Poor Start to the Season

The season for use of caravans started on the 1st March and this year is remarkable for one thing. The site is not fully occupied. You might think that this is a small matter but not when you know the background. I was a caravan owner on the site for 6 years. My van was on pitch no.9 which was the best position for views and also the most elevated part of the site which kept us out of the high water problems experienced by most customers. Those at the rear of the site were most at risk because there was a ditch running around that area which filled up first before inundating the sewage pump system.
In spite of this the site looked so pretty when the sun was shining ,with well kept grass and an abundance of shrubs and flowers, when viewed from the road, and there was a constant stream of potential customers asking for membership. In the 6 years I was involved, and under two park owners there were never any vacancies. If somebody decided to leave their caravan was snapped up very quickly.
So what has made the difference ? There are ,in my opinion, several factors operating which are;
1) The flood. There was a flood at Easter 1998 which wiped out nearly all the caravans. Everyone thought that it was an isolated incident which would not happen again for another 30 years. However July 2007 disproved that idea and every caravan was lost again. Only a few weeks ago the car park was under water again and the current park owner has had to bring a dinghy on site so he can access the park next time it happens.
2) The new owners who took over on 1st August 2006 have introduced a lot of unpopular rules, some of which have seriously detracted from the site's appearance and most of which have served to make the owners themselves very resented. This has made it much less appealing to spend your leisure time there.
3) The cost of insurance which is obviously going to continue to rise due to the floods.
4) The necessity to have flotatation chambers fitted to every caravan stipulated by the insurers. This is ugly and expensive. some owners, who had flotation fitted before the July 2007 floods, found that they worked up to a point but were hindered by gas bottle connections . The gas bottles weigh 47kg each and are not going to float up with the caravan. Most are anchored to the spot by 2 of these. Consequently the caravan is held down on one side and if there is an adjacent balcony it will pierce the thin aluminium skin and it will be beyond repair.
5) There is a longstanding resident on site who has gained the confidence of successive park owners and they have delegated some tasks to her. This has obviously inflated her ego and she has been heard to drop it out in casual conversation with strangers that "she has a caravan site at Binton Bridges". She has been in this "privileged" position for so long that she actually seems to believe that she has authority to tell other residents what to do and she does. She is very jealous of her perceived power and anyone who does not agree with her warped views is immediately targetted as a threat to her. She sets about undermining her rival with whispering campaigns against them with completely unfounded rumours. Because she is so confident and plausible she misleads people by quoting that she is acting on the park owners views and her audience assume she is speaking the truth. One of her favourite tactics is to tell all her "confidants" that if they do not stop talking to the rival then they will be the next to be evicted.
The rival then finds she is isolated and cannot understand why previously friendly neighbours have stopped talking to them. People do not stand up to her because she is so plausible and of course if her threats are taken seriously then there could be a large financial penalty incurred.
At best you are very likely to be the next rival to be attacked. I know as I was targetted mainly, I think, because my wife was very popular on the site and the troublemaker felt overshadowed and in danger of losing her "power". Because she fed the new park owner with various rumours, and the park owner did not know us, he set out to evict us. So because of her unfounded accusations we were put to a lot of worry, (my wife suffered a heart attack in Oct 2006) trouble and expense with solicitors' bills (to the point of issuing an injunction) and eventually lost our caravan and £20,000 insurance money when the site flooded. She is still there and still using the same tactics.
6) A number of people have decided not to renew their membership on the park and have told the park owners that the reason is the way their neighbours were so unfairly evicted. And with the troublemaker mentioned above they do not want to risk the same treatment. They have taken the insurance payment and left breathing a sigh of relief that they have escaped the unpleasant prospect of the same thing happening to them.

The conclusion is that this business seems to be going downhill fast because lack of customers means lack of rent, lack of commission and the bills continue regardless.