Friends of Fineshade
Countrywide Park Homes Ltd
Researching the company
The company behind the application to create a "Holiday Park" at Top Lodge is Countrywide Park Homes Ltd. There are just two directors Anthony and Donna Barney
The company's website says they specialise in Residential and Luxury Lodge Park Homes for Sale. It seems that developing a glamping/camping site to cater for tourists would be a rather different activity for the company.
What do people think on Trustpilot? It's certainly unusual to find a company where 94% of respondents rate them BAD, not poor - but BAD.
Just read some of the comments
A dishonest company who promise great things but always fail to deliver.
And there's more of the same on Glassdoor including some very interesting comments from a former employee: "The worst company you can imagine"
The aerial view below shows part of their country park on the Isle of Wight. All of them have been sold to residents. It is clearly not a "holiday park" in the planning sense.
The Companies House register shows that since the incorporation of the company in 2014 it has had 6 different registered offices. Since October last year their registered office has been in Langley Mill, Nottingham. Previously they were at Wartnaby, Leics. for 1 year, at a Cambridge business park for 1 year, and before that at Yarwell Mill near Peterborough for a year.
The immediate parent company is Baslow Holdings Developments Ltd with the same registered address and directors. Countrywide Park Homes is one of 26 subsidiary or associated companies of Baslow Holdings. These companies are listed below (as at March 2018).
Grove Country Park, Wisbech
This is another of the company's sites described like this
"This unique park comes with the traditional features found in all Countrywide Park Home parks – from a secure gated area to low maintenance homes."
A recent visit to the site in Cambridgeshire provided insights into what Top Lodge could easily look like, were the application to go ahead.
Again, this is very obviously not a site for tourists.
Countrywide Park Homes in the news
Here are some stories which provide further background to the history of Countrywide Park Homes.
Derbyshire live 2017: "Caravan park firm fined £3K for chopping down 121 protected trees
Derbyshire Times 2017: "Caravan owners given 8 days to leave site:
Get Reading 2017: Neighbours fury as Caversham mobile home park turned into 'rubbish tip'.