September 2021

GLAMPSITES
CASE STUDY
Star Field Camping
A summer glampsite in the
beautiful Kentish countryside
with stunning night skies
After a large family gathering
planted the seed of an idea,
country store owners David
and Debby Clark charged their
daughter Holly with setting up a
campsite. The following year, after
an inspiring visit to the Glamping
Show, they decided to up their
offering and now offer seasonal
bell and safari tents. We talk to
Debby.
What’s your back story – your life
before glamping?
Star Field is part of Charity Farm which
has been in my husband David’s family
for three generations. He and his family
have run the on-site country store for
more than 40 years, supplying animal
food and accessories to local farmers
and small holders. We branched
into clothing and gifts as a natural
progression and I fully committed to
being part of the team 10 years ago.
What made you decide to start
offering glamping accommodation?
Retail has gone through a few rough
years, and we were hit by some local
competition offering prices that we
could not compete with, so we looked
at what we had and how we could
diversify.
After a family party, where people
camped, we decided that our beautiful
field was ideal for camping despite being
on a slope, so in 2017 we challenged
our daughter Florence, who had just
come back from university, to set up
a campsite under the 28 day rule. In
2018 we wanted to do it completely
differently so we went to the Glamping
Show and were inspired by Mark Scott
from Clear Sky and some of the other
speakers to just go for it.
How did you research the business
before entering it?
The Glamping Show was great for
research. We were a bit overwhelmed
to start with but the more speakers we
listened to and the more suppliers we
talked to the more our confidence grew.
I stalked a few local sites to see how
they had set up their price structures
and copied some rules and regulations
making a few amendments to fit our
requirements. I spent several hours on
Pinterest to get ideas too.
Tell us about your location and site
Our location is just outside of Cranbrook
in the High Weald of Kent. We are in an
AONB and on the edge of SSSI ancient
woodland. Our skies are dark and we
usually benefit from the best of the
British weather.
Our site is kept as natural as possible
with long grass between units. We are
close to Sissinghurst Castle, which is a
big attraction for our glampers, as well
as several other castles, and just 30
minutes from the coast. We are also an
hour away from London which means
we do get a lot of Londoners escaping to
the countryside.
Our site is on a slope which can be
tricky when it rains an awful lot for some
of the cars (we ask guests to park off the
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