With a model that allows for buyers to specify their sustainability goals, hotels will be able to respond accordingly in their RFP process. Photo Credit: Adobe Stock/Kiattisak
As more travel programmes incorporate sustainability goals into their
supplier relationships, it's imperative that buyers have a
straightforward and open-source way to analyse the sustainability
performance of hotel suppliers.
A recent webinar hosted by the GBTA Foundation and World Sustainable
Hospitality Alliance delved into this topic, offering insights on how to
simplify the RFP process for both buyers and suppliers. This discussion
followed the June launch of the GBTA’s Sustainable Hotel Procurement
Standards.
“Both buyers and suppliers are feeling really bogged down in this
[sustainability] process,” said Kelsey Frenkiel, director,
sustainability programme at the GBTA Foundation. “We have corporate
travel buyers at a range of maturity levels in this process. We had to
create a model that was open source that everyone had access to.”
Varying priorities
The new standards offer buyers a comprehensive set of 50 questions to
evaluate hotels' environmental, social, and governance policies. These
include metrics on water consumption, food and beverage practices, and
the use of electric vehicles, among other sustainability factors.
“[Buyers] can choose what's important to them and hopefully it will
offer a more straightforward process,” added Frenkiel. “When you go to
RFP, your hotel suppliers will already recognise the questions that
you're going to ask and be prepared to respond to them.”
This fragmentation leaves business travel buyers unsure of the right questions to ask, while hotel suppliers are overwhelmed with sustainability questions.
Glenn Mandziuk, CEO, World Sustainable Hospitality Alliance
Glenn Mandziuk, CEO of World Sustainable Hospitality Alliance said
that one of the critical challenges facing the hospitality sector is the
lack of harmonisation with regards to sustainability.
“This fragmentation leaves business travel buyers unsure of the right
questions to ask, while hotel suppliers are overwhelmed with
sustainability questions,” he said. “Our industry's true downfall lies
not in speaking in the same language, but in hindering our collective
progress for sustainability.”
For buyers without dedicated support teams, analysing hotel suppliers' sustainability can be daunting.
“Sustainability is ever evolving with many terminologies – it’s
definitely a learning curve for buyers who might not be climate experts,
or who do not have the bandwidth or scale of a support team,” said Mark
Cuschieri, president, GBTA and global head of travel at UBS.
Sustainability is ever evolving with many terminologies – it’s definitely a learning curve for buyers who might not be climate experts, or who do not have the bandwidth or scale of a support team.
Mark Cuschieri, president, GBTA and global head of travel at UBS
Which metrics matter?
From a hotelier’s perspective, Denise Naguib, global vice president,
sustainability and supplier diversity at Marriott, said that
sustainability data has grown to an ‘incredibly broad set of questions’,
resulting in the biggest question from a supplier perspective being,
‘what are the metrics that actually matter’?
“Some customers are more focused on metrics like carbon and water,
while others are looking at volunteerism and human rights,” Naguib said.
“It can be very time-consuming for hotels to address these.
“Our goal is to continuously be more and more transparent with this
information, putting it in front of individual travellers, meeting
planners and the business travel community to leverage as part of the
decision-making process. That will be the signal and the driver for
increased impact in our industry.”