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Bronze Award for Green Tourism

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Bronze Award for Green Tourism
Gorgeous wooden birdbox with Duffus Castle in the background

We are delighted to announce that Duffus Estate has been awarded the Green Tourism Bronze Award.  Green Tourism is a national certification scheme which promotes green tourism across the globe. They recognise the commitment of tourism businesses which are actively working to become more sustainable. We have been on a journey towards sustainability for several years. Have a look at our map to see our journey so far which has recently been supported by Green Tourism. We are incredibly proud to have received the Bronze Award.

Highlights which helped

There are many areas across the Estate where we have made improvements or formalised what we already do to help achieve this award. Green Tourism have 3 key areas of Planet, Places and People.

Planet

In 2020, after extensive research, we switched to an environmentally friendly, but highly effective cleaning product called Dew. Dew are based in Dundee and produce cleaning and sanitising products with no harmful chemicals. We love them and they are very effective when cleaning and sanitising the holiday properties. In addition they work well with the septic tank systems which are in place at our properties. Furthermore they are gentle to you and your family.

Places

We have developed a comprehensive guide for our guests, with a strong focus on sustainability.  By pointing our guests to shop local at our amazing local shops, cafes and restaurants. We highlight where our wonderful Moray can best be accessed responsibly, therefore making the most of their stay here with us.  We share the great experiences available nearby from surfing the waves to running a Dramathon and everything else along the way.

People

We value people and the community. For example, we welcome our local community to access our beautiful Estate grounds for walking and recreation. Our grass tennis court is free for our guests and local community to use to play. We also host Earthtime Nursery and Forest School in the grounds. 

Duffus Estate contributes to our local community through fundraising (we have raised over £1,300 to date for Moray Food Plus, our charity of the year in 2022-23). Ed and Caroline have been busy tree planting (at Duffus Village Hall and Hopeman Community Heritage Garden). As a team, we gave up a working day to volunteer with Moray Food Plus.

Time

Time is the most precious commodity. For us, the enforced lockdown following the outbreak of Covid-19, gave us the opportunity to take a step back and crystallise our thinking. Sustainability was a priority across the Estate as a whole and one of our main plans was to undertake the application for Green Tourism certification.

This was never going to be a quick project, rather a journey from where we were to where we want to be. Since lockdown we have rolled out a programme of improvements. Electric car charging points have been installed at 4 of our properties. Bird boxes and bug hotels were already in the Estate grounds, and as a result of this project we bought more to feature in our holiday property gardens.

To reduce our plastic waste, we negotiated with our commercial laundry service on how our clean linens are packaged and we switched to using sustainable toilet roll. Kula Coffee Hut was awarded with the ‘Taste Our Best’ accreditation from Visit Scotland for our focus on supporting local and Scottish suppliers.

Team Work for Green Tourism

It has been a long held ambition to gain accreditation with Green Tourism. Special thanks go to Jennifer, our Office Manager who has taken the lead on gaining the Bronze award.

This project was a real focus for several months. Above all, it has been fascinating to learn more about sustainability within the tourism industry and to share with other businesses ideas and aspirations. It was no small undertaking however it has been very satisfying to complete the first leg of our sustainable journey.

Green Tourism Bronze
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