Have you ever been on a caravanning trip, and wondered what it is like to run a holiday park? Do you look at the idyllic surroundings and think: “I’d love to do this”?
Here we speak to Abbie Dudley, Assistant Manager of Office & Facilities at the beautiful Cakes & Ale Holiday Park on the Suffolk coast. She tells us what it is really like running a site. Abbie says …
Running a holiday park is unlike any other job I’ve ever had. It is so many jobs, all rolled into one and tied up with a pretty bow!
Every day is different, and we are lucky enough to have so many returning customers, so it’s nice to have a chat and catch up when they visit.
Keeping up to date and our customers informed
My job has changed dramatically over the past 4 years, to keep up with the ever-evolving habits of UK staycationers.
These days, so much time is spent online – posting on our social media pages to keep our customers up to date and, putting together blog posts on topics of interest for our customers and those searching online for answers to industry-relevant queries.
We put a lot of effort into sharing helpful information – we are quite well educated in the camping and caravanning world, so we like to share what we can. It is a constant challenge to ensure that we keep up with the latest industry news and to relay the interesting points to our customers.
We enjoy knowing all of our potential customers have received the best, impartial and factual information before deciding to purchase a Holiday Home. Well informed customers make for happy customers!
I take it as a compliment if people assume that working here is easy
People tend to think that it must be like being on holiday, or that we must get bored over the winter when the touring field closes. In all honesty, I take it as a compliment if people assume that working here is easy. If they only see enough to think it must be a breeze, then we have done our job well enough to hide all the work and effort it takes to keep this place ticking over!
Cakes and Ale is primarily a family-run business, and we are a relatively small team, but we are all very passionate about what we do. We aim to offer the perfect environment for our guests to relax and unwind in our haven of peace and tranquillity.
Just seeing that we have enabled memories to be made and dreams to come true, that is real job satisfaction and makes all of the behind the scenes work worthwhile.
Cakes and Ale (the name came from the books by William Somerset Maugham and are synonymous with the good life!) is a family and dog-friendly site with holiday homes and an adults-only tourer and camping area. To find out more, visit: https://www.cakesandale.co.uk/ or pop over to the site’s Facebook page here.