Brewster Inn Blog

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When Governor Brewster lived here at the Brewster Inn in Dexter Maine, he had lilacs all around the property line. When he died, the lilacs were killed off by all the trees that started growing over a period of time.  In September 2010 once we had cut down a large amount of trees, we decided to start replanting the lilac hedgerows. No small task considering the size of property we have. We planted the first 24 bushes using 7 different varieties making sure that there was a sequence of different colours all along.

After a month of watering and a hard winter, we waited… and waited… and waited  for signs of life and sure enough buds started appearing about 2 weeks ago. Today i took a couple of photos to show their progress and it looks like in the next 2 weeks we will get lilac smell and colour! This is especially exciting as so many guests to the Brewster Inn have commented on the lilac smell all around when they used to live here in Dexter Maine.

The varieties planted are

Pocahontas

Ludwig Spaeth

President Grevy

Ellen Willmot

Primrose

Beauty of Moscow

James McFarlane

Mine have got a little way to go yet but all being well we should get some great colours and lilac smells this year before planting approx another 33 bushes at the same time this year that will cover along the back of our property.

Next post will be all about why the mechanical digger was in the garden today digging holes.

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Something i’ve always wanted is to get more international guests staying  at the Brewster Inn here in Dexter Maine. We’ve always had a small amount find us on the web each year BUT i wanted to work harder again to get more. In 2009 i signed up to be part of the contingent of attractions and accommodations group representing Maine  at the annual getting together  from all the New England States at the Discover New England international tourism summit where they all  promote their business and area in short 8min meetings to a large group of US and European based receptive and tour operators from countries such as UK, France, Italy and Germany.

The “buyers” as i’ll call them are broken into groups like the ” receptives” that are companies that make the tour packages for the trade such as Travalco AlliedTPro and Tourmappers . These are all  companies that the Brewster Inn has contracts with now to supply our product to the world tourism market.  There were many tour operators there too like  Bon Voyage and Audley Travel and America As You Like It 

Already in  3 summits as i’m now just back from the latest one held at the Omni Mt Washington resort in NH we have a total of 5 receptive contracts with hopefully a couple more contracts to come. The bookings are coming in with just last year alone about 40 room nights from the contracts that we now have. Each year should get better and better as following on from the 27 meetings that i had at this years summit, i’m now talking to the tour operators about who we have contracts with that they can buy from and what packages we are planning on putting together so that when guests come they can experience real Maine like moosewatching, white water rafting, snowmobiling or hiking to name just a few.

Attending the DNE summit as a small tourism related  business in Maine is a great way to network and show off our part of the USA to the world. Its hard work, takes a lot of planning but the long term benefits for the Brewster Inn could and hopefully will be significant. I’ll be at the next summit in 2012.