Rushcliffe Borough Council awarded the contract for the management of five of the Council’s leisure centres to Parkwood Leisure in August 2007. In 2011, due to the good value being delivered by Parkwood Leisure and a strong performance with regards to KPIs, the contract was converted to a NPDO and extended by 5 years to 2022.

Parkwood Leisure worked in partnership to manage the closure of the old Rushcliffe Leisure Centre, transitioning the customers, staff and programmes as part of the opening of the new Rushcliffe Arena site in January 2017. The contract between Parkwood Leisure and Rushcliffe Borough Council was extended until July 2025.

Contract highlights:
Increasing active participation - in 2007, the contract welcomed 1,137,798 active visits across its five leisure centres. In 2018, visits reached 1,231,845 across four sites; an increase of nearly 100,000 active visits per year.

Boosting revenue opportunities - in 2019, new sensory lighting equipment was installed in the learner pool at Keyworth Leisure Centre to support users with special needs. Since the install, swim 'pay and play' income has increased by 25%, party hire income by 663% and swimming lessons by 10%.

Maximising partnerships to improve community engagement - Supported by Parkwood Leisure, Rushcliffe Borough Council has worked in partnership with a number of sports organisations and associations to help engage its sites' visitors. These include Swim England, Nottingham Rugby, Nottinghamshire FA and Nottinghamshire Cricket Club. Edwalton Golf Centre, also managed by Parkwood, has also previously held taster sessions in partnership with a local dementia charity.

Future investment - Parkwood Leisure are supporting the council with the development of the new Bingham Leisure Centre, due to open in 2022.

Parkwood Leisure commenced the contract to manage Torbay Leisure Centre on 1st December 2017 for 12 years.

As part of the bid, Parkwood identified £1.7m of investment to improve the facility; working in partnership with the Council who funded the capital improvements, significant upgrades were made to the site which included more than doubling the size of the gym, refurbished squash courts and upgraded changing rooms, as well as the installation of an outdoor artificial pitch.

The facility is a large wet/dry site and also includes a 25m pool and training pool, 8-court sports hall with event seating, café and soft play, plus a British Cycling funded 1.5km outdoor closed road cycling circuit.

There is a lease and management agreement in place between Torbay Council and Parkwood Leisure, who manages the contract via a subcontracting arrangement with Lex Leisure. Lex Leisure Ltd is a Community Investment Company, with charitable objectives to deliver activities which benefit the community. This arrangement provides the Council with confidence that the partnership is financially sustainable as it is underpinned by the extensive experience and commercial expertise of Parkwood Leisure, coupled with a local, bespoke community focus through Lex Leisure.

Contract highlights:

More children learning to swim - The conversion of the main pool and introduction of the learner pool has increased the capacity of the Centre's swimming lesson programme to 600 (Oct 2019) - this is an increase of 100 children each week.

Increased participation and customer satisfaction - Following the investment, customer satisfaction grew from 63% in September 2018 to 90% in September 2019. Active memberships also increased by 400+ new customers per week.

Extension of the partnership - Parkwood Leisure has secured a 25-year agreement with the Riviera International Conference Centre (RICC) in Torquay, South Devon. The new contract will start on 01 April 2021 and will see £1.4m investment into site improvements including a full gym refurbishment, high and low ropes adventure course and new reception area, as well as structural upgrades to the building.

Parkwood Leisure, one of the UK’s leading leisure operators, has reached the milestone of teaching 100,000 children to swim through its Learn To Swim Programme.

Based on the seven-stage national teaching syllabus devised by Swim England, Parkwood Leisure’s Learn To Swim Programme also incorporates dedicated safety outcomes endorsed by the Royal Life Saving Society (RLSS).

The programme aims to teach children to swim ‘Safer, Smarter, and Stronger’, with sites also encouraged to tailor their programming to educate children on specific local dangers and hazards. Parkwood Leisure operates 45 swimming pools across England and Wales.

With pools closed for extended periods as a result of COVID-19 restrictions, research by Swim England found that more than two million children missed out on swimming lessons. Since the reopening of facilities in April 2021, Parkwood Leisure has seen a 30% increase in children on its swim programme compared to pre-pandemic levels, with over 47,850 currently enrolled.

During this time, 285 new swim lesson instructors have been recruited in-line with customer demand, with more than 250 of these completing their Level 1 and Level 2 Swimming Teacher qualifications funded by Parkwood Leisure.

The success of the swim programme has been recognised by ukactive, who have named Parkwood Leisure as a finalist in the ‘Business Continuity, Recovery and Success following on from the COVID-19 Pandemic’ category at the upcoming ukactive Awards, with this year’s winners to be announced on 30th June.

Commenting on today’s announcement, Suzanne Gabb, Head of Aquatics at Parkwood Leisure, said: “To reach 100,000 learners is a fantastic achievement for our swim programme. What we offer at Parkwood is truly unique, and to know that we’ve been able to not only teach 100,000 children to swim, but also give them the broader knowledge, skills and understanding of the importance of water safety through our enhanced programme is something we are very proud of.”

This week also marks Drowning Prevention Week, an annual campaign led by the Royal Life Saving Society (RLSS) to raise awareness of the importance of water safety. The campaign is being promoted across Parkwood Leisure’s facilities.

For more information about Parkwood Leisure’s Learn To Swim Programme, click here.

For more information about Drowning Prevention Week, click here.

Parkwood Leisure, one of the UK’s leading leisure operators, has partnered with boditrax to launch its body composition analysis and activity tracking platform to a selection of its Leisure Centres.

The introduction of the new technology is part of Parkwood Leisure’s strategy to provide personalised experiences for its members and facility users, through access to information to help inform health and wellbeing activities both in-centre and in the community.

Boditrax’s cloud-based health application provides medical-grade body composition analysis, giving users a comprehensive understanding of physical composition, allowing them to set goals and track progress, either through the device in the gym, or remotely via the boditrax app.

The new partnership will see boditrax devices installed at an initial 15 sites, with more facilities to introduce the platform over the coming months as part of Parkwood Leisure’s centre investment plans.

“This is an exciting development for our centres and one that we believe will really enhance our members’ experiences,” says Alex Godfrey, Parkwood Leisure’s Operations Director.

“Boditrax will not only improve engagement with new and existing customers, but it will also support our local initiatives as part of our commitment to improving the health and wellbeing of our communities. We can see our customers are really enjoying using the technology purely from the number of scans and targets that are being completed.”

“Since introducing boditrax, it’s become a key part of our member journey,” says Gary Sheppard, General Manager at Parkwood Health and Fitness Salisbury.

“Not only is it supporting inductions, but existing members are also engaging with it to develop or change their training programmes in-line with fitness goals. It’s easy to use and provides us with another way to personalise and enhance the experience for our members.”

Parkwood Leisure, one of the UK’s leading public leisure facilities operators, helped prevent more than 7,000 cases of stroke, dementia, depression and type 2 diabetes in 2019, saving the NHS £16 million, a new social value report has shown.

The report, underpinned by industry-leading research undertaken by Sheffield Hallam University, has been developed over the last year by Parkwood in partnership with 4Global to understand the social value generated prior to the pandemic.

Through improved health and subjective well-being, increased educational attainment and reduced crime, Parkwood generated a social value of £425.09 per member for the year - a figure above industry average. In addition, Parkwood has directly helped prevent more than 3,200 cases of depression; a statistic of particular significance following last month’s Mental Health Awareness Week.

The findings in the report have also helped the leisure management firm understand the impact of members not regularly attending its centres. Almost £59 million in social value has been lost during the Coronavirus pandemic. To help combat this, Parkwood has delivered Covid-specific staff training to its teams focusing on safety protocols, specific interventions and targeted programmes, to get people back into physical activity post-lockdown.

In addition, and with the aim of driving even higher social value, Parkwood will be launching a new Wellness Ecosystem service for its members from August. The service will allow users to access a comprehensive digital service that provides clinically robust evidence-based advice and guidance on how to tackle key aspects of their health and wellbeing, in line with NICE and NCSCT guidance.

Glen Hall, Managing Director of Parkwood Leisure said: “We pride ourselves on creating happier and healthier communities. The impact we’re having on health, wellbeing, education, crime and the NHS is clear from this report. Being active has never been more important for our nation and we’re delighted to be helping proactively tackle a wide range of health and social issues. One of our key aims moving forward is to generate even greater social value - hence the launch of our Wellness Ecosystem - whether that is inside our facilities or out in the community, all helping deliver an even greater impact on the nation’s health agenda.”

Chris Phillips, Director at 4Global said: “This report really starts to tell the full story of how being active more broadly benefits individuals and society. We’ve worked closely with Parkwood over the last few years to understand how they have been helping positively impact the broader issues society faces and this report shows they’re really doing that.”

To read more click here and for more information visit www.parkwoodleisure.co.uk