Forty Shades of Green - Sustainable Holidays at Mazzard Farm holiday cottages

Take a holiday anywhere and you will most likely see claims that your accommodation ‘strongly cares about the environment’. Examples of what it does will range from a ‘towel policy’, ‘we recycle’ statement, low energy lighting and / or activity responsive controls, to local sourcing arrangements. All good of course, irrespective of whether these steps were actually taken with sustainability in mind, or ‘just’ plain old cost saving measures.

Increasingly however, operators in the tourism industry go well and truly beyond the ‘please hang up your towel if it doesn’t need washing’ statement, and here at Mazzard Farm cottages on East Hill (Ottery St. Mary, Devon), we believe we do as much as we possibly can to keep up with these developments. And dare we say so, we may have even developed one or two initiatives ourselves!

In broad terms, we distinguish between two major elements: the actions we have taken ourselves / behaviours we show, and guest behaviours we hope to influence, trying to make sure our guests have a great holiday, and one which is as sustainable as possible.

Looking at the former, besides all the obvious ones (i.e. materials used when converting our barns into cottages, energy and lighting, green cleaning solutions, appliances, recycling, biomass boiler, solar PV panels), we provide discounts to guests arriving by public transport and encourage guests to enjoy local wildlife (we are in an AONB). Furthermore, we are very active locally (schools, business forums, green networks), and we regularly offer Mazzard Farm as an ‘educational playground’ for local groups such as the school, nursery and Brownie packs.

It is in regards to influencing our guests’ behaviours where we believe we have discovered new and innovative approaches. Innovations which are easily transferable to other tourism businesses. For example, ahead of guests arriving at Mazzard Farm we e-mail them two documents: a comprehensive Guide to ‘what to do in the area’ and a ‘Shopping Locally in Ottery St. Mary’ 2-pager. Both have a number of objectives: ensuring our guests have the best possible time at Mazzard Farm of course, but other aims include supporting the local economy, keeping food-miles down and reducing the use of a car during people’s stay. We estimate that the East Devon Guide alone reduces guests’ car use by as much as 75%, and since we launched the local shopping 2-pager, supermarket deliveries have virtually ceased.

We very much believe in the carrot rather than the stick, and that is why our approach works. And what is more, we know that some aspects of the ‘Mazzard Farm experience’ can lead to changing behaviours at home too!

www.mazzardfarm.com / 01404 815492