Hotel industry having a change of heart as businesses become more sustainable

Saturday, 16 November 2019

Wellington's Park Hotel has several sustainable features in their rooms

The days of mini shampoo bottles and wrapped soap are dwindling as the demand for sustainable practices has encouraged hotels to re-think what they offer customers.

Experts have noticed a shift in people's mindsets as there is an increasing demand for businesses to use, offer and make more environmentally friendly products.

Known as the business of consumption, hotel owners are having a change of heart with sustainable practices being incorporated into the visitor experience.

Pillows made from plastic bottles, harvesting water from the roof and re-purposing old products to decorate rooms are just some of the steps New Zealand hotels are making.

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Park Hotel's front office manager, Devvrat Kaushal, says the building itself was recycled - repurposed from a 1980s office building into the hotel.

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Kaushal says the hotel has taken steps through lighting, air conditioning and transport to be more eco-friendly.

What was once a 1980s office building on Wellington's Lambton Quay is now a hotel with an on-site gallery and two restaurants.

Park Hotel has a four-star rating, which means there are some things it still has to give guests such as toothbrushes and slippers.

It does not claim to be 100 per cent eco-friendly, but front office manager Devvrat Kaushal said the owners and management team had sustainability at the forefront of their thinking.

Sudima Hotel is the only New Zealand hotel chain to be CarboNZero certified.

The building itself has been 'recycled' into a hotel and guests had free access to bicycles and electric car charging.

The hotel's pillow and bedding supplier, Vendella, made its microfibre out of recycled plastic bottles, and Park Hotel had bought enough pillows to divert 20,862 plastic bottles from going to landfill.

'It's not just about business, but also about what you contribute to the environment… it's about making a difference in the long term,' Kaushal said.

With hotels in Auckland, Rotorua and Christchurch - Sudima Hotel is the only New Zealand hotel chain to be CarboNZero certified.

Vedika Jhunjhnuwala, environment and social advocate of Sudhima Hotels, says environmental practices are not just a 'nice thing to have'.

The hotel's environment and social advocate, Vedika Jhunjhnuwala, said its sustainable practices involved suppliers, staff and guests.

She said the company had been pushing isuppliers to know its environmental practices were not just a 'nice thing to have'.

The ultimate goal for Sherwood Queenstown is to have the only thing entering and leaving the place be guests.

'This is something if you don't have, we'll actually walk away and we're not afraid to make that change.'

Sherwood Queenstown directors Adam Smith and Sam Chapman.

At the end of the year, the company audits everything it does and makes a plan to reduce its carbon footprint and make more sustainable decisions.

Rooms at Sherwood Queenstown have wall linings made from carbon negative cork, carpet tiles from recycled fishing nets, furniture from recycled metal, kitchen and bathroom floor coverings made from recycled car tyres and curtains from upcycled woollen army blankets.

Each of its hotels has a group of volunteers who meet every month to talk about the environment, accessibility and what can be done to make the business more eco-friendly.

Associate Professor Shelagh Mooney says hotels that implement a raft of sustainability initiatives would give them a marketing advantage.

Designed with the environment in mind, the Sudima Auckland Airport Hotel harvests water from the roof and it is used to water gardens and flush toilets.

Last year, it banned plastic straws in all its hotels and planned to become single-use and plastic free by 2020.

Sommer Kapitan, a senior lecturer on marketing and retailing at the Auckland University of Technology, says there has been a deep systematic change in how business is done which went beyond consumer desires to be green businesses in New Zealand.

'We know people come to New Zealand for its beauty and its nature - we want to sustain for future generations … as a tourism provider, you're not making your business have longevity if you're not taking care of the environment and community that you operate in.'

Down south, a hotel called Sherwood Queenstown has the ultimate goal of having the only thing enter and leave the place is people.

One of the hotel's directors, Sam Chapman, said a lot of people came to Queenstown because of its natural environment.

'There was a desire to recognise that and to see if we could operate our business in a way that had the utmost respect for that - and ideally, leave it better than we found it,' Chapman said.

Hotels were businesses based off consumption which inevitably created waste, he said.

When the hotel was being set up, it used an existing building and refurbished the rooms with wall linings made from carbon negative cork, carpet tiles from recycled fishing nets, furniture from recycled metal, kitchen and bathroom floor coverings made from recycled car tyres and curtains from upcycled woollen army blankets.

'It's really motivating as a team to try and find the next threat - we've taken a big push this year to measure our performance which is pretty essential … it's about continuous improvement.'

Associate Professor Shelagh Mooney from the Auckland University of Technology's hospitality department said there was a growing body of research which showed any hotel or organisations that implement a raft of sustainability initiatives and philosophies would give them a marketing advantage.

When it came to New Zealand, there were Māori principles embedded in many of practices and she wanted to see this built upon in the hospitality and tourism industries.

'The Māori ideas of stewardship, of being at one with the environment, of a holistic overview of community values and a collective of looking after each other and looking after the environment - that's massively powerful.

'I would love to see the more widespread adoption of Māori principles of partnership, stewardship and manaakitanga imposed … we know the Western model is flawed and is based economic gains - we have a unique opportunity in this country to really build on those strong indigenous foundations of knowledge.'

Sommer Kapitan, a senior lecturer on marketing and retailing at the Auckland University of Technology, said there had been a deep systematic change in how business was being done which went beyond consumer desires to be green.

The change stemmed from a business to business level - with people in the hospitality industry turning to their suppliers with green products in mind.

Being environmentally conscious was a growing part of the market and people were no longer tolerant of businesses who did not practice what they preached, she said.

'Businesses know they can't fake it because consumers have more power now and that's partially due to the rise in social media.'

'It's about getting the attention of customers by offering something different - it shows you're different and stand out and makes me feel better about a purchase because it aligns with my values.'