What a genuinely local welcome looks like

Most premium holiday homes look after their guests well. Clean linen, a good kitchen, a bottle on arrival. Accreditation is not about any of that, because a comfortable house is the starting point, not the achievement.

What Immaculette accredits is the welcome. Specifically, whether the welcome is built from the place the property sits in, and whether the money that welcome generates stays in that place.

What we look at

• Who supplies the welcome. The bread, the eggs, the milk, the flowers, the beer. We want to see named local businesses, not a supermarket delivery.
• Who guests are introduced to. A property that hands over a list of chain restaurants is not giving a local welcome. One that can get a guest a table with a chef who cooks what the area grows is.
• What happens to surplus. Unwanted produce going to a food bank or a local charity is worth more than it costs, and it is the difference between a gesture and a habit.
• Whether it is repeatable. A single good week is not a standard. We are looking for arrangements the owner will still be running next season.

Why it is worth the effort

A guest who is shown the place properly remembers the stay, recommends it, and comes back. That is the commercial case, and it is real. The other case is simpler: roughly £127.5 million a year leaves local businesses that should be receiving it, and every accredited property pulls a little of that back.

What accreditation is not

It is not a listing. It is not advertising. It is a standard a property either meets or does not, checked against the people and businesses around it.

If you own a property you think already works this way, we would like to see it.