Tag: Travel Without Plastic

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512.460 INDIVIDUAL PIECES OF PLASTICS A YEAR

Imagine a hotel with 146 double rooms. Each guest uses 6 single-use plastic pieces for breakfast. With a 80% occupancy, this leads to 512,460 individual pieces of plastic in a year. And this is just from the breakfast service of one hotel… 

The example above was illustrated by Travel Without Plastic. For years, this social enterprise is guiding the tourist sector how to reduce single-use plastics. They provide toolkits, workshops and they do consultancy. We are a big fan of their work. Today, we share some successful strategies to reduce single-use plastics and meet hygiene expectations.

Hotel Jakarta, Amsterdam

SINGLE USE PLASTICS IN HOTELS

Many hotels still offer bathroom amenities, food and beverages in foam or single-use plastics. With the Covid-19 pandemic the use of unnecessary plastics seems to have increased. For example door seals or remote controls wrappers. What are alternative strategies? Jo Hendrickx, co-founder of Travel Without Plastic guides you through the following steps:

4 TIPS FOR HOTELS TO REDUCE SINGLE-USE PLASTICS AND MEET HYGIENE EXPECTATIONS

  1. Only provide what is necessary. Less is more. Most customers will bring their own bathroom amenities. Do people need shoe-shine? Or cotton-pads? Remove them or make them available on request.
  2. Embrace refills. Bottle your own (filtered) water and make them available for free or for sale. Choose reusable bottles and wash them daily to ensure hygiene. In addition, you can think of refillable soap and shampoo dispensers.
  3. Don’t just switch to other single-use products. Some hotels replace single-use plastics with other materials. For example, a wooden comb or natural sponge. However, when used only one time this does not reduce the overall waste. So again, ask yourself: is this product necessary? If so, consider alternatives. First of all, prefer materials that can be recycled. Furthermore, pay attention to ‘compostable’ products: are they certified ‘home compostable’ or ‘commercially compostable’? Without suitable composting facilities available, try to avoid these products.
  4. Clear communication. There is a ‘perception’ that single-use is more hygienic. But often the opposite is true. Any product or surface can be contaminated with germs. Try to communicate room cleanliness in other ways. For example in the booking confirmation. Or with a verbal explanation at check-in.
Substituting plastics for other materials is not always the best solution

REDUCING PLASTIC = SAVING MONEY

Following these four steps will not only reduce the waste stream, it can also save hotels a lot of money. Curious to find out how much? Or hungry for more tips? Then we recommend you to use the complete Travel Without Plastic guide and toolkit.

​GET IN TOUCH AND FURTHER READING ON REDUCING SINGLE-USE PLASTICS 

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6X PLASTIC FREE GUIDES

This month marks the 5th edition of the Plastic Diet Challenge in the Netherlands. Each week, we reveive tips and tricks how to avoid and reduce single-use plastics. Refilling your water bottle is one step, but there are many other products to tackle. Just look at your fridge or cosmetics. We love plastic-free tips & tricks. In today’s blog, we highlight a couple of interesting platforms and guides. 

1. TRAVEL WITHOUT PLASTIC

The Travel Without Plastic founder Jo Hendricx and her team created ‘Let’s Reduce Single-Use‘, a Toolkit to help hotels and accommodation providers reduce or eliminate single-use plastics and providing practical, affordable recommendations. Besides the toolkit, they offer a “Plastic Reduction Guide”, workshops and personalised support. Furthermore Travel Without Plastic has inspiring blogs and reports.​

Travel Without Plastic

​ 2. HET ZERO WASTE PROJECT

Dutch Sisters Nicky and Jesse Kroon live a zero-waste lifestyle. Step by step they managed to eliminate their waste stream, using the 5R-principle: Refuse, Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Rot. They wrote the practical book “Het Zero Waste Project” (in Dutch), opened their own sustainable lifestyle store called SMIR, maintain a blog, and keep an online overview of ‘bulk stores‘ in the Netherlands.

Het Zero Waste Project

3. SLO ACTIVE

This luxury swim wear brand recently updated their guide, titled Plastic Pollution: Single-Use Plastic Impact on our Oceans. It’s comprehensive, intensely detailing the facts and figures of plastic pollution, the impact on our oceans and marine life. The brand is inspired by the slow movement.

4. BETTER PLACES

Better Places is a sustainable travel agency. Practical tips and tricks how to avoid plastics, eat vegetarian and susainable hotels can be found on their website for each country in their portfolio (in Dutch).

Image: Better Places

5. MYPLASTICFREELIFE.COM

100 steps to a plastic-free life. Wow! This inspiring woman, Beth Terry, has been blogging for more than ten years and researching plastic-free alternatives (see her ongoing Plastic-Free Guide). She also enjoys reviewing alternative products from ethical companies. 

100 Steps to a Plastic-Free Life

6. CUSTOM EARTH PROMOS

Blogger Erin Pearson writes about simple lifestyle changes. Those small impacts can start to add up and make a difference. “These changes can be as simple as swapping one product on your next trip to the supermarket, choosing a responsible eco-friendly company over an oil-guzzling conglomerate, or simply reusing that coffee cup.” On the website Custom Earth Promos you find tips and tricks and a wide range of eco-friendly (packaging) products.

What is your favourite plastic free source?

There are hundreds of cool plastic free tips & tricks guides and zero-waste guru’s. We picked these 5 platforms, because we like them (we don’t receive commissions!). Please note we did not try to make a complete overview. Do you have another favourite plastic-free guide or guru? Leave your comment below. 

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