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Top award for Lancashire ‘glamping’ venue

A Lancashire holiday business has received a Certificate of Excellence from travel review website TripAdvisor.

Box Tree Farm in Wennington gained the award after receiving consistently positive reviews from customers.

Ian Armour from Box Tree Farm said: “The response from the public to the expansion of the ‘glamping’ site here at Box Tree Farm has been fantastic. Our bookings for 2014 are 50% better than last year, which were 50% better than 2012.

“It really is a success story for the farm and the local businesses that have benefited from the influx of people to the area.

“The help the Rural Development Programme for England has given us has allowed glampers, people who go glamping, to come to the Northern tip of Lancashire to experience all the great places and facilities we have to offer.”

Last year the farm introduced six new camping pods, to add to their existing four. They also made improvements to access and walkways on their site.

This work was funded thanks to £43,980 came from the North Lancashire Local Action Group.

Karen Kerrigan, Local Action Group development officer for Lancashire County Council, said: “We’re delighted to hear that Box Tree Farm is having a lot of success since they received LAG funding.

“Box Tree Farm is a great example of how this type of funding can help a rural business to develop in new areas. They’ve created new jobs and brought new overnight visitors into the areas, which benefits other local businesses.”

Local Action Groups are administered by Lancashire County Council. They help to shape local plans for rural areas of the county.

These groups use local knowledge to help develop and support sustainable economic opportunities for rural businesses, increase business start-ups and encourage the sustainability of existing micro-businesses.

They also encourage the development of biodiversity, renewable technology and bio-energy in rural areas.

Lancashire’s previous Rural Development Programme for England (RDPE) ran from 2007 to 2013. This programme will be evaluated during 2014 to see what worked well and what could be improved, before the new programme starts in 2015.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Simon Malia .