Ditching Green Tourism Scheme

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Highlands John

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We've been members of the National green tourism scheme for 7 years, started at bronze and worked our way up to gold.
Been disillusioned with this scheme for some years, this year we've decided to drop out. Why? It doesn't perform.
Visi tscotla nd seem to take the attitude that just having the accolade is enough, for me there's no point my spending £114 a year if it doesn't bring in bookings.
On my guest questionnaire, out of 100 respondents only 3 people said that our Green tourism award was a factor in their choosing to book with us and there's virtually no traffic coming from the Green Tourism website to our own. Plus there's also quite a bit of work jumping through all the hoops they set just to prove we're doing what we say we're doing.
Don't get me wrong, we will continue to do all the things we currently do to make our business as environmentally friendly as possible, it's just not worth spending money to prove this to guests.
Any other green schemes out there, how do they perform??
ps: I'm back from a fab holiday in Orlando.
 
We are part of the same thing here. No bookings from it at all but I don't pay for it. No one mentions it when booking. No lookers come in from the site. It's something we do anyway because we would, not to get the rating, but it hasn't brought in any biz.
 
I guess things are very different here! Our state's version of "Visi tscotla nd" has a link to find green lodging in the state.
There is no charge for the inn to get on the list. The inn just submits their list of green things they do, which is published on the state website. Everybody who applies gets on the list, free. No checking. If you have one compact fluorescent light bulb in your place, you're green!
I don't know if it has produced a single booking, but I'm the only one in the county to bother getting my place on the list, so might as well do it because there's nothing to it!
 
I spent a year trekking down to Charleston once a month for an Environmental Management Systems class that cost me about $1000 in lost revenue because invariably someone would want to book a room the night before or night of the class plus the gas and time. They did a site inspection and told me I was already doing just about everything I COULD do. They never got around to coming up with a logo to be displayed - even though OUR DEP office was going to other States teaching it and THOSE States DID come up with logos.
Because of what we were doing (mostly because it saved ME money to be doing it) I was listed on many "Green" sites. In all these years since (around 2004 when we did the classes - they were free) I may have possibly had 2 reservations because we were "Green". All the Green sites I am listed on are free listings or I am not on it. I do not pay for that kind of thing. I do things the way I do them because it saves me money, not for any fad or trend reason.
 
I guess things are very different here! Our state's version of "Visi tscotla nd" has a link to find green lodging in the state.
There is no charge for the inn to get on the list. The inn just submits their list of green things they do, which is published on the state website. Everybody who applies gets on the list, free. No checking. If you have one compact fluorescent light bulb in your place, you're green!
I don't know if it has produced a single booking, but I'm the only one in the county to bother getting my place on the list, so might as well do it because there's nothing to it!.
Arkansawyer said:
I guess things are very different here! Our state's version of "Visi tscotla nd" has a link to find green lodging in the state.
There is no charge for the inn to get on the list. The inn just submits their list of green things they do, which is published on the state website. Everybody who applies gets on the list, free. No checking. If you have one compact fluorescent light bulb in your place, you're green!
I don't know if it has produced a single booking, but I'm the only one in the county to bother getting my place on the list, so might as well do it because there's nothing to it!
For the Scottish scheme you pay £114 a year (I think it's more than that now) and a guy comes round every two years and checks up on you. The time-before-last inspection was by someone who'd only worked as an inspector for a few months, I knew more about the scheme and green issues than he did, that's when disillusionment started to set in. It started out about £50, but every year it goes up without my seeing any development of the scheme for the extra money.
Since the inspector comes from Perth which is 150 miles away, by leaving the scheme I'm actually reducing my carbon footprint.
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I spent a year trekking down to Charleston once a month for an Environmental Management Systems class that cost me about $1000 in lost revenue because invariably someone would want to book a room the night before or night of the class plus the gas and time. They did a site inspection and told me I was already doing just about everything I COULD do. They never got around to coming up with a logo to be displayed - even though OUR DEP office was going to other States teaching it and THOSE States DID come up with logos.
Because of what we were doing (mostly because it saved ME money to be doing it) I was listed on many "Green" sites. In all these years since (around 2004 when we did the classes - they were free) I may have possibly had 2 reservations because we were "Green". All the Green sites I am listed on are free listings or I am not on it. I do not pay for that kind of thing. I do things the way I do them because it saves me money, not for any fad or trend reason..
We've got a logo and a badge we can display. I've taken theirs off our website and created my own.
 
we use the Considerate hoteliers - they do try and promote themselves and all they ask is that we do our best. can be joined by anywhere in the world - http://www.consideratehoteliers.com/
 
We're certified green and it didn't cost us a thing through our state association. I've done the green TA. It's only been a few times where I know they booked with us because we're green. More often, if I remember to tell them during the 'spiel' about our bath products being all natural and we're green certified, they will say "yes! I read that!" and it's a positive for them.
We are green because it makes sense. Both for business and personal reason. We pay no money to be listed on any green lodging. If we did and did not receive any results, I'd be outta there!
 
We are certified green. But it's interesting how many guests waste energy (leaving the balcony doors open while turning on the a/c or heat, throw towels on the floor after one use, etc etc. so I don't think being 'green" does much good, as many are all talk and no action as far as I can see.
 
We are certified green. But it's interesting how many guests waste energy (leaving the balcony doors open while turning on the a/c or heat, throw towels on the floor after one use, etc etc. so I don't think being 'green" does much good, as many are all talk and no action as far as I can see..
first time ever guest told me he had read all our green stuff on the web site and was very impressed! told him he was the first one who had ever mentioned it!
 
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