<
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/30/travel/disposable-hotel-slippers-sustainability.html>
"In November, managers at the Arenas del Mar resort near Manuel Antonio
National Park in Costa Rica, challenged employees to come up with ways to
operate more sustainably. The maintenance crew suggested electric locks on
guest room doors. The food and beverage department proposed making jams from
fruit peels. And the housekeepers advised: Ditch the slippers.
“It didn’t make sense because you use them once and throw them out,” said Hans
Pfister, the president and co-founder of Cayuga Collection, the hotel group
that manages the resort, which took housekeeping’s advice. “It’s very
wasteful.”
Like plastic straws and mini bottles of shampoo, disposable slippers — flimsy
models usually made of plastic and fabric, and often found bedside at turndown
or bagged in hotel closets — are the next single-use item in the cross hairs of
sustainability activists.
“Anything single-use is problematic,” wrote Willy Legrand, a sustainable
hospitality expert and a professor at the IU International University of
Applied Sciences in Bad Honnef, Germany, in an email. He cited the large
footprint of a small slipper once you factor in production, shipping and waste.
Single-use slippers, he said, “feel out of place and out of touch.”
Nina Boys, the vice president of sustainability for Beyond Green, a group of
hotels vetted for their sustainability practices, called slippers “low-hanging
fruit” in the fight against plastic."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
