Zip World's story

Marni Burchall, Social Media Manager

No two days are the same for Marni, who trained as a Primary School teacher at Bangor University, before switching to a temporary role at a local hotel.

Her position there evolved to running the hotel’s social media accounts and she realised a real passion for digital communications and telling stories online.

“All the posts you see across Zip World’s social media - on Facebook and Instagram - is content I’ve created,” she says. “Hospitality and tourism offer a great career for anyone, whatever your background. Teaching provided transferrable skills like presenting and writing, which have been useful in this job.”

When she’s not filming, snapping photos or editing and proofreading web copy and marketing materials, Marni - who has worked with Zip World for five years - is rubbing shoulders or buckling up with some of the many celebs to pop into Zip World. And she captures and documents the visits across social media, of course.

Well-known visitors include The Apprentice team, Top Gear crew, King of the Jungle Joe Swash and Ant and Dec, Welshman Luke Evans, Carol Vorderman and even Mr Tumble!

Marni said: “When you work in tourism, you’re getting to see and post about people doing things that they otherwise wouldn’t get a chance to do.

“You see people living their dreams and achieving goals and that’s a lovely thing to do all day.”

Marni said: “When you work in tourism, you’re getting to see and post about people enjoying themselves and having fun, as well as push themselves out of their comfort zone and the sense of accomplishment afterwards is amazing to see.”

Brett Parkinson, Supervisor / Wind Instructor

Brett joined Zip World straight from school two years ago, when his friends were heading to University and he wasn’t sure which path to take.

He is now responsible for controlling how fast the rides run and regularly monitors wind speed at the Bethesda site.

He says: “I make sure everyone comes in nice and safe.

“We can run in winds up to 50mph. At the start of every day, we send test weights down the zip line to get an idea on how the guests will come down in the wind.

“Once they come down towards the base, the Winds Instructor uses a speed gun similar to what police use to catch speeders on the roads. We then measure how fast the test weights come into the brakes and record it on an excel graph on the computer.

“We cross reference on the anemometer, which measures the wind speed and direction to work out whether to speed the guests up or slow them down so that they arrive on the base of the big zip safely.”

For Brett, meeting tourists from all over the world is the highlight of his job.

On a recent visit to the States, he was thrilled to meet Americans who had been to Bethesda and knew all about Zip World.

“You meet so many people from other countries,” he says. “I’ve just been in the States and amazingly, met people who had been here. It’s so cool to see how many people come here.”

Efa Burgess, Front of House

Efa is looking forward to building a long-term career within Tourism and will soon start training to be a Front of House Supervisor at Zip World.

“Working here has grown my confidence tremendously,” she says. “I was really nervous as a kid but day to day contact with so many different people has really helped with that.

“I love working here because I meet so many people. I’ve watched this site being built. I watched the lorries bringing the wires up through the village, when the build first started.

“It was exciting back then and I never thought I would actually work here.”

When she’s not the friendly face welcoming visitors to Zip World, Efa often pops up to the top of the wire, to test safety cameras or to reassure any nervous visitors she has already welcomed.

At Zip World, each team gets involved with another team whenever needed.

Efa says: “There is such variety with the role and opportunity to move up to another role, to try something different. I’ve had massive support from all my managers to build myself up and up-skill.

“It takes me out of my comfort zone, but that’s a good thing.”