New Plymouth holiday park operator wins Emerging Star Award

Peter Crawford of New Plymouth’s Fitzroy Beach Holiday Park has been awarded the 2018 Holiday Parks ePay Emerging Star Award for holiday park professionals under the age of 35.

Crawford was chosen for his strong focus on business marketing and environmental advocacy, combined with a personal emphasis on the concept of whanaungatanga, meaning relationships and family connections.

After completing a business degree in enterprise development and marketing, and owning a few small, part-time tourism businesses, he took over the Fitzroy Beach Holiday Park as a family business in 2013. Under his management, the park has increased its yearly visitor revenue by over 30% for each of the past four years. This growth can be directly attributed to Peter’s skills in both online and traditional marketing methods, and the spirit and work ethic of his family leading the team they work with.

Crawford recently introduced a new international payments currency system which is already adding revenue, and is currently implementing a pricing model designed from insights of hotel software.

Crawford was elected to the Holiday Parks New Zealand board in 2017, and regularly meets with local body councillors and members to help others in the sector. He has overseen a number of community initiatives and environmental management programmes, which have led to the holiday park being granted significant funding to extend its pest eradication programme into the community.

The Fitzroy Beach Holiday Park received the ServiceIQ Visitor Experience Award in 2017, after assisting four staff through the New Zealand Certificate in Tourism (Visitor Experience).

Holiday Parks New Zealand Chief Executive, Fergus Brown calls Crawford a very worthy recipient of this award, advising “he has demonstrated a highly professional business approach to the operation and marketing of Fitzroy Beach Holiday Park and other parts of their business.

“We are increasingly seeing young business people buying into the holiday park sector and like Peter, they bring a new dynamic business approach.”

New Plymouth District Mayor Neil Holdom congratulated Crawford on winning the national accolade, adding “holiday parks are an important economic contributor and it’s great to see more tourists discovering just how amazing the lifestyle capital of New Plymouth is.

“Peter deserves this award for the way he is proactively working with the community, including his efforts to get rid of pests as we strive for Zero Waste 2040 and Predator Free 2050.”

This is the second year the Holiday Parks’ Emerging Star Award has been presented. It recognises a holiday park professional who could be in an ownership, management, office or park operation role. Entrants must be under the age of 35 as at 1st January 2018.

The Award is being run in partnership with ePay Gift Station, New Zealand’s largest virtual retail channel selling pre-paid products through thousands of retail outlets.

Image: Peter Crawford, courtesy of Tourism Industry Aotearoa.

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