestnutt Holiday Parks operate four parks, which have been in the family since 1968 in what started as a small site close to the beach when Geoff’s grandfather had the opportunity to buy back land vested from him during the second world war. The first park had no running water, no sewer, no infrastructure, and just small touring vans, and the business has grown from there with the family purchasing more parks close to the original site.

Involved in the family business from a young age when he used to walk around the park picking up litter, Geoff returned to Northern Ireland after university to work in different roles within the business. He is now Director of a dynamic team along with his brother, and other family are also involved in the business.

For Geoff, that personal, family touch is what makes holiday parks the special places people return to, through the generations, year after year, so he was initially reluctant to change too much when it came to digitising the business.

“It’s a wholesome, family environment. Customers still come back time and time again, first with their children and now with their grandkids and it’s great to see. So, at the back of my mind, I was concerned we would lose some of the personal touch by introducing more technology to fully digitise our holiday park operation. Even though we’ve grown over the years, we’ve still tried to keep the personal touch as that’s a differentiator. However, because of the size of the business and what’s required now, it’s essential to modernise. We can no longer do things by paper. It just doesn’t work. Things get lost, you need to run at a much more efficient level, and people’s expectations are higher than ever so we can’t be let down by our software systems. We needed a one-stop shop to be able to coordinate the management side of the business as well as connecting more with our customers.”

Searching for a new IT business solution…

Knowing they needed to take a step up from Chestnutt’s current hybrid system, Geoff started to keep an eye on other packages and holiday park software providers at trade shows, in holiday park industry trade magazines, and online.

“We were looking for the next step that would give us a software system that was more comprehensive in its look and feel,” said Geoff. “A system to support the customer journey, capture details and processes, and look after our customers’ in a meaningful and productive way. With Elite solutions being built on the Microsoft Dynamics 365 platform, this gave the added assurance that they were the right provider for us.”

But obviously it was important to Geoff that the impact on their customers whilst they switched from their existing holiday park management provider to Elite Dynamics was minimal.

“It was a big commitment, so you have to set time aside in addition to your day-to-day job,” said Geoff. “At the end of the day, the customer isn’t interested in what you’re going through regarding processes or implementing a new system. They just want to know that their holiday is going to be good, and their caravan is going to be looked after. Our job is to keep our customers happy.”

Facing multiple challenges

So how did Geoff and his team approach the task of implementing a new business solution while navigating their way through Covid plus the challenges brought about by Brexit in Northern Ireland?

“Well let’s just not mention Brexit,” he says. “That has been a nightmare! In some ways during Covid was the best time to replace the software, but then actually in other ways, it wasn’t as we had to get used to new management systems as well as new health and safety processes and procedures, and everything else going on with Covid. By human nature, no one likes change and everyone gets comfortable in their own systems and ways of doing things, so it was key to bring the whole staff with us and they soon grasped it with familiarity and using the system regularly. It’s a big system. It does a lot, so we just tried to take it in manageable steps. I’d recommend anyone to take a step back and keep the learning in sizeable bites because you could soon get swamped if you look at the system as a whole. The easiest analogy I gave people was to think of it as building a house. We had the foundations laid, we just needed to focus on the things that needed to be sorted first and build on those.”

Significant business growth

Chestnutt Holiday Parks have grown over the years from one original park to operating four parks along the Mourne Coast. The majority of their holiday homes are owner occupied with some owners travelling as little as a few miles to the parks to those a couple of hours’ drive away. The recent addition of the Carlingford Lough Ferry, operating from the nearby harbour, has also cut journey times as well as opening new routes across to the dramatic Cooley Peninsula in the Irish Republic. As the business grows, this is where Geoff believes Elite Dynamics will come into its own as it streamlines, improves, and grows with the business.

“Caravan holidays tick a lot of boxes, particularly in the current climate”, says Geoff. “You can get out into the natural environment, which is great for mental health and physical wellbeing but you’re also socially distanced, self-contained, and in a safe environment where you’re not a million miles away from home if something did crop up. It gives you peace of mind. You have your own base, your own bolthole, your own happy place. When people turn the corner and see the mountains and the sea, it means it’s time to switch off from everything else and have memorable times with the family. It’s a decompressant.

“More people are starting to see the value in owning their own caravan holiday home. Moneywise, lifestyle, location – leisure time is so important that they want to enjoy and make the most of every minute. I really don’t see how we could operate like we do today without the software. It’s an integral part of running a successful business. It’s not always an easy decision to take but it’s like anything that’s worthwhile doing, the benefits outweigh any time or effort, and we continue to be excited by the possibilities of what we can do, especially with our customer journey and how we can be more adaptable and communicate with them. It just makes it that much more of a streamlined and professional operation.”

Going live within the midst of the pandemic…

Chestnutt Holiday Parks went live with EliteParks in 2020 at the height of the Covid pandemic so Geoff feels they are still at the start of their journey but can see a great deal of potential. They had thought about switching park management provider for a while when they realised things just weren’t working for them.

“It had served our purposes, but we got to the stage where we knew there was just too much time being taken on certain processes,” said Geoff. “Direct debits for example were taking a long time to reconcile and there wasn’t the confidence in some of the data we were pulling out, so we had to then take more time to double check it. Time efficiency is a big big thing as is having the reassurance that it’s all correct.

“There’s a lot of work getting used to new systems but so far the software requests have been undertaken and we’ve been able to re-evaluate how we do things. It’s also flexible in the sense we can keep some of our old processes as we know they work for us as well as doing other things better with the new system. The support from the Elite team has been good. They are knowledgeable and helpful when we’ve gone back to them, which has been encouraging as we’re depending on their expertise if we hit something we don’t know how to work around. They’re an extension of our team.”

Improved customer communication

So, what about Chestnutt’s owners and customers? Now that the new software system is in place, is Geoff still worried about losing the all-important personal touch?

“We’re actually really excited about the new ways the software will help us communicate and inform our customers. We were worried about being able to keep the personal touch, but we think the software’s going to be integral in making it even more personal. We’re introducing an owner’s app, which will give us a certain amount of ownership to keep them informed but also for them to be able to keep in touch with us too. It’s very much a two-way street. We’re expecting to see a positive take up of the app as we have a lot of young families so it’s another avenue to engage with them. With the help and support of Elite Dynamics, we’re enhancing our customer journey and looking after our customers in a meaningful and productive way.”

https://www.chestnuttholidayparks.com/