Farm park owner eager to reopen after floods and Covid
THE annus horribilis that was 2020 for many started a little earlier for Rhys Edwards.
The owner of the popular family attraction Cefn Mably woke on a Sunday in February to see water rushing across his farm.
The farm, which is on the outskirts of Cardiff, was flooded and Mr Edwards took the decision to shut for a few months to repair and make renovations.
Just a month later and the whole country went into lockdown, and the attraction hasn’t opened again.
Instead of patching up the farm, Mr Edwards took the bold decision to drastically overhaul the site to ensure once the country returns to normal, or close to it, families will flock to the farm.
He has bet £2m on it.
One of the first things visitors will notice when they return to Cefn Mably
Farm Park is the aeroplane that was in the middle of the big field has gone. The second thing is likely to be the train track that cuts a path around the grounds.
Mr Edwards felt that with the site closed to visitors it was an ideal time to make the improvements he had long been wanting to make.
While these works will be continuing for a while even after the venue can reopen, visitors will see some big changes.
The main building has been taken down and is being replaced by a huge, open building that is being erected by the people that build Amazon centres. There will be no columns in the new aircraft hangar of a building that will house a soft play centre – bigger than the previous one – as well as a new farm shop and cafe.
In a bid to future proof the venue, there will be an outdoor kitchen that will be located by the new pitch and putt golf course, courtesy of the people behind the one on Barry Island.
“The little worry I have is because I’m going to go right to the wall and spending every last penny we’ve got on this,” Mr Edwards said
“If we did then have more knockdowns, I couldn’t... there’s nothing left in the tank. You know what I mean? But if we don’t get this building up then well, this new building is our future.”
Mr Edwards needs the lockdown to finish before the Easter holidays. Weekends help pay the bills but it is the holidays and half-terms that the farm really pays it way.
“We’ve always got over 40 staff working seven days a week,” Mr Edwards explains.
“The whole facility has to be fully manned seven days a week. So, to be fully manned, there are lots of days you would lose money just to be open, it’s just the nature of the beast.
“But then on a half term and holidays that’s money coming in. And that’s the bit that puts money in the bank to pay for things like the railway, to pay our mortgages, and to get through to the next half term.”
To put things into perspective the electricity bill for the farm is normally between four and five thousand pounds, Mr Edwards said.
It has been a tough year for the family. Mr Edwards, his wife and two daughters live on site. This has allowed him to oversee the changes and work on the improvements.
“This last phase of what we’re doing, we are going all out,” he says.
“It’s a million-pound building. The whole ground floor will be up on a mezzanine, 1.3 metres up from the road.
“So, if it ever flooded again the water would go underneath.
“I want to be able to sleep at night. And never have this disruption to our business again, because you don’t realise how hard it was. Lesser people would have rolled over and folded a long time ago.
“It’s a huge thing that’s happened to us, and then the Covid. But we have stayed very positive through the whole thing, and we are going to come out the other side and hit the ground running.”
The little worry I have is because I’m going to go right to the wall and spending every last penny we’ve got on this
Rhys Edwards