Green Initiatives

At a time when not a day passes without hearing something about global warming or the environment, The Berkeley team have come up with a fantastic idea.

Toni Martinez, purchasing manager and a passionate environmentalist, created and chairs the Berkeley's green committee: a steering group dedicated to implementing ways to carry out our business in an environmentally friendly way, reducing our carbon footprint and encouraging all staff within the hotel to put green issues firmly on the day to day agenda.

On Thursday, 12th July Toni and the Green Committee members put together a very special event in the hotel: in partnership with the kitchen brigade, they came up with a healthy and enviromentally friendly lunch for Time Out, our staff restaurant. A lavish buffet was on offer, sourced from organic supplier and prepared in a way that reduced our carbon emissions by preparing with zero energy use.

The team also took over the training room to meet and greet staff and show them other green initiatives currently being implemented across the hotel and creating awareness among all staff about the importance of enviromental issues and our individual impact.

To top it all, each member of the team was given a metal mug to take away and use while in the hotel. This mug now replaces all plastic cups used in the staff restaurant and it's embossed with an email address for staff to write and share their "green ideas" with the committee. Each and every member of staff also receive a free energy efficient lightbulb for their home.

Tony tells me that we used 8,000 plastic cups a week at a cost of £6,000 a year for the hotel. We now only provide glass cups in the restaurant for use during meal service and the new metal ones for "take away drinks". These cost £1,380 for 600 of them. You do the sums!

So, green initiatives are not only good for the environment but also for the health of your finance Directors.

There are many other examples of green initiatives in hotels and we are featuring a few examples of these in our video section:

Marriott's green hotels meeting program

Zero waste policy at the Boulder Outlook hotel

70 Park Avenue: An Eco friendly boutique hotel in Manhattan

Do you have any green initiatives going in your organisation? Why not share them with us.