Joe Andrick, general manager of True North Hotel Group’s Residence Inn by Marriott Kansas City Country Club Plaza and chair of the Hotel & Lodging Association of Greater Kansas City, did more than just advocate the association’s new green strategy for hotels earlier this year; he volunteered to be the first small business to say “yes” to green after being approached by a local college student group.
Andrick’s “practice what you preach” initiative turned three hours of a February Saturday into a project for a dozen college students who replaced the hotel’s incandescent light bulbs with 600 new fluorescent ones. Two months later, Andrick has already more than recouped the $1,500 he spent on the new bulbs, and he anticipates saving $1,000 per month going forward.
Andrick says that the light bulb replacement in his 106-suite hotel will create a 70 percent reduction in energy consumption, leading to annual greenhouse gas reductions of 150 pounds of CO2 a year per bulb. The light bulb change-out was a project of The William Jewell College Students in Free Enterprise team, which chose this project for their Sam’s Club Environmental Sustainability Challenge.
“As chairman of the Association this year, I thought I would lead by example,” said Andrick, who added that True North Hotel Group’s “Give Back” community service initiative was added inspiration.
Thank you to Dee Dee Dochen for sharing this story with Green Lodging News.
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