APPARENTLY, when Bentley Motors says it will give special visitors and friends a taste of honey when they visit the Crewe plant, the carmaker isn’t speaking figuratively. True, it would allow guests a look into its delectable produce and the processes that created these, but it would also give them actual honey — you know, that gooey stuff made by bees and then stored in a jar.

This is because Bentley “adopted” bees which in May have chosen to live at the carmaker’s grounds in Crewe. The swarm of around 120,000 bees, since christened the “Flying Bees” (geddit?), have built hives in the area, and the honeycombs from these have now been collected by Bentley beekeepers. The Crewe bee crew, busy as ever, has then extracted and filtered the sweet stuff. The resulting harvest, coming from only two hives, has produced more than 100 decanted jars of honey.

The exercise is no mere whim. According to Bentley board member for manufacturing Peter Bosch, the Flying Bees form part of a wider program the carmaker is developing to “ensure that our site and business operations reflect our ambitions to become the most sustainable luxury automotive manufacturer.”

“We’re delighted that the initial stage of this project has been a success and we’re looking at installing more hives and increasing the amount of Bentley honey we can produce next year. We know that every little step helps to support local biodiversity and we have plenty more ideas in the pipeline to make sure we’re playing our part,” Bosch says.

Now Bentley being Bentley, the honey does not come stored in just any container the carmaker happened to find lying around. The jars and packaging reflect Bentley’s famous attention to detail, using a label created by Bentley interior designer Louise McCallum. The honey, after all, serves as a unique gift to special guests. Sweet.