More hotels are making it easier for planners to incorporate a CSR element into their meetings by introducing programs and packages that involve charitable giving or community volunteer activities.
Among them is Kimpton Hotels’ new Great Meetings Great Causes program, which enables planners to pick two options from a menu that includes donations made by the hotel company in the group’s behalf to charitable causes such as Dress for Success and the Red Ribbon Campaign, or to environmental organizations.
“What we’ve found during the past two or three years is that interest has more than tripled among our customers to address these concerns,” says Jesse Suglia, director of hotel sales for Kimpton. “Planners are being asked by their organizations to come up with [CSR] solutions and this is a way to help them do it.”
According to Suglia, Kimpton’s CSR program is highly flexible, with planners able to choose the cause or organization they want to benefit. Hotels will also work with planners to organize volunteer efforts during the meeting.
“Our salespeople have complete leeway to work with planners in developing the program that’s right for them,” he says. “This is totally driven by the client and the cause they want to support.”
The response to the new program has already been enthusiastic, he adds.
“We’ve had a great response,” he says. “We’re seeing customers come to us that have not used Kimpton before.”
Ritz-Carlton Hotels and Resorts, which has long had an internal CSR program for its own employees called Community Footprints, recently extended the concept to guests by introducing Give Back Getaways. Designed for individual guests, the company plans to roll out a version tailored for groups this summer.
Available at all Ritz-Carlton properties, Give Back Getaways provides guests with opportunities to participate in volunteer efforts that are usually a half-day in length and vary by location. For instance, guests at The Ritz-Carlton, Cancun can work with marine biologists to help return nesting sea turtles to the sea, while guests at The Ritz-Carlton, Tysons Corner, located outside Washington, D.C., in Tysons Corner, Va., can work with psychologically challenged children at the nearby Rainbow Center.
“Our instincts tell us there will be a lot of interest [in Give Back Getaways] and we’re making it part of our culture and our brand,” says Sue Stephenson, vice president of Community Footprints at Ritz-Carlton headquarters in Atlanta. “Our guests tend to be very philanthropic and tend to do a lot of volunteering in their own communities.”
