Founded in 2002, Water Babies is now the world’s largest and most professional baby and toddler swimming programme. It already has an established presence in the UK, Ireland, Canada, The Netherlands, New Zealand, China and welcomes over 50,000 children and their parents/carers at around 560 local pools every week.
They are also leaders in training programmes and have set the industry standard with their training academy now forming the basis of the British Standard for teaching swimming to parents and babies. As part of its ongoing ambitious expansion plans through franchise opportunities, Water Babies has most recently joined forces with China and a framework is already in place, with initial investigations into live sites underway.
rpa:group has been involved in an immersive process of design for this global expansion, which involves the entire Water Babies operations team and management, who can draw on 14 years of experience to ensure that Water Babies continues to be the leader in their field. Water Babies has been reliant on leisure centres and other leased aquatic spaces, upgraded to maintain their key USP, which is to ensure a consistent and very high standard of water treatment and levels of service. However, the brand is now developing their own bespoke facilities, which comprise a complete set of facilities dedicated to the brand offer. In addition to bespoke teaching pools, the changing experience has been re-designed from the ground up with retail, F&B and leisure facilities further enhancing the customer journey.
rpa:group is currently developing the interior environment concept with the branding agency, to define the new standard for this exciting revolution in leisure experiences.
