By Marnie McPhee
When visitors book a room at the Doubletree Hotel and Executive Meeting Center in Portland, Oregon, they may not be aware that they’ll be staying in one of the greenest hotels in the U.S. Then again, that may be exactly why they picked this Doubletree. A growing number of savvy guests choose this 476-room hotel in the bustling Lloyd District in the city’s inner east side precisely for its dedication to the environment.
While many hotels have taken the first baby steps toward sustainability, such as switching to compact fluorescent bulbs and low-flow water fixtures, usually they’re driven more by cost savings than a commitment to sustainability. This Doubletree Hotel, however, is implementing a substantive green transformation. They buy local organic fruits and vegetables and green cleaners, donate food and compost food waste, cut energy and water use, use environmentally sensitive landscaping, reupholster furniture or donate it to a low-income housing program, and empower employees to do even more.
The hotel is the first in Oregon to meet Green Seal’s standards, and the first to earn a “seal of sustainability” from the City of Portland’s green business program, BlueWorks Business.
Portland is a famously green city – sustainability permeates local, regional and state government, businesses and neighborhoods. Its Convention Center draws thousands of visitors annually, many of them to events focused on environmental topics. Why wouldn’t the center’s headquarters hotel mirror that commitment?
Doubletree’s program starts at the top, with management’s personal dedication to greenness, and it plays out hotel-wide. They’re proving that sustainability is good not only for the environment, but also for the bottom line, customer loyalty, and employee morale. “Thanks to a concerted and conscious effort by our entire hotel team, our ultimate goal is to become one of the most sustainable businesses not only in the Portland community but the hospitality industry as a whole,” says Steve Faulstick, General Manager.
First Steps to Greenness
Doubletree’s Environmental Purchasing Policy guides all purchasing decisions, and is overseen by an Environmental Compliance Steering Committee, or “Green Team,” which has been meeting since 2004. The goal is to “buy products and materials that are recyclable, made of recycled content and reduce waste. We work to mitigate fuel waste, and create demand for environmentally harvested products, by purchasing local products from like-minded vendors.”
All employees are fully engaged. “Nothing happens without the entire team believing it,” says Michael Luehrs, Director of Operations. “For instance, our composting program never would have been successful unless the prep cooks, dishwashers and servers hadn’t come on board first.”
Waste Reduction
Since 1996, the hotel has reduced its waste disposal volume by an impressive 65%. Recycling containers for paper, glass, aluminum, and plastic are in public areas, guest rooms, kitchens and offices.
The kitchen staff assiduously separate compostables (food scraps, including meat and dairy; wood; paper; and waxed-paper containers), increasing the volume of compostables from the original five to seven tons per month, to an average of 14 tons per month, and raising the ratio of compost to garbage to at least five to one.
To reduce waste, the kitchen also maintains small inventories, prepares appropriate amounts of food for conferences, serves high-quality leftovers in the employee cafeteria, and, through “Fork It Over!” donates excess packaged items (such as brown-bag lunches) to a local shelter.
Oregon Oil collects the hotel’s waste kitchen oil and sells it to companies producing biodiesel and other waste-oil products.
Packaging
Food service switched from single-serve to bulk containers for jams, sweeteners, creamers and more. In addition, per the purchasing policy, 75% of the products used in the hotel come from suppliers that deliver products in environmentally safe packaging and shipping containers, reuse them when possible, and collect them when they’re empty.
Sunshine Dairy and Medosweet Farms deliver their dairy products in reusable plastic crates. SYSCO Systems ships in cardboard totes; when possible, the hotel reuses them for shipping, while SYSCO picks up unusable totes for recycling. Larger shippers use and reuse pallets. Hotel policy prohibits regular suppliers from using Styrofoam packaging; staff is looking for a recycler to handle the Styrofoam pellets they receive from other sources.
Office Supplies/ Furniture
The purchasing department collects and recylecs used toner cartridges and buys paper with at least 30% post-consumer waste. A paper-saving program has reduced paper purchases by 20% a year.
Doubletree buys high-quality furniture that can be reupholstered, and other durable goods that withstand heavy use. The hotel donates outdated pieces to the nonprofit Central City Concern.
Energy
Since 1999, hotel engineers have invested over $245,000 in initiatives that have reduced energy use by 32%, and saved $360,000. Highlights include: Installing timers on storeroom light fixtures and motion sensors on meeting room light fixtures; Replacing less efficient magnetic ballasts with electronic ballasts, and incandescent bulbs with high-efficiency compact fluorescent bulbs; Converting bathroom lighting to high-efficiency T12 fluorescents; Replacing several motors, chillers and boilers with more efficient products; Replacing most of the hotel’s windows with Energy Star-rated models; Ensuring that all HVAC equipment, and equipment for offices and guest rooms, are energy-efficient. And the hotel buys 35,000 kWh of clean wind power annually from their electric utility.
Under the guidance of Faulstick, who serves on the Lloyd District Transportation Management Association, management has done the nearly unthinkable: eliminated the hotel’s airport shuttle service, and instead encourages guests to take the MAX light-rail trains that provide door-to-door service from the airport to the hotel.
The hotel also subsidizes employee mass-transit passes. That saves approximately 7,500 gallons of gasoline and 7,500 pounds of carbon monoxide per year.
Buying from local suppliers significantly reduces energy consumption and greenhouse gas output.
Water:
By installing low-flow showerheads in all 476 rooms, and replacing 200 toilets with water-conserving 1.6 gallons/flush units, staff has reduced total water usage by 15%. A Linen Reuse program gives guests the opportunity to use towels and sheets more than once before they’re laundered.
Urban Eco Systems is converting the hotel’s landscaping to water and energy conserving naturescaping.
Buying Locally
The hotel sources 65% of its food products from a 500-mile radius – an area that fortuitously encompasses some of the most productive and diverse farms and fisheries in the U.S.
Executive Chef Ward calls his approach “FLOSS: Fresh, Local, Organic, Seasonal, Sustainable.” He nurtures one-on-one relationships with his suppliers of seafood, dairy, meats, fruits and vegetables, herbs, jams, honey, and grains.
Green Cleaning/ Pest Control
The Doubletree works closely with Ecolab, the national firm that supplies the hotel’s cleaning and pest
-management products. The hotel uses only Green Seal-approved cleaners, paints, building materials, adhesives, laminated products, caulking compounds and office supplies. They also have embraced Integrated Pest Management, which chooses the least-toxic pest-control alternatives.
So Many Wins
The hotel’s managers are justifiably proud of their achievements, and promote the hotel’s sustainability program on its website, and in brochures, table tents, media releases, hotel tours, and a lobby display.
Customers are taking notice of the hotel’s actions. “We realized that there was a great market, of customers demanding sustainability,” Brecht says. “I can track $500,000 in convention business we’ve earned in just the six months since we got our Green Seal certification!” One of these delighted customers wrote: “I had no idea that the Doubletree was eco-conscious, and I applaud that.”
To engage guests even more, hotel management soon may offer a “green rooms” package, which would include a “back-of-the-house” tour. This eye-opening look into the hotel’s sustainability program already is wowing meeting planners, suppliers, and the media.
The program also fosters exceptional employee loyalty. “Our turnover rate is incredibly low – 30% vs. the industry standard of 60% – and we’re really proud of that,” Luehrs states. Brecht adds that, “Corporations try to create a system, such as badges and slogans, to boost employee morale, but I believe our employees have a sense of purpose and responsibility to sustainability and that has even more effective impacts.”
Brecht says, “We know we’re ahead of the pack, and we want to stay there. We’re looking for that next bar to go over.”
Luehrs lists their sustainability goals for the near term:
* Define the hotel’s carbon footprint (by the end of the third quarter of 2006), then reduce it.
* Switch guest rooms to “green rooms” featuring sustainable wool carpets, drapes, bedding and hard goods (early 2007);
* Gain LEED-EB (Existing Building) certification (mid-2008) – If they’re successful, it will be the first U.S. hotel to meet both Green Seal and LEED-EB standards;
* Complete the hotel’s naturescaping project (mid-2008);
* Provide guidance and leadership to Portland’s hospitality community to join their efforts and, in so doing, better position Portland as a ‘Green’ destination;
* Design a rainwater harvesting system to augment the city’s water supply and reduce storm water runoff;
* Generate electrical energy onsite by installing wind and/or solar power systems; Achieve zero landfill impact (by 2015).
Luehrs sparkles as he describes other possibilities, including loaning bikes to guests, and collaborating with the Portland, Oregon Visitor’s Association to create a “Green Familiarization” tour – an all-expenses-paid promotional trip to introduce meeting planners to sustainable hotels. “The more we do, the more we want to do,” he says. “But we are very careful about not over-promising or overstating how green we are.”
The team is eager to cross-pollinate ideas with others in the industry and community. For instance, during their annual “Green Month” in March 2006, the chef hosted guests and meeting planners at a “Green Table,” where he discussed the sources of the raw ingredients, which participants then turned into delicious meals.
Managers also tackle the misperception that sustainability is expensive. “It’s very different to think sustainability first, then profits will follow,” Luehrs says. “But that’s what we’re doing. We invested $245,000 to earn $360,000 in utility savings over a seven-year period. We understand the additional costs we experience today will equate to solid, quantifiable business returns as well as the less tangible benefits of the goodwill created with our clients and guests.”
And so far, the hotel has funded the sustainability program without taking advantage of local, state and federal incentives and tax credits.
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Marnie McPhee is a freelance writer in Portland, Oregon. She specializes in sustainability – recycling, composting, energy efficiency and renewable energy, organic agriculture, and green building.
Excerpted FROM In Business, September-October, 2006, a SustainableBusiness.com Content Partner.
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