Turnaround Services Acquisition & Growth The Lantern Way Track Record Team Downloads Get in Touch →
Lantern Care Group
Proven Outstanding.
Repeatedly Delivered. Deeply Human. Highly Governed.

We deploy a proven Outstanding dementia care methodology into underperforming homes across England — creating measurable value through the Outstanding Toolkit, and measurably better lives for residents, one home at a time, year on year.

For Investors For Commissioners
30+
Years frontline
dementia practice
20+
CQC Key Lines
rated Outstanding
5
Pillars, one
proven methodology
10 yr
Group-build
horizon
For Care Home Owners

Rescue Your Rating.
Restore Your Home.

Hands-on management contracts for homes facing CQC enforcement, Requires Improvement or Inadequate ratings — delivered by The Lantern Way, the methodology behind four CQC Outstanding homes and a National Care Awards Care Home of the Year win.

Your Position
Requires Improvement or Inadequate rating, Warning Notice, or a registered manager who has left with no cover.
The Solution
Proven leadership placed directly into your home under a fixed-term management contract — we run the floor, not advise from outside.
The Timeline
Visible improvement typically begins within 4–6 weeks, moving through three structured phases to steady state.
The Outcome
A home that inspects well and operates well — handed back to your own management team on a structured plan.
Three Phases. One Disciplined Arc.
01
Crisis & Turnaround

Intensive on-site leadership to stabilise immediate risk: safeguarding, staffing, care planning, and the evidence base regulators expect first.

£12,000 – £15,000 / month
02
Stabilisation

Governance systems embed, permanent leadership is recruited or developed, and audit cycles move from reactive to routine.

£7,500 – £9,000 / month
03
Steady State

Light-touch oversight while your own team runs the home day-to-day, with OSTK auditing quality and holding the standard.

£3,500 – £5,000 / month

Milestone bonuses of £5,000–£10,000 apply for each CQC rating uplift achieved. The monthly fee within each phase doesn't reduce — your total cost falls because engaged ownership moves you through the phases faster.

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Acquisition & Growth Strategy

One methodology. Any qualifying home.
A ten-year build.

Lantern's growth isn't tied to a single deal or a single county. We identify care homes anywhere in England — rated Inadequate, Requires Improvement, or Good with unrealised potential — and deploy the Outstanding Toolkit to lift both CQC rating and trading value. Home by home, that's the engine behind a ten-year plan to build the Lantern Care Group.

I
Disciplined Acquisition Criteria

Target homes are rated Inadequate or Requires Improvement at distressed, near-bricks-only pricing, or Good-rated homes with clear unrealised EBITDA potential — anywhere in England, not restricted to a single region. Motivated sellers, verifiable upside, no dependence on one geography.

II
OSTK Methodology Deployment

From day one of ownership or engagement, The Lantern Way is deployed — a five-pillar operating system for dementia care that systematically improves CQC rating, occupancy, and fee income. It is the engine of every return, not the property market.

III
Value Proven Over Time, Not Once

A home acquired at distressed pricing and improved to Good or Outstanding typically sees trading value rise 1.5–2× within 18–24 months. The evidence for this isn't a single case — it's a career's worth of independently inspected outcomes, repeated in different buildings, under different owners.

Fund the Next Chapter

Two conversations.
One mission.

Whether you're looking to back a proven, repeatable methodology across multiple homes, or you're a commissioner with a home under pressure right now — the OSTK is the answer to both.

For Investors & Funding Partners
A Compelling Return and a Verified Social Outcome

Lantern creates value on two tracks simultaneously — financial return from quality-driven asset uplift, and independently verified improvement in the lives of people living with dementia. CQC ratings are the metric. The OSTK is the engine. We're raising funding to acquire and deploy OSTK into the next qualifying home, with a pipeline building toward a ten-year group.

  • Funding sought per opportunity or as a standing pipeline commitment
  • Distressed acquisition at or near bricks-only pricing
  • Post-OSTK trading value 1.5–2× within 18–24 months
  • Target IRR 18–25% over a 5-year hold
  • Proprietary methodology, independently CQC-verified — not replicable by competitors
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For Commissioners
A Turnaround Service for Homes Under Pressure

When a commissioned home is in special measures or facing enforcement action, the statutory responsibility is yours. Lantern OSTK Services takes operational control and deploys the methodology from day one — protecting residents and restoring the CQC trajectory.

  • Operational control assumed from day one
  • Visible improvement typically within 4–6 weeks
  • Management contract, co-commission, or acquisition
  • 30+ years South West LA and ICB relationships, extending nationally as the group grows
  • No change of ownership required for initial engagement
Download the Brief ↓
The Outstanding Toolkit — The Lantern Way

Five pillars.
One system. Verified outcomes.

The OSTK is not a training programme or a quality framework. It is a practitioner-developed, field-tested operating system for outstanding dementia care — evidenced by repeated CQC Outstanding ratings in different homes, under different owners.

Pillar One
Connection Before Care

The person is known before the task is performed. Genuine human relationship is the prerequisite for all care delivery — not a soft aspiration but an operational standard that every member of staff is held to from day one.

Pillar Two
Emotional Intelligence

Staff are trained to read, interpret, and respond to the emotional world of people living with dementia — including behaviour as communication, not as a management problem to be suppressed.

Pillar Three
Meaningful Living

Every resident's day is structured around purpose, identity, and activity. Life histories are active clinical tools — not filed documents — driving individual care at every interaction throughout the day.

Pillar Four
Environment as Care

The physical environment is a therapeutic instrument. Sensory design, wayfinding, and spatial planning are deployed to reduce anxiety and support orientation — a component of the care itself, not an add-on.

Pillar Five — The Foundation
Highly Governed Practice

Robust governance systems, documentation standards, and clinical oversight that satisfies CQC at its highest level — protecting residents, staff, families, and the business simultaneously. This is where Outstanding ratings are earned, sustained, and evidenced. It is also what gives investors and commissioners the confidence to trust the Lantern model.

Track Record

Not a one-off. A repeatable trajectory.

The OSTK is the codification of 30 years of frontline dementia care practice — refined and independently inspected, more than once, over more than a decade. More than 20 CQC Key Lines of Enquiry rated Outstanding. The ratings are public. The outcomes are verifiable.

2015
Good
The Old Rectory Nursing Home, Exeter — rated Good at CQC inspection. The starting point.
2017
Outstanding
Same home, same registered manager — Paul Courtney. Rated Outstanding overall — Effective, Caring, Responsive and Well-Led all independently rated Outstanding.
2018
Outstanding
Parkwood House, Plymouth — rated Outstanding with the OSTK deployed as Director of Development. A different building, the same result.
2019
Care Home of the Year
National Care Awards winner — dementia care excellence, judged against services across England.
2019
Outstanding
The Seaton, Devon — rated Outstanding with the OSTK deployed as Director of Development, running alongside Parkwood House.
2024
Outstanding
Devonshire House and Lodge, Plymouth — rated Outstanding for treating people as individuals, with the OSTK led as Development Manager.
2026
Double Regional Finalist
Great British Care Awards, South West — Paul Courtney shortlisted for both Care Home Registered Manager and Care Innovator. Leaders in Care Awards finalist for innovation in care homes.
Independent Recognition

Independently judged. Repeatedly recognised.

Every award below is an independent judgement of care delivered to real people living with dementia — alongside four homes, across two provider organisations, rated Outstanding by CQC.

2026 — Shortlisted
Great British Care Awards 2026 Regional Finalist
2026Great British Care AwardsDouble Regional Finalist, South West — Care Home Registered Manager and Care Innovator
Leaders in Care Awards 2026
2026Leaders in Care AwardsFinalist — Innovation in Care Homes, for the OSTK dementia programme
Winners
National Care Awards 2019 Winner
2019National Care AwardsWinner — Care Home of the Year, for dementia care excellence
Great British Care Awards 2017 Regional Winner
2017Great British Care AwardsRegional Winner — South West
Outstanding Care Awards Devon & Cornwall 2018 Gold
2018Outstanding Care AwardsGold — Care Home Activity Organiser of the Year, Devon & Cornwall
Leadership

Practitioner-led, not consultant-led.

Lantern is built on a career spent at the frontline of dementia care — not a consultant looking in, but someone who has done the work.

Paul Courtney
Paul Courtney
Founder & COO

Trained and qualified as a Registered Nurse, with over 30 years of frontline dementia care experience in the South West. Developer of the Outstanding Toolkit — The Lantern Way — with a record of taking homes from Good to Outstanding, and from crisis to compliance, using the same five-pillar methodology Lantern now deploys.

The OSTK remains Paul's own intellectual property, licensed to Lantern — aligning the methodology's success directly with Lantern's commercial performance. He brings practitioner presence to every engagement, not a management layer at a distance.

Nurse-Qualified CQC Outstanding ×4 Dementia Specialist
The Lantern Way in Practice

Life made meaningful, one person at a time.

These are not decorative extras. Each idea starts with the resident — their history, choices, relationships and sense of purpose — and turns ordinary moments into measurable wellbeing.

A resident choosing a colourful drink from the Lantern hydration theatre
Choice • Health • Theatre

Hydration Theatre

Hydration becomes a social occasion residents look forward to — increasing choice, conversation and fluid intake without making care feel clinical.

A wheelchair user enjoying a live rugby match with a family member
Identity • Family • Belonging

Rugby: Making It Real

A lifelong passion is supported beyond the care-home door — protecting identity, strengthening family connection and creating memories that matter.

Residents relaxing beside a large accessible garden aviary
Resident Led • Nature • Purpose

The Resident-Driven Aviary

An idea shaped around residents creates daily purpose, gentle sensory engagement and a natural reason to spend time outdoors together.

Residents enjoying conversation and coffee in a welcoming care-home café
Independence • Friendship • Routine

Café Life

A familiar place to meet, choose and linger restores everyday independence and makes spontaneous conversation part of daily life.

Residents and a team member sharing conversation in a homely garden bistro
Hospitality • Community • Joy

Bistro Life

Shared tables, warm hospitality and an unhurried atmosphere turn mealtimes into belonging — supporting appetite, relationships and joy.

Visualisation of a Four Seasons Garden: a looping level path with handrails around a central oak shelter and water bowl, with spring blossom, summer lavender in raised beds, autumn trees and winter evergreens, seen from a terrace outside the lounge
The vision A Four Seasons Garden, seen from the lounge terrace. AI-generated visualisation of the concept.
Our Aspirations — Environment as Care

The Four Seasons Garden.
Biophilic care, all year round.

Nature is not a view from the window. Our ambition is for every Lantern home to have a garden designed around the turning year — somewhere residents can walk safely, choose to be, and stay connected to the rhythms of life outside, whatever the season.

Designed and researched by our Programme Manager, Olivia Courtney, the Four Seasons Garden is built on recognised best practice in dementia-friendly design. It is the outdoor expression of our biophilic pathway, within the Environment as Care pillar of The Lantern Way, and an extension of our household approach: small, homely spaces where life carries on, indoors and out.

  • A loop, never a dead endPaths that circle back home, so walking feels free and wayfinding feels easy.
  • Something alive every seasonBlossom, scent, colour and berries planned so there is always a reason to go out.
  • Hands in the soilRaised beds, herbs and bird feeding that residents tend themselves, with purpose and routine.
  • Measured, not assumedEach garden benchmarked against recognised biophilic design patterns and reviewed alongside our EADDAT environmental self-assessment.
EADDAT Tier 2 self-certified (DSDC) Lantern Biophilic Benchmark
Illustrative Four Seasons Garden plan A walled garden divided into spring, summer, autumn and winter beds around a looping path, with a central shelter and a terrace leading from the lounge. Spring Summer Autumn Winter Blossom & bulbs Raised beds to tend Colour & grasses Evergreen, berries, birds Terrace from the lounge Shelter & water
Illustrative concept only — each garden is designed around the home, its residents and its outdoor space.
Olivia Courtney
Programme Manager — Four Seasons Garden & Biophilic Care
Olivia Courtney

Olivia has spent many years in care, much of it in dementia care and much of it as a hands-on carer — so she designs from the resident's side of the experience. A lifelong lover of the outdoors and an accomplished equestrian, she has a natural gift for bringing the outside in. Olivia designed and researched the Four Seasons Garden concept herself, and now leads it as part of The Lantern Way and our household approach to care.

Downloads

Take something with you.

Our documents are written to answer the questions each audience actually asks — not to describe the business in general terms.

For Investors
Investor Brief

The market opportunity, the OSTK methodology, the investment thesis, and the return figures behind the model.

✉ Request by Email
For Commissioners
Commissioner Brief

The turnaround service offer for Local Authorities and ICBs — written for Directors of Adult Social Services and commissioning leads.

↓ Download PDF
For Care Home Owners
Owner's Guide

How a Lantern turnaround works for your home — the three phases, what we take on from day one, fees, and how control is handed back.

↓ Download PDF
Get in Touch

Let's have a conversation.

Whether you're exploring an investment, a management contract, or you have a home that needs to change — the first conversation is always 30 minutes and always straightforward.

✓ Thank you — we'll be in touch within one working day.

Prefer to book a call directly?

30 minutes. No preparation required. We'll cover the model, your questions, and whether there's a fit — in that order.

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✉
pa.courtney@lanterncare.co.uk
Paul Courtney, Founder & COO
📍
Based in South West England
Acquiring and operating across England
☎
07903 218743
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