Headon Farm Caravan Site & Storage faced a sudden technology crisis when a power outage damaged their long-standing booking system.

A Family-Run Business with Deep Roots

Headon Farm has been in the Reader family for five generations. Located in the beautiful Devon countryside, the farm has evolved through many chapters. After the devastating Foot and Mouth outbreak in 1999, which resulted in the loss of all livestock, Richard and Linda Reader turned a difficult time into an opportunity. They established Headon Farm Caravan Site & Storage in 2002, offering peaceful rural holidays and secure caravan storage.

Since then, the business has grown steadily, with their children Rebecca and James often lending a hand. Cosmic has worked with Linda and Richard since 2017, supporting them with everything from SEO and Google Ads to blog writing, digital strategy, and practical tech training.

The Headon Farm Technology Crisis

On Tuesday 3rd June 2025, Linda contacted Cosmic in distress. Overnight, a series of intermittent power outages had caused their main office PC to fail. This wasn’t just any computer, it stored a bespoke Microsoft Access database linking both their caravan site and storage bookings. The database had evolved over 20 years and was essential for day-to-day operations.

Although several backup systems existed, nothing appeared to be working. The local backup had failed, the external hard drive was deteriorating, and the cloud backup seemed to be missing. For three days, Linda and Richard feared they had “lost everything”, future guest bookings, pitch allocations, and essential records.

“It made us feel ill,” Linda later told us. “We were a week away from going on holiday, and I thought, ‘How can we go and leave this behind?”

How Cosmic Helped

Working Together to Recover

Although Linda initially contacted our web team, we were determined to help however we could. Our Head of Web, Pete Goff, signposted her to Connor Williams from our Tech Team, who immediately jumped in to help. There was no delay or “we’ll schedule you in”, support began right away.

During this process, we identified a cloud backup that had been set up some time ago by our colleague Jon Allard using SharePoint Online. It had continued quietly working in the background, something that proved incredibly valuable.

Connor worked closely with Linda to:

• Assess the extent of the damage
• Rebuild the PC
• Restore essential software and settings
• Retrieve the missing database

That backup, unexpected but intact, was the lifeline they needed.

Connor not only restored the Access database but also spent time explaining every step, ensuring Linda felt confident in the recovery process. She later described him as “a very, very good trainer… He even spotted that part of our external hard drive was failing before it did, he went that extra mile.”

By Thursday evening, just 48 hours after the initial contact, the database was recovered, the system was functioning, and the site was operational again. “It wasn’t all finessed,” said Linda, “but it was working.”

Going Beyond the Crisis

With the crisis under control, Connor stayed on to strengthen Headon Farm’s systems. During the restoration, he spotted early signs of a failing external hard drive, preventing a second potential data loss. Connor set up improved backup processes and installed protective equipment, including an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) to guard against future power outages. Throughout, he explained each step clearly, ensuring Linda felt informed and confident in the changes made.

“This showed us the importance of having professional support in place,” said Linda. “It wasn’t through our negligence, but it exposed vulnerabilities we hadn’t thought of. We’ll definitely be revisiting the idea of moving our system online.”

The Headon Farm technology crisis became a turning point, encouraging discussions about moving their booking system to a secure online platform, building long-term resilience, and strengthening a trusted working relationship that began in 2017.

“With Cosmic, you don’t get a different person every time. We’ve known Pete for years, and now Connor and Matt Ballard too. That continuity builds trust, and it makes a huge difference when you’re in crisis.”

A Community-Centred Business

Linda and Richard continue to run Headon Farm Caravan Site & Storage with a warm, personal approach that’s reflected in how they do business.

“We don’t have online booking,” Linda said. “We like to speak to people, get to know what they want. Many of our customers have been with us from the start. It’s a people business.”

Whether you’re facing a tech problem or simply want to improve your systems, our Tech Team is here to help keep your business running smoothly.