Exclusive Collection Impact Report April 2024 - March 2025
IMPACT
APRIL 24 - MARCH 25
The foundations we put down when we became a B Corp are taking root now.
Our earlier initiatives gave us a baseline that allows us to track and measure progress; making our sustainability ambitions for the next three years fully quantifiable.
The 2024 - 2025 Impact Report highlights clear gains made last year and our 3-year recertification is a reflection of the hard work, commitment and fun we’ve had in using our hotels and estates as places where positive impacts can be made on our teams, local communities and the wider environment.
We’ve now achieved a B Corp Certification Qualification of up from our initial score of 80.3 94.4
It’s a magnificent gain made possible by everyone we engage with: our people, supplier partners, members and golfers, weekenders, leisure guests, and the business clients and event organisers who choose Exclusive Collection to help meet their own sustainability goals.
While it’s hugely rewarding to increase our score, it raises the bar further around our objectives of:
Goal 1: Reducing water consumption
Goal 2: To be carbon positive on scope 1 and 2 by 2026
Goal 3: To focus on improving our biodiversity metrics
Goal 4: People, social & community
These objectives fall neatly under our B Corp pillars and give us a clear roadmap for the next chapter.
slow down, breathe deeply, switch off.
In 2024, we launched The Reeds at South Lodge; a development of lodges and a new wild swimming lake. And it’s not just guests going wild for it; we’ve attracted wild swimmers and a host of new wildlife also drawn to the biophilic design and build.
Biodiversity has been a focus for us from the very beginning of our B Corp journey and over the past year, nature has responded. From kestrel chicks and swifts dancing across the skies to otters and other water-dwelling wildlife, our rewilding efforts are taking root and transforming our 691 acres.
The result? A richer environment that not only supports the planet but offers our guests a deeper connection to it.
It’s the kind of setting that invites you to slow down, breathe deeply, switch off and relish in our premise of ‘creating happiness in amazing places’.
Danny Pecorelli Managing Director
How our B Corp certification re-qualification stacks up
17.5% increase
94.4 from 80.3
Governance: 17.6
15% uplift in the score that considers transparent leadership, mission alignment, and accountability structures.
Workers: 25.2
14% up on our performance around employee wellness, safety, career development, and inclusive practices.
Community: 26.0
22% improvement in how we engage in local sourcing, education and charitable giving.
Environment: 20.9
Our environmental management and sustainable practices across operations and supply chains increased by 28%.
Customers: 4.5
Up 2% in our stewardship towards improving the social impact of other businesses or organisations.
20242025
Highlights
A snapshot of how far we came in 24/25, growing our social and environmental impacts while staying true to our purpose of using our properties and estates as a force for good.
Turnover
Awards, brand
• Hotel Cateys 2024, Team of the Year, The Pass at South Lodge
• South Lodge - Highly Commended at Country & Town House Awards: Best Spa and Wellness Experience
• Three restaurants with a Michelin star, 23 AA Rosettes and the ‘Best Trencherman’s Pub’ award
Awards, people
• Hotel Cateys 2024, Hotel Chef more than 250 covers, Sarah Frankland
• Brit List, Outstanding Contribution, Danny Pecorelli
• Boutique Hotelier, Power List, Stephanie Hall
Education and influence
• 100+ placements to local schools
• 203 hours with our Chefs’ Academy
• 29 people on our management training programmes
Biodiversity
• 2.54 hectares on new planting
Supply partners
• £2.1m spent with likeminded B Corps
Community
• £20,371 in central funding from Head Office, bolstered by even more money raised by each of our seven locations.
• 1 charity day per 850+ employees across the Collection
Good food
• 6,773 meals distributed to our local communities through Olio
• CO2 emissions avoided via Olio 12,160 kg CO2 across 7 hotels
Energy reduction
• Total kWh 17,726,414 -17.7% on last year
• Water reduction saving 3.30% year on year
Make a noise
• Instagram follower growth: +46% YOY
• Consumer press circulation: 9,592,579
• Monthly online unique users: 35,535,514
Goal 1
Reducing
water consumption
A snapshot of how far we came in 24/25, growing our social and environmental impacts while staying true to our purpose of using our hotel and estates as a force for good.
We’re making smart water usage second nature.
Over the last year we’ve put a big focus on our hotels’ taps and tanks, appliances and amenities to reduce our consumption. We targeted a 3% annual reduction in water usage for April 24 –March 25 and hit our target by saving 3,550 m3 of water over the year:
3.30% saving
We’re not stopping there as we’re in the process of replacing outdated systems, as well as a tightening up on our daily operational practices. From the simple act of transferring unused bottled water from meeting rooms into water butts in the walled gardens, harnessing the natural flow of the River Bybrook to irrigate the championship golf course at The Manor House, and even tapping into a borehole to keep England Rugby at the top of their game with a tip-top training pitch at Pennyhill Park.
Key initiatives
• We’ve started work on a borehole at South Lodge with the aim of drawing 69 m3 per day from 70 m depth.
• Rainwater harvesting tanks used in The Reeds lodges.
• At South Lodge, using reed bed technology, all drainage is contained on site.
• We’ve partnered with Hansgrohe across the hotels to reduce consumption with low-flow bathroom fixtures such as showers and taps.
• Water-neutral design in The Reeds and water source heat pumps.
• All of our sprinklers at The Manor House Golf Club have been upgraded and their location pinpointed on GPS. Linked to an app, we can water as and when required from the clubhouse and even home!
• On-going focus on 3% annual reduction in water usage.
• Olio food redistribution from our 7 hotels saved 2,126 m3 of water.
Embracing blue health
With nearly 50% of our guests joining us for meetings or events, we help them unwind by promoting not just ‘green’ but also ‘blue’ health—encouraging the use of our lakes, as well as our outdoor spaces. This year, 1,751 swimmers took to our new 51-metre wild swimming lake to tap into the energising benefits of cold-water swimming - stepping out of the fast lane never felt so good! Our mission to embed water-wise choices through every guest experience continues.
Goal 2
To be carbon positive on scope 1 and 2 by 2026
We continue to enhance our carbon-positive impact by reducing consumption, investing in green energy, and implementing insights from our Energy Savings Opportunity Scheme (ESOS) Phase 3.
We turned 700kg of apples from 21 varieties into 1,000 250ml bottles of fresh juice.
We’re in control of our Scope 1 emissions by updating our boilers, generators and kitchen equipment with biomass boilers and air source heat pumps. We’ve got projects underway for insulation and sensors that will enable us to save on energy consumption and we’ve also specified and verified deep green energy sources for any electricity we use in Scope 2.
Our total kWh across the collection is down 17.7% year on year. This was helped by a
At Botanica at South Lodge, we eat root to flower, embracing the entire plant; peelings, pulp and all!
The revisions we’ve made to our boilers and plant over the last few years mean we continue to save energy and improve efficiency.
Location-based Market-based
March 2023 March 2024
2,322 2,425 1,393
March 2025
We take the carbon conversation seriously and are using our influence to educate and eradicate unnecessary emissions through supplier and client education events.
April 24 - March 25
April 23 - March 24
34% better buying
We’ve honed our supplier list with notable B Corps Origin Coffee and Lucky Saint becoming group wide suppliers and distributors Hatch Mansfield, Classic Fine Foods and Warrens Office all becoming B Corps.
Walk the talk
Partnering with a global leader in events management, we brought together senior corporate stakeholders from FTSE 100 procurement, sustainability and marketing departments. Our 36-hour thought leadership event was packed with insight, best practice and future commitments to bringing sustainable solutions on to the agenda for strategic meeting management programmes.
As well as partnering with Olio, where surplus ingredients from our kitchens support the hotels’ local communities, we’ve implemented Klimato. This partnership enables event organisers to understand the carbon footprint of their menu items and to make climate-conscious choices.
As a consequence, we recently re-designed our event menus, and we’ve noticed that labelling each menu item is having a tangible influence on choice without sacrificing customer satisfaction.
As business events and personal milestones are a large part of our business, Klimato is a big conversation with long term commitments in place leading up to 2050.
Short-Term Target
Long-Term Target
Olio: food surplus and its impact
It’s not just events where we are making a difference - we’re using our ingredients to full impact. At Botanica at South Lodge, we eat root to flower, embracing the entire plant; peelings, pulp and all! For example, our Wasted Falafels are made from the freshly squeezed morning juice pulp. The restaurant has even gone dairy free and zero waste, further reducing our environmental footprint, and last year was awarded 3 Food Made Good stars, the highest accreditation from The Sustainable Restaurant Association.
At Lainston House, during 2024’s autumn harvest, we turned 700kg of apples from 21 varieties into 1,000 250ml bottles of fresh juice. And our rocket composter yielded 600 litres of compost which has been spread back onto the kitchen gardens.
Key initiatives
Infrastructure and Green Energy
• Biomass boilers, air source heat pumps, CHP units
• EV chargers, electric buggies
• Biophilic design of our new lodges, The Reeds, and surrounding environment
Carbon Sequestration
• 19,000 vines planted
• 2.54 hectares of trees and shrubs added across the estates
• Land App used for mapping and planning
ESOS Phase 3 & Audits
• Insulation and sensor upgrades
Education and Influence
• Sedex membership
• Klimato integration for carbon tracking on menus
• Rubbish day out – team visits to our waste partners to understand disposal, recycling and energy from waste
CO2 Emissions Avoided via Olio
• Total: 12,160 kg CO2 across 7 hotels
By educating today, we’re helping eliminate emissions tomorrow — and in the process, making our hotels and grounds more beautiful, and giving guests even more reason to join us.
Goal 3
To focus on improving our biodiversity metrics
As custodians of heritage buildings and estates, we’ve a real opportunity to create new stories and legacies for the future. Since we became a B Corp, we’ve partnered with Land App and in the last year we’ve used our knowledge of our estates’ carbon sequestration to reintroduce habitats and hedgerows that have diminished and disappeared.
Our grounds, gardens, and golf course span 691 acres.
Our grounds, gardens, and golf course span 691 acres, and we’ve recently begun nature impact surveys to better understand our biodiversity net gain. We’re putting new practices in place to support wildlife more effectively such as specific grass-cutting schedules to encourage the growth of plants and grasses that help insects and butterflies thrive and replacing non-native species like rhododendron with native trees such as willow, silver birch, and oak.
During the process we’ve discovered numerous new guests enjoying life at the Collection!
• At The Manor House, we’ve been working with the Wiltshire Wildlife Trust to better understand the wildlife on our 365-acre estate. We’ve spotted otters and are now coppicing our hazel woodland to encourage the elusive hazel dormouse. We’ve also enhanced our patches of calcareous grassland to tempt rare orchids and wildflowers into bloom. It’s all part of creating a mosaic habitat – a patchwork of different ecosystems that allows local wildlife to forage, nest, and breed.
• The birds and the bees are never far from our minds either — across the hotels we’ve added owl boxes, bird boxes, and created pollinator-friendly spaces for bugs and bees.
How we’re enhancing our estates
Proposed areas for improvements to landscape
Intensive orchards
Mixed Scrub
Bramble Scrub
Reedbeds
Scrub and heath
Vineyards
Calcareous grassland
Wetlands
Woodland and forest
Lainston House new woodland
Our estate at Lainston House is as much of a hive of activity for the natural habitat as it is for our guests. Our newly planted woodland will attract yet more residents to the estate!
Key initiatives
New Planting
• We planted 3,984 sapling trees, shrubs and hedgerow species across Pennyhill Park, Lainston House, and South Lodge with the help of our nature partner, Protect Earth. These new woodland areas will boost biodiversity and provide cleaner air — perfect for our conference guests and their blue-sky thinking!
• At The Reeds some of the water lilies in the wild swimming lake are from cuttings taken from Monet’s garden at Giverny.
Heritage Species
• Even our planting draws on local varieties and at South Lodge our new orchard includes rare Sussex varieties such as Crawley Beauty. We’ve added field maples, grey willows and wild cherries.
Pops and Pips with Purpose!
Our 5.2 hectare vineyard, planted with our B Corp neighbour, Ridgeview, is now beginning to bear fruit.
While sparkling wine is the primary objective, we’re committed to using every part of the grape and have partnered with Pelegrims, who will help us transform the by-products into high-quality skincare, ensuring nothing goes to waste.
We’ve launched treatments using grape and vine leaf extracts in our new house product that offers antioxidant and hydration benefits.
Our partnership uses vineyard waste captured across seasons. At harvest, we collect grape seeds, stalks, and skins. In spring, we use vitamin C-rich vine sap from pruning. In summer, we repurpose leaves removed to help grapes ripen. All elements are hand-harvested and would otherwise be discarded.
We extract molecules from the polyphenol family — especially resveratrol — for their powerful antioxidant benefits for skin, and viniferin, which is rich in vitamin C. Though quantities are limited, they are hyper-local, avoiding ultra-processing and long transport distances.
“
Jérôme Moisan, co-founder, Pelegrims
Goal 4
People, social & community
With our mission to ‘create happiness in amazing places,’ we know that it starts from within our business. We encourage a workplace where our people feel valued, fulfilled, and inspired. When they are content and engaged their energy radiates and it sets us apart.
We champion careers in hospitality by partnering with schools, colleges, and universities.
In the last year we continued to evolve our people culture and to champion hospitality as a career path. We also remain committed to wellbeing, inclusivity, and opportunity — ensuring every team member feels valued, respected, and connected to our purpose.
Employee Wellbeing & Culture
We engage with our people in a way that works for them. With 36.8% of people falling into Gen-Z (1997-2012) and 37.1% Millennials, we know online learning, gamification and apps are the ways to involve, train and develop them. On our internal app we had more than 19,000 posts and 23,000 comments from our colleagues!
Our Qudos Colleague Appreciation Programme is unique to us and uses gamification to celebrate the teams’ achievements. A Qudos is a digital thankyou card sent in under a minute. Recipients get an interactive card, appear on a wall of fame, and enter a monthly prize draw for a family experience or voucher. The programme’s accessible format engages our diverse, multi-site workforce—including those without desk access or company email.
Labour turnover reduced from 38% to 31.7%.
We’ve been looking at how we can help the teams’ wellbeing too and are rolling out some new ways of working. Our spa therapists for example are now limited to 4 hours massage per day to support their own muscle mass and wellbeing!
100% of employees are paid the real Living Wage and we’re a signatory to the Hoteliers’ Charter.
It’s not just our menus that celebrate what’s nearby — we’re fans of hiring close to home too and at South Lodge, 70.5% of our team live within the local RH postcode.
Education & Career Pathways
We champion careers in hospitality by partnering with schools, colleges, and universities to offer placements, mentorship, and real-world experiences.
On our graduate & academy programmes, we trained 5 Graduate Managers, 7 Cloud 9 Graduates and 15 team members on our Food & Beverage Academy.
Our Chefs’ Academy is seen as a beacon for training, and we spent 203 hours with aspiring chefs visiting our hotels to learn from our teams.
We had more than 100 placements from schools and colleges across the hotels to learn more about a career in spa and wellness and food and beverage.
Community & Charity
Over the past year, we donated £21,371 to charity and actively participated in a wide range of community initiatives across the counties.
Whether it was tidying beaches, cooking up hearty breakfasts, or transforming leftover corks into seasonal decorations, our teams were hands-on and heart-first. Joy often comes from the simplest gestures — like gifting a Christmas tree or sharing surplus seedlings from our green-thumbed colleagues.
Our people have embraced every opportunity to make a meaningful difference in our seven locations.
We understand that today’s workforce has different expectations, and we’re committed to meeting them and championing the lively hospitality sector. By deepening our partnerships with schools, colleges, and universities, investing in local community initiatives, and offering coaching, apprenticeships, and meaningful opportunities, we’re helping people overcome employment barriers and enabling fulfilling futures.
About Exclusive Collection
Eat well, sleep well, do you well and take a breath from the everyday in beautiful surroundings.
Exclusive Collection are proudly leading the way as the first Certified B Corp, family-owned collection of country house hotels, spas, golf, cookery school, and a pub thrown in for good measure.
Exclusive Collection was founded in 1981. The group includes: Fanhams Hall, Lainston House with Season Cookery School, The Manor House with golf club and The Castle Inn, Pennyhill Park and spa, Royal Berkshire, South Lodge and spa and Ansty Hall.
