Sean Harper of Just For Fun Holiday Club is gearing up for an exciting June!

It’s June already and we’re half way through the year – it’s also officially the first month of Summer, even if the weather has been a bit mixed!

Up today is Sean Harper, from the Just for Fun Holiday Club. Based in Swindon, the Just for Fun Holiday Club provides affordable childcare for children during the school holidays between the ages of 4-13 years. With a huge range of activities to participate in, the children never have an opportunity to get bored.

JUNE is the first month of Summer – what will you be doing this summer in your organisation? 
This summer will see us enter our 7th as a holiday club provider. This one we hope will be our biggest and best yet. We have 4 venues open across Swindon with a first for us on the 9th August. We are running at 1 venue only an inflatables day, curtesy of Josh Grant at Bounce Squad who is providing us with the biggest and best castles around. We have a range of inflatables including castles, 75ft combat run, mega slide, sumo suits, target wall, indoor disco, penalty shootout and more. 

We will have on average 300 children per day and now having secured our third Met during our latest OFSTED inspection we are excited to welcome lots of new ones to one of our venues. 

What are your personal plans for Summer activities if you feel happy to share? 
Personally, for me this summer my aim is to try and get the balance between working and spending time with the family. I have just been away with the family, and this was the first time I have been away in the school holidays for about 15 years. The quality time I spent with them was very much needed and made me realise that I shouldn’t be compromising this and missing them grow. The business ran smoothly and so this summer I need to continue the balance. I need to try and be present in the moment and switch off whilst we are doing activities. This is still something I’m trying to master.  

Does June hold any particular significance for you or your organisation?
June is a special month for Just for Fun Holiday Club. This is when we were founded and the dream to work for ourselves started. The aim was to earn enough money to pay for a family holiday each year. Started with such a small aim/goal. We grafted to promote all over Swindon and had a lot of support from friends who booked on, shared posts, gave feedback, built websites, found venues. It was the start of the journey. 

Now going into year 7 we have over 70 staff who are committed to us during the holidays, 4 venues, a good reputation in the town, a huge provider of the HAF programme and myself being able to go full time from September last year. 

It's been a slow journey but one that I have loved and have learnt so much during my time as an entrepreneur.

June is often associated in nature with growth and abundance – what are your plans for growth in your organisation this year? 
The business is getting bigger, and we have now created an assistant manager role to sit just under and support the managers during the holidays. We have 8 fantastic managers who help us deliver each amazing day across all the venues and at some points during the day we have pinch points. Our aim is that the assistant manager can support during these times to ensure the smooth running of the day continues. 

For me personally I will have finished my Mental Health course that I started at the start of the year. This new knowledge will help me support the young children who attend and can help upskill our coaches and ways in which they can support the children within their group. 

As we hit this mid point of 2024– which one business has really supported or helped you over the last quarter? 
A business that has really helped us this last quarter is GMT creative services. Gary and his team have been on hand to create posts, reels and  videos to showcase our new website and push for all our places to be filled during the holidays. He has done this with interviews of both management, staff and the children on camp. He’s great and so easy to work with. No idea is too crazy, and he’s gone above and beyond to help us get everything right. He creates all of our content, and this is always of the best quality. I couldn’t recommend him enough. 

Have you got any events planned for the coming months which you’d like to mention – where you and/or your business will take a leading role? 
I would like to mention again our inflatables day. August 9th at Grange Juniors. 8.00 – 5.30. Lots of booking options available for the day. Prices start from £19. With Kids About no longer open, this will leave a gap for the sort of weeks that Alistair and the team would put on over the summer holidays. Although this isn’t anywhere near the level that they would deliver we are really looking forward to it. 

June 30 is Social Media Day – what does social media mean to you and your business? What are your favourite social media platforms?
Social media is our main way of connecting with our community. It allows us to get a message out quickly with the power of sharing posts to spread it to a wider audience. We use facebook and Instagram mainly. 

We are looking at TikTok but must be cautious with the age limits of users etc. Are we sending out the right message if we set this up when the age of use is 13+ and our children attending will all be under that. This would however directly get us to our audience as many children have this app rightly or wrongly. 

Anything else you’d like to say?
I’m going to finish with this quote from Greg Behrendt

‘I’ve learned that anything in life worth having comes from patience and hard work’

To learn more about Sean Harper and the Just for Fun Holiday Club visit https://justforfunholidayclub.co.uk/