British beach huts - 20th August 2021

The British seaside wouldn't be the same without beach huts. These colourful cabins are great places to spend time, alone or with others. They're popular with people on holiday. They're a perfect spot both in good and bad weather.

Melanie Whitehead manages a beach hut organisation in a seaside town.

Melanie Whitehead: "This is my beach hut. It's a fairly standard beach hut. Most huts have a cooker for making the all important cup of tea. It comes into its own when it's a horrible day because obviously I can put windows in, I've got spare jumpers and things. And I can, yep, snuggle in here, look at the view and forget about the world really."

It costs about £40,000 to buy a beach hut. Ten years ago, it was a quarter of the price. Melanie has seen the prices increase. The pandemic has been responsible for this.

Melanie Whitehead: "So, the pandemic, this really is very unusual. I mean, we almost saw prices increasing, you know, week on week."

If you can't buy a beach hut, you could rent one. Sarah Stimson runs a beach hut hire company. She believes there is another reason for the rising prices.

Sarah Stimson : "But there is also an element that lots of people have beach huts in their families and then never sell them. So, the availability of beach huts is actually quite small. There's much, much more demand than there is in terms of availability."

Sarah says beach huts remind people of playing in their gardens as children. She thinks that's why adults love beach huts.

Sarah Stimson: "It's a bit like having a grown-up Wendy house on the beach, isn't it? So I think grown-ups quite like it for that reason."