Gourmet Garden Trails (Extension)

The Gourmet Garden Trails project has previously received SSF funding and completed delivery. However, in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic, Visit England have released additional funding to adapt existing projects to focus on the domestic market to drive recovery of the visitor economy. This funding offers the opportunity to carry on and add to the work previously delivered by the project.

The Gourmet Garden Trails extension will prioritise:

• Adapting product for and targeting the domestic market by capitalising on the growing trend for enjoying local food, local produce, and local landscapes, with a focus on wine and RHS partner gardens.
• Geographical and product expansion including East Sussex, with a focus on the South East.
• Developing further seasonal content to expand the year-round offer, supporting local business and jobs at a fragile time.
• Making the product self-sustaining through integration with VisitBritain’s Tourism Exchange Great Britain (TXGB) distribution platform for individual products and explore other third party booking partnerships for booking ‘packages’.
• Collaboration with Produced in Kent’s Support Your Local and Help Kent, Essex and East Sussex Buy Local campaigns, to cross promote and maximise benefits.
• Position Gourmet Garden Trails to be able to leverage more funding.

Sector Support Fund

The Sector Support Fund (SSF) was established to support one-off, discrete pieces of work of a pan-LEP nature with a sector focus that bring demonstrable benefit and which have support across the LEP area.

The SSF used Growing Places Fund (GPF) Revenue grant to fund a programme of works which supported the sector focussed activities being undertaken on a pan-LEP basis and which were predominantly led by the SELEP working groups.