The Demise Of Pontins Holiday Firm On BBC Breakfast [05.01.2024]

so ponin you remember holiday camps uh used to be a by word for affordable family fund but the business appears to be in trouble because it's closed three of its six remaining sites just in the last few months most recently Southport in mercys side and this has sparked concerns over those remaining Allison Freeman has been taking a look at the firm with a glorious past with an uncertain future hello campers heidy hi the yellow coats of Heidi high were familiar on our screens for years in the 1980s but the blue coats of ponton entertained families for decades in post-war Britain they were a key part of the inspiration for the sitcom set in a British Holiday Camp ponting's popularity revolved around family fun activities for all ages staying in self-catering Chalet in Holiday Villages it was run a sort of you know a fun sort of place and you you know you'd encourage people just to get involved and enjoy themselves you know with we're doing all these activities and we we gained the real pleasure from you know those experiencing and and giving people a really good week you week's holiday you know and it was Testament because the amount of people K Morton said fantastic weight loved it you guys were brilliant and you know it's those sorts of things that just stay with you it cemented its place in popular culture in the 1973 film holiday on the buses which was shot and set at the Press Statin pontins Camp have a happy holiday and it also spawned a series of entertainers who'd dawned the famous blue coat before going on to become household names like Shane Richie Bradley Walsh and Lee Mack the first pontins was created in 1946 by found Fred ponon the business went from strength to strength throughout the 50s 60s and 70s and at its peak there were 30 ponon holiday Parks the business was first sold in 1978 after numerous subsequent sales the competition of cheap foreign holidays became too much and in 2011 it had to be bought out of receivership by Britannia hotels the reputation from its Heyday replaced by one of rundown venues by that time time there were only a handful of camps left in November last year a further two of the remaining six closed praten in North Wales and campas Sans in Sussex then this week just days after a New Year's Eve party was held there it was announced that ponon Southport doors would not be reopening after they'd closed due to flooding in a statement ponon said it had made the announcement with great sadness and it had come to the difficult decision to close its doors after assessing the future viability of the park the company apologized for any inconvenience caused the decision came as a shock to many including business owner Amy Phillips who was due to hold one of her company's family weekend is there in February she believes the effects will be far reaching hearing that Southport ponon is closing has not only affected businesses like mine that but that use places like ponon for EV but it's also affected families because pontins is a bit of an institution really it's always been an alternative sort of budget holiday if you like and at a time where parents are really struggling we're hearing this a lot this year um across our events you know times are tight for families and without places like pontins there's potentially families that won't get a holiday this year pontins was voted the worst Holiday Park provider in the UK in a witch survey last year and with just three sites left it's not clear how much longer this once well-loved name Will Survive Allison Freeman BBC News well if you want to know what it's really like to be inside of ponon if you've never been we can talk to two people who used to work at the Southport ponon you saw in Allison's report Michael Scotland and Annabelle Nicholson Jon good morning you both morning how long ago did you work there uh so it was 2016 we left we there 2013 to 16 so it's four seasons did you enjoy it yeah it best job it was like neither of us went to University so it was like the uni experience I was 18 fresh out of college my first job you know you go and live live on site and it was just it was it was a ball wasn't it what were your jobs so we worked in the we were blue coat so we worked in the entertainments department so I was in the show team so I was doing singing and Michael was more of a you were comp compare and presenting yeah and then doing like lights and sounds as well so it's been a great work experience straight out out of school um fun yeah opportunity for romance yes that's where we met 11 years ago didn't we and we're getting married this year so congratulations thank you very much tell us a bit about for those people that know M ponon what what what was the thing about it that made it so successful and indeed now I don't know what you're hearing from people there now what's going on with these place is closing down what are you hearing I think for us bias I think people Lov it because the entertainment as well to to be honest I mean I have to say that cuz it was me but um I think it was it was familiar for people it was it was nice cheap cheerful you got exactly what you wanted but I think may maybe over time it has just dipped ever so slightly maybe some of the things you're talking about there you'd think would be bang on for now you know people budgets are tight you know what you're getting you're going to have fun you would say in some ways that it's perfect when when you got a cost of living crisis going on but something's not working is it I think when we were there we were kind of there at such a good time weren't we and it was the peak and it was just such a good affordable holiday for families who might not necessarily be able to travel abroad they might not be able to um go to certain places and they kind of come over to pontins slightly distracted there by the snakes yeah I know what was going on there we had that was just a welcome party so we'd have certain things come in so when the guests arrived they had something to do while they W to check in and it would have been different animals so there would have been loads there there was just always something going on when we were there so you thought it would be good to welcome people with snakes I mean I like snakes but no yeah no I don't really like snakes but you know you have to we a smile we had Safari Sam and s s and he was a snake we did yeah obviously the Safari Sam who's the crop crew he hates the Croc crew yeah Captain Croc's the leader of the Croc crew yeah there are a lot of very famous entertainers who came out and aren there have you got a list for us of of people one of them was le le if you look at the stage if you looked up it was still there where he painted his name in Black he hadn't painted over it so he could still see it at the back of the stage and shame Richie as well and Bradley Wan system as well was it I mean I know you had a lot of fun it sounds like you had a lot of fun but was it tough as well because you have to entertaining people is not easy no yeah and you've got to be from kind of if your shift start 8:00 in the morning even if you just walking around Park you have to have a smile on your face you know you know you are ponon so you have to keep a smile on your face and then as soon as you finish at 11:00 maybe at night you've got to keep that up so it I think that's in the end why we decided to kind of hang up our blue coat cuz as much as we loved it it's a lifestyle and we had to we didn't see you know there's times where we weren't seen our family and we had one day off and it might be a Monday and nobody else is off on a Monday everyone's off at a weekend so that's why we kind of gave up and went into the 9 must when you finished and what you do now you're you just don't do that line of work anymore no no but you did you feel like you were kind of smiled out just I mean that smiling all the time like that that's hard well for some people it's hard Charlie yeah sometimes it comes naturally to some people and no yeah but I feel like in my I work in recruitment now so I feel like it's transferable skills that you can keep a smile on your face and the confidence and being able to speak to anyone and do because I think you know if I can't do anything I just think oh well I've stood on stage and made a fall out of myself on a daily basis so I can do anything now you just sing yeah just start doing a routine which we do when when weing tea at night that's what we do really that's what our household relive the ponon expence we just put music on and it's Just Dance not even lying good luck with the wedding oh thank so much oh thank you very much lovely to meet you Bo