Our customers come from various backgrounds but use our residential site to get their young people away from big cities. We find many schools look to sites like ours to provide their students with wildlife, forestry and conservation opportunities. I think many companies have shown their green credentials and how products have been sourced for their customers, as their customer base wants this information before getting invested in their product or service.

Our clients are starting to ask more questions about what and how we recycle, where products come from (Carbon Footprint), if they are easily repaired. Its something we have been working on for the last 4 years and it makes clients really happy when they know their old products are not going straight into landfill. They are also choosing to spend more on Appliances, in order to buy quality products produced in the EU. Great for us, more profits in the more expensive items. Costs go down as we don't have to spend as much on disposal of commercial waste, and we are also helping people short on cash, to get recycled items at an affordable price. 

Its a winner all round for us. Which is why we are taking part in SAGE Earth, its an amazing project, with such potential to quickly enable us to be informed about our impact on the Global Environment, and what we can do to reduce it for ourselves and our clients. 

Yes. Increasingly, our customers are looking at sustainability issues when selecting products. Currently, a topic of great interest in the wine trade is how to reduce packaging waste, so expect to see more wines presented in aluminium cans or bag in box formats over the coming year.

This is really interesting Andrew; I would have expected that the traditional glass bottle would have been sustainable?

Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment, Lorraine. It's great to hear your clients are also taking an interest in sustainability. 

Hi Steven, yes glass is a wonderful material which is reusable and recyclable. It is also made from natural materials. But, there is a lot of energy used to make glass and it does not biodegrade so further energy is needed to recycle it. Other packaging materials are also lighter , which reduces the energy required for transporting goods. 

Hi Andrew - Thanks so much for commenting, this was something I didn't know either so really interesting to read! 

I have a wide variety of clients however the two main customers with issues are;

- A joinery in relation to sustainable and renewable timber supplies.

- A Golf Club which uses various chemicals and fertilizers for maintaining the course

These issues are coming up in more and more conversations especially over the last year.

Thanks for your comment, Thomas. Interesting to hear what issues are coming up for your clients.

We always try and select suppliers who have a similar sustainability ethos to us and use local supplies where possible to reduce our carbon footprint.

Equally we have more and more guests at our hotel who ask about what our initiatives are before booking, so they too are making a considered choice on where they are staying based on their own values.