Abernethy Trust is a Christian Trust. It operates as a Company Limited by Guarantee and is also a charity registered in Scotland. It runs several outdoor education centres, including the Ardgour Centre in Ardnamurchan. Its mission is to offer people of all ages the opportunity to have new and exciting experiences in the outdoors, and through this, change in positive ways.
Barry Edmonson is in charge of the Ardgour Centre and works a lot with young people. He explains the ethos: "We take the young people who come to us at face value - we don't know their history - but we give them challenges and see them change".
The Ardgour centre is based on 3,000 acres of the Kilmalieu Estate on the shores of Loch Linnhe. It was opened in 1991 after its owners, the Burns family, offered the estate to the Trust on a long-term lease for a peppercorn rent. Ardgour has accommodation for 32 people in the main house, in shared rooms, and has added a purpose built sports centre which includes a full sized basketball court, gym and indoor climbing wall. Young and old, from complete beginners to instructors who want to upgrade their skills, can try their hand at everything from abseiling to mountain biking in stunning surroundings.
The Abernethy Trust operates as one organisation, but each centre in effect is a separate business unit. Several years ago turnover at Ardgour dropped off and it started to build up small losses; partly this was down to a decline in bookings for management training, and partly as a result of some bad winters when there was little snow to attract the skiers. Ardgour is also quite a small centre, and remote - access is by ferry across the loch - so it is both relatively expensive to run and to reach. It is also a very challenging environment to do outdoor activities in over the winter months.
As a business, Ardgour has had to address these challenges and turn its potential disadvantages around. One of the first things Barry did when he took over Ardgour in 1998 was to persuade the Trust to move its Outdoor Instructor Training Course to the Ardgour centre. This made sense because Ardgour had space in the house over the winter to accommodate extra students, and offered tough outdoor conditions to learn in. The move has been a success: students on the 12 month course stay in the house over the winter, then do rotating placements in the Trust's other centres - freeing up accommodation for the busier months at Ardgour.
The team also applied some lateral thinking to the problem of the lack of snow in Scotland, by hiring a chalet in Switzerland where the snow is plentiful. A pilot scheme in 2009/10 offered package trips for groups which proved even more popular than they had hoped. The chalet has been hired again this winter, as well as for several weeks over summer 2011 to test activities such as mountain biking.
The centre has worked hard to fill up all its available spaces: Monday to Fridays over spring and early summer are generally for school parties; weekends are for short courses, aimed mostly at adults, and summer and autumn is for a variety of youth groups and family holidays
Ardgour has also turned to renewable energy as a way of generating income. Barry says, "We wanted to become a green business - after all we work in the environment ourselves". With support from both Community Energy Scotland, and HIE, Ardgour has created a small hydro scheme on the burn that runs through the estate. It opened in June 2010 and will bring a net benefit of around £50,000 per year to Ardgour, both through savings in heating costs, and from selling electricity to the grid. The next step is to try to improve the energy efficiency of the main building, and look at ways of improving the accommodation. Barry says, "People have a higher expectation of quality now; they want more privacy, more comfort and more choice".
Meeting these expectations and keeping costs down in a price sensitive market is not easy. However, HIE is helping Ardgour to adapt. Barry says "In the past we've only really gone to HIE when we wanted funding, but I've been surprised by the new relationship. Fergus has brought good ideas, things we don't see within our own circle, and challenging questions. We feel their involvement is helping us to sustain a rural business and social enterprise; it's a real partnership now".
HIE has also brought practical help. Fergus Watson says, "At the moment we're helping with a feasibility study to explore various options for expanding the building. We've also brought in a marketing consultant to help them look at other niche market opportunities and increase occupancy rates. This is a well managed organisation, with well established and structured business processes in place. What we're able to do is look at the business as a whole and see what might be needed to make sure it has a sustainable future".
- Traded Turnover - ££250,000
- Employees - 10
- Assets - Kilmalieu Estate, Ardgour House, farm buildings, sports barn, 4 chalets
