Deal type
Sector
RJD Partners backs management buy-in of Dunham Leisure Limited
HMT Corporate Finance, led by partner Andrew Wall and manager Amish Bakhai, advised an MBI team and RJD Partners on the management buy-in of Dunham Leisure Limited ("Dunham"), a leading holiday park business based in South East Scotland.
The management team is led by Graham Hodgson as Chief Executive, Beverley Dixon as Operations Director and Andrew himself taking a role as Finance Director. Graham and Beverley previously led the private equity backed MBO of South Lakeland Parks (“SLP”) in June 2006, before the business was successfully sold in December 2007, whilst Andrew has been a Partner at HMT since 2008. The MBI has been financed through a combination of investment by management and funds managed by RJD together with banking facilities provided by Yorkshire Bank Corporate & Structured Finance.
Dunham was previously owned by Dennis Dunham, a leisure and property entrepreneur, along with other members of his family. The business comprises two well established parks: Thurston Manor, a 175 acre park situated 30 miles from Edinburgh near the historic coastal town of Dunbar in East Lothian; and Pease Bay, which is situated directly beside a sandy beach, five miles south east of Thurston Manor.
Andrew Wall commented, “We had been working with Graham & Beverley since last year to identify suitable platform for them to build a new group and replicate their success at SLP. HMT initiated the transaction via a direct approach to the Vendors so that our clients we were able to secure the transaction off market, outside a competitive process. HMT subsequently secured funding for the transaction from RJD Partners and Yorkshire Bank, both of whom we were aware had an appetite to support a quality transaction in this sector. Dunham represents the largest transaction to have been completed in the caravan park sector for several years and HMT look forward to working with the management team to complete further acquisitions for the new group.”
Richard Caston, Partner, RJD Partners comments, "Having tracked the sector for some time, RJD is delighted to back Graham Hodgson, Andrew Wall and Bev Dixon as an experienced management team with an impressive track record in this sector. The Dunham parks are well established but nevertheless offer significant development potential and represent an excellent platform for further park acquisition opportunities."
"Despite the challenging economic climate, we believe the holiday park sector will continue to benefit from recent trends such as Staycation as well as the increasing demand for owner-occupied holiday accommodation, thus providing very good opportunities for value creation."