When Sea Cadets came to us many moons ago, they didn’t just need a new website, they needed a comprehensive, secure, future-proof platform that would completely modernise how their organisation worked online.
As a national youth charity supporting 10-18 year olds across the UK, Sea Cadets offers courses, activities and achievements to thousands of young people each year. But behind the scenes, many processes including payments were still manual. They needed a digital solution that would bring everything together in one place, work seamlessly with Westminster (the military database used across the army and navy), and be secure and scalable enough to grow with them for years to come.
So that’s exactly what we built.
Using a custom online portal built with a combination of WordPress, Laravel and Django, alongside Stripe for payments, we developed a bespoke platform where cadets can explore and book courses, track their progress and view achievements, while parents and guardians can make secure online payments. What was once a manual system now handles over £1 million in transactions each year.
Working within strict military-grade security standards meant the architecture had to be robust, precise and completely reliable requiring complex coding. It was technically demanding but has given us experience that sets us apart from other agencies.
But what’s made the project especially rewarding is the long-term partnership. Lolly has supported Sea Cadets for over eight years, managing hosting and infrastructure, and continuously refining the platform through an iterative approach, launching features and listening to live user feedback. That process has helped shape a platform that now serves more than 11,000 users every month, a stat we’re very proud of!
For us, this project has always been much more than technology. It’s about creating something that genuinely transforms how an organisation operates and supports its community. It’s a brilliant example of what can happen when strong strategy, technical expertise and long-term collaboration come together. And without blowing our own trumpet… it demonstrates how Lolly’s capabilities go beyond websites – we can architect and deliver full-scale platforms, handle complex third-party integrations, and manage the entire hosting and infrastructure side of things, all under one roof.