It was such a great pleasure to have met my fellow industry colleagues and moderate the Sustainability discussion at HSMAI Chief Commercial Officers Roundtable together with my Sustainability colleague, Weixuan Yeh and Associate Professor Michael Kruesi from the Singapore Institute of Technology ( SIT) .
Here are some key takeaways and learnings:
🍀Sustainability is no longer a nice-to-have, but a must-have for venues and hotels to be the preferred choice for consumers. As such, there is a need to set common sustainability standards for the hotel industry through robust certification.
🍀Overall, customers are not willing to pay a premium for sustainability, but this may change with younger consumers being more conscious about their environmental impact. So it’s important for venues and hotels to align their efforts to meet customer expectations of sustainability.
🍀Sustainability Managers need to educate and engage team members on how to effectively communicate the venue’s sustainability initiatives to guests. They can also consider opportunities to incentivise guests to choose sustainable options through “reward” factor like loyalty programs.
🍀In addition, there should be efforts for Reputation Management before any new sustainability projects and initiatives go live, to avoid any backlash from customers.
