Park Resorts

The Opportunity

When Bourne Leisure acquired Rank Holiday Division in 2000, it became the owner of several major UK holiday locations, including three Butlins camps and a number of Haven caravan parks. One year later, Bourne decided to rationalise its portfolio and dispose of 12 medium sized Haven parks which were located around the UK coastline.

Working closely in partnership with a management team led by David Vaughan, we saw an opportunity to buy these parks as the foundation for a brand new business. Our collective vision was to become a leading operator of medium sized caravan parks in the UK, under the Park Resorts brand.

The Strategy

Following the purchase and fully supported by our team, Park Resorts carried out a major redevelopment of all 12 caravan parks, investing £20m into new and improved facilities that would appeal to a wide market. We also implemented a new head office infrastructure and introduced more rigorous governance and reporting processes.

The business later acquired four additional parks, taking its total estate to 16 locations at the time of our realisation.

The Result

Park Resorts was sold to ABN Amro Private Equity in December 2004 for a total consideration of £165m. The transaction saw Park Resorts combined with GB Holiday Parks, owned by ABN Amro, to create the UK’s second largest caravan park group with 35 parks retaining the name Park Resorts.

We realised 6.8x return on our capital investment through the sale and elected to retain a residual investment in the enlarged group, and this has achieved a further 2.0x return. In 2007, we fully realised our investment via a £440m sale to GI Partners. In total, we generated a return of 8.8x capital from our investment in Park Resorts.