Exclusive: Luxury Explorer plants a tree in one of our own woods for every room night booked through us.

Why?

We all know that all businesses must act responsibly with regard to the environment. In this context, travel is a particularly emotive and contentious subject, so back in 2007 we wanted to provide a simple and effective way of offsetting some of the environmental impact of luxe-trotting.

Luxury Explorer has been planting a tree for every room night booked through us for the past 4 years. This means: any room booked online on any of our partners' hotel websites while you are in the LuxuryExplorer.com portal; or via an LE availability request; or even if you book by telephone direct with the hotel (as long as you let us and them know that you found the hotel through LE).

Luxury Explorer also plants trees to offset our own carbon footprint, including all travel relating to reviewing and selecting hotel partners around the World.

How?

The idea is simple; 1 Room = 1 Tree means that every room night booked with LE results in a tree being planted on your behalf. Book a room for 7 nights at one of our hotels and we'll plant 7 trees. But Luxury Explorer is not content to simply 'trade' the carbon offset to some unknown third party.

For the same reasons we inspect each of our hotel partners, regularly visiting them to write our Top6Trips reviews, we also want to know that the trees we donate are actually planted and won't be bulldozed after a year or two. And when some of them are, necessarily, felled that the timber is put to good use. So we've decided to plant our own woods, using sustainable management techniques.

Luxury Explorer's first wood has been planted at Denhay Farm near Bridport, in the beautiful Marshwood Vale, Dorset, UK. Denhay is famous for its outstanding Cheddar cheese, air dried hams and bacons and, also, as a key supplier to Duchy Originals.

George Streatfeild, Denhay's managing director, shares Luxury Explorer's vision and passion for quality, service, environmental responsibility and accountability and is delighted to be LE's first partner. We will announce a second location for LE's second wood in 2011.

How does it work?

Planting trees is simple, nurturing them to maturity when they will have a positive impact on the environment is more complex. This is why Luxury Explorer wants direct control of the process.

LE leased land from Denhay Farms on a long-term contract and is planting designated areas with healthy saplings. Each acre comprises approximately 700 trees. When the each acre is fully allocated a further acre is planted and so on. By appointment, personal members of our 'Luxe-Trotters Club' (currently >1500 worldwide) can even visit the wood to see 'their' trees for themselves.

Over time, woodland requires careful management and after eight to ten years up to 50% of the trees will need to be removed as the wood is 'thinned', to allow the maturing trees to continue their healthy growth. However, by this point, the trees will be much more effective at absorbing carbon dioxide, so the eco-effect of the investment continues to improve. The felled trees will then be used to create a Luxury Explorer collection of furniture and accessories, such as picture frames, to be designed by famous designers.

Luxury Explorer plants only indigenous hardwood trees at Denhay: mainly oaks, beeches, cherry and some alder, for wetter areas. The cherry trees will be the fastest growing and the oaks the slowest, but this blended approach creates a balanced woodland area over the long-term.

During 2011 Luxury Explorer will choose other sites where the company can have similar direct access to the woodland or forest, while maintaining its need for fully audited planting and management.

For more information write to: contact@luxuryexplorer.com or visit Denhay Farm's website at www.denhay.co.uk