42 | Northern Enterprise Awards 2022 Eden Camp’s existing market is mainly adults aged 30-50, while it also welcomes 25,000 families on average throughout the year. This is in addition to primary schools, which are drawn to this interactive venue for excursions. Over the past two years or so, the digital transformation, propelled by the forced closure during the pandemic, has seen the average age of customers decrease from 48 to 34. The aim is to decrease this slightly more in order to stay relevant to a younger customer base and secure futureproofing for the next generation. Updating the displays and enhancing customer experience is at the forefront of all the developments onsite, including upgrading the café and gift shop in 2016, to launching Eden Camp Heritage Restorations in 2010 with a team of dedicated volunteers who restore the vehicles, including the recently completed M50 Sherman! 2021 saw massive investments in the site facilities, including new central toilet block, which is self-sustainable through solar power, re-landscaping of the front of the site, a brand-new events and exhibitions space, and the launch of the new Blitz experience. The museum’s main goal is to provide a fun and safe environment to educate the next generation on history and heritage. Enhancing displays with more interactive and immersive methods brings British history to life in a way that no other museum can. Visitors to Eden Camp can get involved in all sorts of activities, from riding in rare tanks, target practice, and even making WW1 tack biscuits. Then, its living history displays and demonstrations feature re-enactment groups with vehicles, weapons, and activities, alongside educational workshops hosted by the museum’s collections and engagement team, and living history volunteers, offering displays and activities from the home front including covering the role of women at war. Behind the scenes tours are also available of the museum to explore the Prefab house and the archives themselves, which are normally shut to the public for security purposes. Not only did the museum focus on its digital transformation during the unfortunate closure during the pandemic, but it also turned its attention toward improving operations, including its carbon footprint. It developed a carbon neutrality plan which is projected to be completed by 2030. Starting with the removing of its diesel generator, it installed an electricity cable to power the whole site, instantly reducing its carbon emissions by around 140 tons each year. Following this, the new toilet block was installed with infrared facilities to reduce waste and excessive water use, and all heat for the water is self-generated through solar panels on a dedicated grid to preserve the historic building they are powering. With this completion and the replacement of the toilets themselves, Eden Camp saves on average 90% water per flush! With its new Green Policy, the staff have taken steps to reduce the museum’s carbon footprint in as many areas as possible, including waste management where all waste is recycled or reused where appropriate, carshare where possible to travel to and from work, and conserving energy where they can with electricity usage. The aim for 2021 was a 50% reduction in carbon emissions, which the team smashed with an overall reduction of 77% for that year. The next target is an 85% reduction by 2025 with offsets for the military vehicles, hopefully reaching neutrality by 2030. Oct22264 Best Educational Day Out Provider - North Yorkshire The team also works hard to keep the business local and over 85% of its suppliers are within a 25-mile radius, keeping emissions down on deliveries. This means the museum can support the local economy and give back to its local community, which has been so supportive, not only through the past two years, but even spanning back to the war where the community welcomed the POWs in their homes and families. The museum still endeavours to expand on its community outreach and one way of doing this is opening up history into different mediums. Using donated items from its archive to inspire creativity, the museum has, for the second year, partnered with a local youth theatre company, Be Amazing Arts (BAA). The company and its young cast have performed immersive promenade performances using the Eden Camp museum and artefacts to bring history to life. In 2021, using a fantastic collection of love letters from the archive, the BAA team created Letters From Betty, a promenade performance showing a long distance love that survived the war and showed the points of view from the home front and the front line. Eden Camp and BAA worked together again this year to produce A Suitcase For Teddy, which was inspired by evacuee memoirs of those travelling from Guernsey to the UK. Working with a local company, and inspiring local young people to experience history through a different medium has opened Eden Camp up to a wider audience whilst providing the perfect backdrop for a performance with a difference. The museum is excited to be hosting BAA’s adaptation of Peter Pan as the Christmas performance in November this year. Company: Eden Camp Modern History Museum Email: [email protected] Website: www.edencamp.co.uk Stan Johnson, local businessman, first opened Eden Camp as a museum in 1987, and it has remained familyowned ever since, being passed down a generation in 2015. The museum offers a plethora of displays in the original grounds of a prisoner of war camp, covering events throughout WW2 as well as WW1 and post-war conflicts. To bring history to life even more, it offers living history displays and demonstrations.
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