In-room entertainment: conquering the resort and holiday park market

 

Have you ever been sat in your house, trapped inside by a ferocious rain, and found yourself bored to death? If the answer is yes, you probably can imagine the tragedy of experiencing that feeling when you are on holidays that you waited for for the better part of the year and having to spend it indoors instead of on a bike or in the pool. This is the scenario that prompts resorts and holiday park owners to find ways to keep their guests happy even when they’re trapped inside by the english weather.

 

The worst nightmare for every holiday accommodation provider is the guests leaving their premises dissatisfied. And what is more disappointing than not being able to enjoy your time off to the fullest? That’s why finding the right equipment and games for the lodges and luxury cabins is so important to holiday parks and resorts.

Well chosen in-room entertainment can also encourage the younger generations to visit the holiday park. Whether it's a group of friends from university or a young couple looking for a weekend together, they will want to bond and enjoy their own company as much (if not more) as going to the pool or visiting nearby attractions. Games and other indoor activities allow young people to have fun together during evenings at the resort while bonding with each other.

The great thing about distributing your products to holiday parks and resorts when you’re a provider of in-room entertainment options is that they can be installed inside the lodges as well as in general game rooms on the premises. Almost one in three holiday parks have a game room and one in four has some other kind of entertainment venue.

 

 

Audio visual entertainment

The most obvious in-room entertainment option is of course TV, although it is usually associated with hotel rooms, those TV systems can be just as effectively applied to holiday parks and resorts. Naturally the simplest option for the operators is to put television screens in their lodges and let the guest watch satellite or cable TV, but there might be better ways to do it. 

With the rise of Netflix and Amazon Prime customers have become accustomed to streaming services and expect to be able to choose the movies they wanna watch. Unfortunately Netflix is not licensed for commercial use, therefore it is illegal to install it in hotels, holiday parks and resorts. The most popular way to satisfy this need for choice by far is the screen cast systems, which allows the user to display what is on their phone, tablet or laptop onto the tv. However there are also Netflix-like services available for commercial use, that are gaining popularity in the industry.

The convenience of choosing your own movies to watch is undoubtedly an innovation in the world of in-room entertainment, however the experience can be improved further by changing the very equipment movies are watched on. Flat screen TV is pretty much a given in hotels these days, but timber lodges and caravans usually have more space to experiment with. More room allows for a bigger TV screen or even a projector which can completely change an evening from a dull gathering to a real cinematic experience. If you are an audio visual systems company this is where you can gain a lot of customers in this industry.

The utility of TVs and projectors for holiday parks doesn’t end there. Many younger customers bring their consoles such as Xbox and Playstation with them, so it could be of interest to the resort operators to actually install consoles in their accommodation units themselves, like some hotels already have!

 

 

Non-digital entertainment

But console games are not the only games that keep people entertained in the world. Pool tables are one of the most popular ways for holiday park operators to entertain young guests, corporate visitors and families. Placing pool tables in lodges is particularly popular among holiday parks operated by the big names such as Centre Parcs, Bourne Leisure or Parkdean Resorts, but also game rooms in independent sites are also populated by them. 

Just like pool tables, table football and table tennis can be a great way to impress the guests’ whether by placing it directly in the lodge or in an entertainment venue. 

But there are more social games that can be installed both in-room and in holiday parks . Another great example of such activities are darts, because a dartboard can be installed anywhere and it doesn’t require a large amount of space to play. The relatively cheap cost of dart boards can be the decisive factor for the operators in choosing which games to install in their lodges.

Board games are another cost effective way to entertain the guests and although many companies in the games sector don’t see it this way - holiday parks are great places to sell their products to in bulk. Most board game distributors are focused on individuals, however selling them to the right businesses can provide a decent profit with larger orders supplementing the cash flow.

The UK has seen a massive rise in popularity of board game related hospitality businesses and although holiday parks have been participating in the trend for quite a while now, they don’t seem to get a lot of recognition as customers in the industry.

 

 

Whether you are in the business of in-room TV systems, digital entertainment or physical indoor games and activities, one thing is for sure: there is a large market of leisure and hospitality operators that need your services and products. We are looking for companies from this sector to satisfy the growth in demand we’ve seen in the sector and to exhibit at the Holiday Park & Resort Innovation Show. You can exhibit your products in front of 18,000 owners and operators of holiday parks, resorts and caravan parks.

 

If you can provide relevant in-room entertainment solutions email us at patryk.kielsa@prysmgroup.co.uk and let’s discuss your potential involvement!