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Green Hotels
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From roadside motels to four-star luxury suites, green is fast becoming the color of hospitality. But it isn't always easy. We all play important roles in helping the lodging industry meet energy-saving goals.
Why should we help the lodging industry? Because its the fourth most intensive commercial user of energy in the U.S. And we're all footing the bill.
Patricia Griffin, President of the Green Hotels Association, helps the lodging industry reduce solid waste, pollution, and save water. She asks us to imagine changing our sheets and towels after every use, as is often the practice in over 54,000 hotels and motels in the U.S.
Griffin: Hoteliers around the world use millions and millions of gallons of water and tons of detergent washing towels and sheets that have only been used once, and none of us use towels and sheets just once at home.
Griffin says our decisions as customers make a major difference in the success of green programs.
Griffin: It's very important that hotel guests get involved. The power is absolutely, positively with the customer. If a customer will speak to the general manager or to the sales manager or write them a note, with compliments or comments recognizing a hotel's greenness or its lack, that hotelier is going to make greener decisions.
In Durango, Colorado, the Rochester Hotel is a charter member of Green Hotels Association. Co-owner, Kirk Komick, uses water-saving devices and linen cards, which give customers the option of reusing towels and sheets.
Komick: About 70% of our guests use the bed card and the linen card. That reduces our laundry expense significantly.
The Colony Hotel in Kennebunkport, Maine, welcomes guest participation in conservation methods. Lana Wescott, Director of Sales and Environmental Programs, looks for new ways to educate and involve the public in The Colony's sustainability practices.
Wescott: Each guestroom has a recycling bin and it has 4 different areas of recycling and, some of the people who come from different countries, they're just amazed to see that in their room and they're very receptive to it and a lot of our guest comment cards say, "Thanks for opening my eyes to this. This is a whole new world for me," and they're taking home that knowledge that they got while they were here.
The Colony Hotel is a leader in the green hotel industry. Their strategies include ecology tours, creation of wildlife habitat, grounds free of pesticides, plus an innovative composting program. Wescott also gives colorful information on the hotel's recycling program:
Wescott: This is certainly one area that everybody finds interesting… that we remake our former guestroom bedspreads and curtains into gift-shop collectibles for sale, so dog blankets are made, baby crib quilts and sheets. We take some of the old sheets and use them as kitchen aprons, so there are very unique ways that you can reuse items and things that you just normally wouldn't think of.
Can hotels save money with this philosophy? Wescott is definitive:
Wescott: Absolutely, we are, because we're being creative in the way that we do things. As I'm sitting here talking to you right now, my desk-top is actually an old door from a guestroom. We definitely see operational costs going down.
Griffin provides real numbers:
Griffin: The New Orleans Intercontinental Hotel decided to start recycling. Well, the very first month hotel management was absolutely astonished to find that separators were pulling $1,000 a month of hotel property out of the waste stream. They then went on to sell recyclables, they were earning 600 dollars a month, and their very first year they saved 79,000 dollars through recycling.
Green hotels also seem to attract more guests through assuming environmental responsibility. Komick believes it improves their bottom line:
Komick: By going green we've definitely used it as a marketing tool. We have a tremendous amount of repeat business at the hotel, and we get very, very strong feedback from our guests on our efforts, and they definitely appreciate it and definitely like being on board with helping the environment.
Money-savings and additional guests are not the only tangible benefits. Wescott spells it out:
Wescott: We have prevented over 60 tons of garbage from being dumped in our local landfill since 1993.
Komick gives hoteliers some parting advice:
Komick: Jump on board. It's a great marketing tool and it saves a lot of money.
At home or away, think green and ask for green services.
Visit our website www.gooddirtradio.org for green meeting planners guides and more ideas on making conservation a money-saving, earth-saving priority.
I'm Tami Graham and I'm Tom Bartels. Thanks for joining us on Good Dirt… Digging up Good News, for a change.
Promo: The lodging industry is the fourth most intensive commercial user of energy in the U.S. Did you know it's the traveler who has the power to change this?
Griffin: It's very important that hotel guests get involved. The power is absolutely, positively with the customer.
Whether you travel for business or pleasure, find out how much influence you have, and how the lodging industry has changed because of what we request.
Thanks for joining us on Good Dirt.... Digging up Good News, for a Change.
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