Site Occupancy

It's like any holiday your booking the demand is high at weekends and school holidays when working people want to get away and demand is low during mid week when working people can't get  away it will always be the same supply and demand we can't blame the club for that first come first served

Fortunately most of my bookings are midweek - except for long holidays.  I booked them last month and have only booked serviced pitches.  I didn't get all the sites I wanted, but managed 'work-arounds' - e.g. the dates I wanted at Exmoor House were taken so I booked Exbridge Lakeside, just down the road instead.  Hunters Moon was also booked for our dates, so booked Bingham Grange instead.

David

Reading last month's magazine the Club has been doing this over Winter with additional pitches at River Breamish and Barnard Castle. Thinking of sites we have visited there have been site extensions at Southport, Seacroft and Bridlington and additional pitches at Burrs and the New Forest. I am sure there are more. Planning permissions for new sites are difficult but extensions often easier because the locals realise the benefits brought to the locality by members.

"Hunters Moon was also booked for our dates, so booked Bingham Grange instead."

be interested to know how you get on at BG, DSB, we used on a few occasions before the club bought it, and really liked it, it was certainly not what one would expect of a club site and i dont believe the club have gotten round to do any refurbishment, hence some very poor reviews from members, and i believe the previous owners crammed in some more pitches before selling. It used to have a really good on site restuarant but i believe that is no more, but good luck hope you enjoy it. 

as for site occupancy and the booking system, I think this year now is exceptional , and possibly 2022 will be the same, and it is ok saying book early, if you are able to do this, but my SIL e.g. is not given her holiday dates until Feb/Mar so no chance of beating the rush, as i said previously, it would be good if there was some way of checking on just how many bookings are cxld and giving how much notice would be another key measurable, just maybe if you had some key measurables maybe somebody could write some software whereby you could go in a queue for a pitch at a certain site and be given 1st preference for a pitch if you were top of the queue when somebody cxld, system could send you an alert and give you a period of time to take up the offer, before moving down the queue or am i living in a dream world

I've no idea of the other sites, but the extensions at Southport & Burrs were done years ago. (and Southport especially still has little greenery on the extended bit.)

It will be interesting whether the rush for sites when they expect to open i 0n 12th April will remain? as at this point in time i understand? that all community facility blocks will be closed as per the ccc until mid May? which is how i read HMGs road out of lockdown,and is mentioned on our clubs website.

Rtfs wrote ' maybe somebody could write some software whereby you could go in a queue for a pitch at a certain site and be given 1st preference for a pitch if you were top of the queue when somebody cxld'

That would only work if people waited around on the off chance. Reality is that they will have moved on. Could involve a lot of work for nowt.

It can be frustrating when you are trying to book but some dates you want are not available.

The trick in my experience is patience. Keep checking and more often than not cancellations or further pitches being released means that the site magically becomes available for the dates you want.

It can get a bit stressful as the clock ticks round to the 72 hour latest cancellation period however.  At that point it's best to have thought of a backup plan!

I agrre that the Southport extension was completed some years ago, but that at Burrs is much more recent.

 Your comments don't alter the fact that, in answer to the original post, the Club has been extending sites and adding pitches to existing sites for some time and continues to do so. This seems to me to be a good use of members' money!

We have found as our holiday type has become more popular and even more so since staycations ,even more popular with people realising the UK (although small in comparison to "over there") has much to offer,

Sites that in the past could be booked at short notice are now getting busy at peak times ,but we still find that if a site is showing full especially at weekend when a longer stay is wanted it a call to the site concernered has except on very few occasions been positive