How to Plan a Company Retreat Your Team Will Look Forward To

Every January, somebody in the office says “we should do a team trip this year”, and by March it has quietly turned into a long lunch. If you have been handed the job this time, good news: knowing how to plan a company retreat comes down to a handful of decisions made early and in the right order. I have organised enough group weekends to know where the wheels come off, so here is the plan I would follow for a 2027 retreat.

Why company retreats matter more in 2027

Most teams spend less time in the same room than they used to. The Office for National Statistics found that 28% of working adults in Great Britain were hybrid working in early 2025, rising to 36% among 30 to 49 year olds. That flexibility is lovely, but it means plenty of colleagues know each other better as a little square on a screen than as a person.

There is a wellbeing side too. Gallup’s latest State of the Global Workplace data puts UK employee engagement at 10%, with 18% of employees saying they felt lonely a lot of the previous day. A retreat will not fix that on its own, but a couple of days away together is one of the quickest ways I know to turn a group of people who share a calendar into a team.

The events industry is reading the same signals. In Amex GBT’s 2027 Global Meetings and Events Forecast, published in October, 91% of meetings professionals said they expect spending on meetings and events to rise next year, and the top things attendees are asking for are more personalised experiences, more social time and networking, and more hands-on workshops. In other words, people want time to talk to each other.

How to plan a company retreat: start with one clear goal

Before you look at a single venue, write down what the retreat is for in one sentence. “Agree our plan for 2027” is a goal. “Get the new starters to feel part of the team” is a goal. “Strategy, culture, celebration, training and fun” is a wish list, and it leads to an agenda nobody can keep to.

Ask the leadership team to sign off that sentence, then share it with everyone invited. It makes every later choice easier, from the length of the trip to the size of meeting room you will need.

How long should a company retreat be?

For most teams, two days and one night is the sweet spot. You get a working afternoon, a relaxed evening, a proper morning session and a lunch before everyone heads home. Two nights works brilliantly for strategy-heavy retreats or teams travelling a long way, because the first evening becomes the arrival and the real work starts fresh the next morning.

A day trip can work for a small local team, though you lose the evening, which in my experience is where most of the good conversations happen.

Choosing the right venue

Hotels and conference centres are fine, but you share them with everyone else. With an exclusive use house the whole place is yours: the sitting room becomes your breakout space, the big kitchen becomes the place where people chat over coffee, and nobody has to watch what they say in the corridor. Have a browse of our corporate event venues to get a sense of what is out there.

When you shortlist, check these with the venue:

• Bedrooms: how many, how many are shared, and whether anyone needs a ground floor room.
• A space big enough to seat the whole group together, for both meetings and dinner.
• Wifi strong enough for a video call or a shared presentation.
• Catering options, from a private chef to a well stocked kitchen you run yourselves.
• Travel time from where most of your team lives, and parking or the nearest station.

If you would rather see everything in one place, you can filter all of our exclusive use venues by size and location.

Building an agenda with room to breathe

The biggest mistake I see is a timetable packed from breakfast to bedtime. Plan for roughly half the time you have, and protect the rest.

Mix work sessions with time outside

Keep work blocks to about 90 minutes, then get people moving: a walk, a bit of fresh air, a coffee in the garden. Short sessions with a clear outcome beat a whole morning of presentations every time.

Plan one shared activity

One shared group activity is plenty. Old school garden games, a cooking challenge, a guided walk or a quiz night all work, and our team building page has more ideas. If you want a few classics that suit a big house, we have rounded up some favourites in our post on team building activities at your exclusive use venue.

Keep the evening relaxed

Dinner together around one long table does more for a team than any icebreaker. Give it time, keep the speeches short, and make sure there is a good option for anyone who does not drink.

The practical bits people forget

A few things that save a lot of fuss later:

• Send a short form before you book to ask about dietary needs, accessibility and room sharing. People are more honest in a form than in a group chat.
• Agree what the company pays for and what it does not (the bar tab is the usual question) and put it in writing.
• Share travel details and a simple timetable a week before, with the venue address and a contact number.
• Plan the follow-up. Book a short catch-up a fortnight later to check on whatever you agreed at the retreat, so the ideas do not stay in the house.

When to start planning your company retreat

For a spring or summer retreat, start looking now. The best large houses get booked well ahead, especially for popular dates, and you will want time to collect dietary forms and sort travel. Once you know your goal, numbers and rough dates, get in touch and we can suggest houses that fit.

My last tip: book the checkout as late as the house allows. That final slow morning, with the kettle on and nobody rushing for a train, is often when the best ideas of the whole trip turn up.