Fair. Independent. Transparent.
Our Approach to Judging
The credibility and integrity of the Holiday Park Awards are incredibly important to us. That's why we've designed a judging process that is independent, transparent and focused on recognising genuine excellence across the industry.
Entries will be reviewed by an independent panel of judges selected for their expertise and experience.
While some judges will have knowledge of the holiday park sector, we're also bringing in specialists from outside the industry. Areas such as accessibility, guest experience, hospitality, marketing, business growth, sustainability, customer service and leadership all play an important role in creating exceptional holiday park experiences.
By combining different perspectives, we can ensure entries are judged fairly and against recognised standards of excellence, rather than simply industry familiarity.
Your Holiday Park Award Judges
Rob Parkinson
Peter Watkins
Rob Parkinson is Chief Executive of the Family Holiday Charity, which enables families facing some of life’s most difficult challenges to enjoy time away together, creating precious memories and renewed hope for the future. Throughout his career, Rob has championed social change through leadership roles across the beyond-profit sector, including as Chief Executive of Home-Start UK, Action Homeless, LOROS Hospice and Warwick Students’ Union, and as Director for England at the National Deaf Children’s Society.
A passionate advocate for strong governance and organisational impact, Rob has also served as a trustee and chair of several charities and social enterprises. He is currently a trustee of Cats Protection and brings extensive experience of leadership, strategy, and social impact to his role as a judge for the Holiday Parks Awards.
Ali Carmichael
Peter is an experienced hospitality leader with more than two decades of management experience, having progressed into his first management role at 20 and General Manager by 30.
Throughout his career, Peter has built a reputation for combining strong commercial performance with a genuine focus on people, service and guest experience.
Peter is a hands-on leader who believes that exceptional hospitality starts with engaged teams and a clear focus on the guest. His experience spans hotel operations, food and beverage, commercial strategy, team development, guest experience and business transformation.
His approach is simple: look after your people, look after your guests, and the business will follow.
Jo Butler MTMI
Jo Butler MTMI is an experienced tourism professional and Director of Jo Butler Consulting. She is General Manager of Visit South Devon and leads Meet Plymouth, working with tourism and hospitality businesses across the region to strengthen destinations, develop visitor experiences and grow leisure and business tourism.
Her expertise spans destination marketing, partnership working, conferences and events, group travel and travel-trade development. As a Member of the Tourism Management Institute, Jo brings valuable insight into what creates an outstanding visitor experience and enables tourism businesses and destinations to thrive.
Ali Carmichael is the founder of Experience UX, a consultancy specialising in helping businesses understand their digital services from a customer perspective. He has worked with holiday parks and leisure businesses to uncover the gap between how organisations see their own websites and how customers actually experience them - and what to do about it.
Ali recently spoke at the Holidaymaker XP event on why the digital customer journey so often fails to match the physical experience holiday parks promise - and what to do about it.