FEC Profile
Down with the kids
Winner of ‘Best Attraction over 12,000 square feet’ at last year’s BALPPA FEC awards, Hobbledown outdoor activity park and zoo is from the team behind the successful Kidspace FEC chain. Ronnie Dungan spoke to marketing manager, Katherine Newton to find out exactly where Hobbledown fits into the market….
Upon becoming fathers, the pair realised there was a major shortage of quality places to take their children that were both fun for the children, and, just as importantly, well- designed for the adults. The Kidspace concept was born following extensive
H Zorbing
research across Europe and America, and once the business model proved successful, there were always plans in the pipeline for expansion. This time they decided to turn their attention to an outdoor
attraction (so they could cover the summer market as well as winter) and bought themselves a rundown farm. Hobbledown is a completely unique concept, in that it is based on a storybook of the same name. All the facilities in the park replicate the storybook, from the various villages around the site to the special names given to the animals. They commissioned author Angela Kecojevik, with whom
they worked closely to come up with a story to fit the theme and their vision for the project, which was created at a cost of £4m.
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obbledown was created by lifelong friends Nick de Candole and Richard Farley, the brainchild team behind the award-winning Kidspace Adventures.
The park is somewhere between a farm attraction, FEC and a zoo, founder Richard Farley, explains. “Hobbledown actually has it its own Zoo Licence. Although we retain a lot of the traditional farm animals such as pigs, goats etc, we also have a lot of exotic animals like camels, wallabies, meerkats, otters, raccoon dogs, reptiles and much more. A huge draw is also the adventure play we have such as our high ropes course and underground tunnels. He continued: “Our equipment has been designed to be
quirky, challenging and above all fun and the whole ethos when creating Hobbledown was to find the type of play equipment that is not available in a public park. Hobbledown’s owners created their vision with the Dobson Report in mind which encourages children to take more risks in a safe environment, allowing children to develop much needed skill sets.” The park’s target audience can be families with toddlers or
families with older kids up to the age of 13, which is older than the typical farm attraction crowd. “We target an older audience, because of the adventure play element,” explains Farley. “The age group has sustained
JUNE 2018
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