Designing holiday clubs that fill week 1 and week 6

TL;DR: Most UK after-school operators build holiday clubs that fill the middle weeks of summer easily and bleed money on the first and last weeks. The fix isn't more marketing. It's deliberate programming: differentiated week themes, parent-friendly booking patterns, transparent pricing, and a multi-week discount structure that rewards full-summer commitments without giving margin away. A holiday club running 12 children per day for 6 weeks at £35/day is £63,000 of revenue; the same operation running 8 children per day average is £42,000. The difference between full and patchy isn't quality of care. It's whether parents booked in March or in June. Get the booking rhythm right, and the children fill themselves.

If you run a UK after-school club and your holiday provision is the part that wobbles between profit and loss, you already know the pattern: weeks 2, 3, 4, and 5 of summer book solidly. Week 1 (still feels like school) and week 6 (back-to-school chaos) sit at half capacity. Easter is variable; February half-term is reliably underbooked; October half-term goes either way.