The UK Wedding Association (UKWA) has announced that The Wellbeing Farm in Lancashire has become the first business to achieve “Leading” status within its industry benchmarking framework.
The Wellbeing Farm achieved the highest score awarded to date under the UKWA framework, becoming the first wedding venue to exceed the 90% threshold while also meeting minimum standards across all three assessment pillars: Professionalism, Sustainability and Credibility.
The Wellbeing Farm was also the first independent wedding venue in the world to achieve B Corp certification, following years of work by founder and CEO Celia Gaze and her team to embed sustainability and ethical business practices into the operation of the venue.
Celia Gaze, Founder and CEO of The Wellbeing Farm, said:
“We are absolutely delighted with this recognition. Sustainability and responsible business practices have been at the heart of The Wellbeing Farm from the beginning, so achieving the first UKWA Leading status is incredibly rewarding for our whole team.
We’ve always believed that couples and clients should not have to choose between values, quality and experience. This recognition shows that it is possible to build a successful events business while remaining committed to sustainability, community impact and doing business responsibly.”
UKWA’s benchmarking framework was founded to help raise standards and transparency across the wedding industry, enabling businesses to measure and demonstrate operational standards in areas including sustainability, business practices, training, inclusivity, policies, customer transparency and credibility.
Alison Hargreaves, Founder of the UK Wedding Association, said:
“When we developed the UKWA benchmarking framework, the aim was to create meaningful standards that identify and promote strong professionalism, sustainability and credibility across the wedding industry. Our benchmarking framework now gives businesses a way to measure, quantify and demonstrate those values.
We’re delighted to see The Wellbeing Farm become the first business to achieve Leading status. As the first independent B Corp certified wedding venue in the world, they’ve consistently shown that sustainability, strong business practices and commercial success can go hand in hand.”
Set in the Lancashire countryside, The Wellbeing Farm has become known for combining sustainability with hospitality and distinctive event experiences, and recently featured on Channel 5’s Rich Wedding Poor Wedding.
Author: Sam Hyland
Sam is the assistant content manager for Event Industry News (EIN). Sam is involved in publishing news stories, videos and podcasts. Sam also collates the latest stories for the EIN e-newsletter. If you have a press release or story you think we might be interested to know about please email features@eventindustrynews.com
