Community is one of those words that everyone thinks they understand. For centuries, it was easy enough: a community was the collection of people you could see from your front door, the neighbours you nodded to on your way to market, the congregation that filled the pews on Sunday. Community had edges: hedgerows, parish boundaries, limits of how far you could walk in a day.
But today, community no longer simply obeys fences, footpaths or even families. It doesn’t exist only in village halls or around parish noticeboards. It also lives in podcasts and LinkedIn posts, in shared ambition and exchanged ideas. At Oxygen Conservation, I’ve come to realise that we are living proof of that evolution. We’ve just broken 12,000 followers on LinkedIn and passed 100,000 YouTube views for The Shoot Room Sessions. It’s an overwhelming reminder that so many people care, and I feel humbled and grateful beyond words by that signal. It tells me that the community we’re building stretches far beyond the 12 estates we manage. Our community doesn’t end at the edges of our land – it extends across oceans, into homes, workplaces, and imaginations all over the world.
From Estates to Ecosystem
When we buy land, we do it to restore, regenerate, and reimagine what’s possible for nature in the UK. Leighon, Mornacott, Dorback, and Esgair Arth – these names have become the chapters in our story of Scaling Conservation. But the land is only the canvas. The true art is what happens when people gather around that work. On our Estates, we’ve invited in communities. Sometimes literally; by opening gates, hosting school groups, or welcoming walkers back onto landscapes long since closed. Sometimes metaphorically – by sharing our work in radical transparency, publishing first drafts of ideas, and inviting feedback even when we know it might sting. We’ve always said: we will listen, even if we don’t always agree.
That attitude has built trust. And trust is the foundation of every real community.
Digital Doors Wide Open
When we turned our Shoot Room into a podcast studio, we closed the doors to the sporting enthusiasts who once visited our estates annually, and instead opened them to a new kind of community – viewers and fans of the show who now join us weekly in their thousands. We didn’t do this to become broadcasters; we did it because we knew storytelling had to become part of Conservation. If the natural capital economy is the fastest game on earth, then we need a commentary team to match. The Shoot Room Sessions has become that voice: a place where we share not just polished strategies but honest doubts, difficult trade-offs, and the behind-the-scenes thinking that most businesses hide.
Global Community for Local Impact
One of the most surprising, and frankly humbling, aspects of our growth has been the international attention. The USA has become a particular hotspot of interest. Maybe it’s the scale of landscapes there. Maybe it’s the culture of backing bold ideas. Ultimately, it’s perhaps not such a surprise — our love of American sport and tech startups means our brand often speaks more naturally to USA culture than to the UK.
But what has genuinely broadened our perspective is the momentum building across Europe. We were recently invited to the Netherlands to deliver the keynote address at the IPE Real Assets Conference, speaking to some of the most influential investors shaping global capital flows. And in just a few weeks, we’ll be travelling to Sweden to give a lecture at the University of Gothenburg, sharing the evolution of natural capital as a credible, investable asset class.
Whatever the reason, we now find ourselves in dialogue with investors, ecologists, and entrepreneurs across the Atlantic and across Europe who want to learn from what we’re doing, and increasingly to invest in it.
That’s community too. Not in the old sense of borrowed sugar, but in the modern sense of shared ambition. The ambition to make conservation not just possible, but profitable. To prove that protecting nature can compete with the best ideas in Silicon Valley, the sharpest deals in the City of London, or the boldest plays on Wall Street.
Pride in the People
If there’s one thing I feel most proud of, it’s not the acres acquired or the records set for carbon credit prices. It’s the people who make up this community. The Oxygen Conservation team itself – recruited with care, trained like elite athletes, challenged and supported in equal measure – are the beating heart of our work.
But around them, a wider circle has formed: our podcast listeners, our LinkedIn network, our investors, our neighbours, critics, collaborators, and even our fiercest detractors. They are all part of the same ecosystem. Some cheer us on, some push us harder, some call us out. But every one of them keeps us sharp, honest, and focused.
Redefining What Community Means
I sometimes think about how odd it would sound to a landowner a hundred years ago if you told them their Estate would one day host a community that existed online, stretched across continents, and measured its engagement not in cups of tea but in podcast downloads. Yet here we are.
The myth of community is that it needs a shared geography. The truth is that it needs a shared story. At Oxygen Conservation, our story is one of urgency, ambition, and belief. Urgency because the biodiversity and climate crises are accelerating. Ambition because we aim to manage a billion pounds of natural capital by 2030. Belief because we know conservation can scale if it stops apologising for wanting to compete. That story has resonated. And in resonating, it has built a community.
Looking Forward
Crossing milestones like 12,000 followers and 100,000 views is energising, but they’re just markers on a longer journey. What excites me most is imagining where this community can go next. How do we use this platform not just to celebrate success but to accelerate action? How do we turn attention into more acres, likes into better livelihoods, followers into fellow adventurers on the road to a wilder, better future.
We talk often about Scaling Conservation. And that also means scaling a community. Every acre restored is an invitation. Every podcast episode is a door opened. Every social post is a signal to anyone, anywhere, who wants to be part of something bigger.
A Final Reflection
I take enormous pride in what we’ve built together. Pride not just in the landscapes we’ve begun to restore, but in the network of people who believe in our mission. Pride in the courage it takes to think differently, in the resilience to withstand criticism, and in the generosity of those who’ve joined us – whether in person, online, or in spirit.
Community, in the Oxygen Conservation sense, is not defined by borders but by belonging. Not by where you live, but by what you live for. And if the last few years are any guide, this is just the beginning.
Perhaps the truth is; we’re not just rewilding land, but the idea of what community can be.