MIDDLETON, WIS.—There is nothing fancy about the title—The Green Team—but the eight people who make up that group at The North Central Group, an owner/operator/developer of 27 Marriott, Hilton and Carlson properties in the Midwest and Southwest, are relentless about making sure each property is carrying out as many of the company’s 158 green strategies as possible. The Green Team consists of four people from the Middleton, Wis.-based company’s corporate office and four from individual properties. Each hotel’s green progress is rated using a score card consisting of the 158 green strategies that have been pulled together from other companies’ best practices throughout the lodging industry.
The Green Team was created in 2008. “That is when I joined the company,” says David Coe, facilities and purchasing manager for The North Central Group. “Our president wanted to take a more proactive approach toward sustainability.”
According to Michelle Schultz, regional sales manager with The North Central Group, each company hotel has its own green champion. That person is not someone who is assigned green champion duties but someone who is sincerely passionate about green. Initially, the green champion was assigned but Coe says he later learned that was the wrong approach. A bottoms up, rather than top down approach works best, he says.
Eight Areas Targeted for Improvement
Green champions at each property work on eight areas of improvement: energy, air, water, green programming, recycling, waste reduction, green meetings, and breakfast food and beverage. Quarterly, green champions are visited by a member of The Green Team to check on their progress. Each morning at each property, a morning huddle is used as a time to remind staff about green initiatives. Audits of all properties are combined to come up with an overall score. During April—Earth Month at The North Central Group—the company’s overall score jumped eight points.
Green initiatives at hotels range from white roofs to recycling to LED lighting. Coe says The North Central Group has a process by which managers at individual hotels apply for funding for green initiatives. The Green Team considers and approves these. Before any new product or technology is rolled out companywide, it is tested extensively.
“We really tested ozone laundry,” Coe says. “It did not give us the impact we had hoped for. We plan to test an energy-saving device for vending machines. We will identify one or two properties to test them for us.”
“A lot of initiatives start with a lot of enthusiasm but you can’t make rash decisions,” says Jeff Lenz, president and chief development officer for The North Central Group. “We are able to pick and choose where we want to test things.”
Where possible, The North Central Group takes advantage of rebates and other incentives.
“Focus on Energy in Wisconsin has been very helpful,” Coe says. “We also worked with the city of Madison (Wis.) on a signage project. In Arizona, we took advantage of rebates for some boilers.”
Rewarding Achievement
The North Central Group is currently looking at ways of recognizing green efforts at the property level. “We have had a green hotel of the year award,” Coe says. “It was presented at our annual meeting. It was a cash award.”
The North Central Group owns and manages 26 of its own properties and third party manages another. While none of the hotels in its current portfolio are LEED certified, Lenz says it is a goal of the company to achieve LEED certification the next time it builds a hotel.
“Financing is still difficult to achieve for new construction, he says. “It’s still a goal of ours to try to achieve our first LEED building.”
Go to The North Central Group.
Glenn Hasek can be reached at editor@greenlodgingnews.com.
