I see this all year round in our industry and especially this year given the pandemic but the number of acts of kindness is never ending. That is why I love this industry so much—its heart is gigantic. I could list many examples here but here is just one I learned about this morning. In advance of the Christmas holiday, Caesars Entertainment, Inc. leaders and volunteers plan to distribute 20,000 frozen turkeys and festive cookies to Las Vegas Team Members in a contactless drive-thru outside the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino throughout the week. In the spirit of holiday giving, Caesars...

I am currently working on an article on the Hotel Marcel. It is expected to open next year in New Haven, Conn. The hotel will have many unique features—net-zero energy, LEED Platinum, etc. One of the most unique features about the hotel is that it is expected to be the first Passive House certified hotel in the United States. I just came across the certification in another article I read so I thought I would share a bit about the certification. The Passive House certification program is run by PHIUS (Passive House Institute US, Inc.) It is a nonprofit 501(c)(3)...

In June I posted an article about The Red Sea Development Co. (TRSDC), the developer behind one of the world’s most ambitious tourism projects. The project is being developed over 28,000 square kilometers of pristine lands and waters along Saudi Arabia’s west coast and includes a vast archipelago of more than 90 islands. TRSDC just announced it has awarded its highest-value contract to date to a consortium led by ACWA Power to design, build, operate and transfer The Red Sea Project’s utilities infrastructure. The contract marks a significant step forward for The Red Sea Project, establishing it as the region’s first tourism...

Caesars Entertainment, Inc. has published its 2019-2020 PEOPLE PLANET PLAY Report on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). PEOPLE PLANET PLAY is the framework underpinning Caesars Entertainment’s CSR strategy, addressing the ways in which Caesars makes a positive contribution to people, the environment, and communities through its business and responsible conduct. The circumstances for this report are unique. It encompasses the time during the merger of Caesars Entertainment Corp. and Eldorado Resorts, Inc. that created Caesars Entertainment, Inc. and the COVID-19 pandemic that resulted in property closures around the country for several months and a return to work with new protocols and...

Nephros, Inc., a commercial-stage company that develops and sells high-performance water purification products and pathogen detection systems to the medical and commercial markets, announced the results of a study this summer of water safety issues in light of the COVID-19-related nationwide shutdown. As further described in a new academic paper available on the biology preprint site bioRxiv, from Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Nephros collected and analyzed 88 water samples from a variety of occupied and unoccupied buildings, using its SequaPath pathogen detection system. Key takeaways from the study include: Bacterial counts in unoccupied, underused building plumbing systems were significantly higher—between...

When cleaning your guestrooms after a guest has left pay special attention to the linens. In case you missed it, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last month released the results of some Chinese researchers indicating significant spread of the Coronavirus on sheets and pillow cases by presymptomatic travelers—a very good reason not to used shake linens upon removal from a bed. The researchers studied two travelers who had been transferred to a hotel for a 14-day quarantine. They stayed at the hotel for just one night before being transferred to a hospital after symptoms began to appear. Approximately three...

Different companies and associations have been implementing programs to help bring back meetings to their hotels. The CEO of Wynn Resorts recently talked about creating safe zones. The California Hotel and Lodging Association just released its “Clean + Safe Guidance for Meetings and Events,” providing COVID-19 health safety protocols for California hotels as they prepare to reopen for individual meetings and events. The Guidance incorporates recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the California Department of Public Health and Cal/OSHA and is aligned with CHLA’s guidelines for individual travel that was issued in April. The 11-page Guidance focuses on...

RAJA, Europe’s No. 1 packaging supplier, recently studied which countries are winning the war on municipal waste—an important study given that global waste is predicted to grow by 70 percent as soon as 2050. RAJA explored the municipal waste of 29 countries over five years to find out how they handle their waste, and whether they have been able to reduce it year-on-year. You can check out the study yourself here but here is what I found to be interesting: The world leader in recovered waste is currently Switzerland, recovering 100 percent of their municipal waste. However, this is...

Montalba Architects, the Santa Monica, Calif. and Switzerland-based architecture firm, recently completed three new Swiss projects, including newly imagined accommodations for the hospitality-concept, Whitepod. The new Whitepod eco-chalets, which are ideal for group and family travel, are equipped with modern conveniences and minimalist, sustainable design that allows the alpine landscape to take center stage. “Heritage and craftsmanship are at the heart of design, so we give considerable attention to making sure local, timeless materials are incorporated into each project to create a continuation of a user’s experience with both the space and the region as a whole,” says Founding Principal...

Can the lodging industry learn a few lessons from Walmart? So far there has not been a lot of zero emissions goal setting in our industry at the company level. A search on Green Lodging News produced an article from 2017 that details the plan of Vail Resorts, Inc. It has committed to zero net emissions by 2030. In the last two weeks Walmart announced a target of zero emissions across its company’s global operations by 2040. Walmart also announced it had committed to help protect, manage or restore at least 50 million acres of land and one million...