Sustainable operations

Sustainability at every level - for the environment

We want to lead the way and show that impact on the climate can be reduced even within large hotel operations. Therefore, all of our hotels are ISO 14001 certified.

Sustainability Rating

It's easy to talk about green ambitions, but in order to make a real difference you need a clear plan and concrete actions. Transparency is very important to us. That is why we are now introducing our own Sustainability Rating on our website.

The Sustainability Rating is presented on a 10-point scale and is a summary of how each hotel works to become better in specific areas of sustainability. Consumption within each area is measured individually at the respective hotel. Once a week, the results are summarised as a rating published on our website. Consumption is measured in a way that enables comparison with all hotels within Strawberry.

Performance indicators

The areas below have been identified as having the greatest impact on the climate within the hotel industry. We have therefore chosen to work with these areas in particular.

Energy consumption
Chemical usage
Water consumption
Refuse and food waste
Textile laundry
Carbon emissions

How it works

Each hotel makes an estimation of the expected consumption, based on the estimated occupancy. The actual consumption data is collected daily from suppliers, such as electricity providers and laundry services, and this is registered in a central system that generates a rating for each hotel. The system is transparent internally and hotels that still have quite a way to go on their sustainability journey can learn from hotels that perform better.

The way forward

Making the sustainability rating public is a major step forward. It gives our guests the power to make sustainable choices when choosing a hotel, and they are thus able to push for change. With the help of our dedicated core team, all hotels and not least the general public continue to develop our methods. Guests are already able to provide feedback and suggest improvements as part of their stay.

Energy

All hotels will be run on renewable energy.

Oil, coal and natural gas account for 75% of the world's energy consumption. This causes major climate emissions. Therefore, we have a goal to power all hotels with renewable energy by 2024.

Since 2007 we have purchased "renewable guarantees" from Ishavskraft in Norway. Wherever possible, we have switched to renewable energy sources. Several hotels have invested in geothermal and solar energy.

Chemicals

Dangerous chemicals to a minimum

All chemicals that we use are classified in red, yellow and green, depending on how much they affect people, animals and the environment. The hotels constantly work on reducing the use of dangerous red and yellow chemicals. Additionally, we are working with our suppliers to produce more environmentally friendly products and methods.

To reach our goal we review the daily usage of chemicals in all hotels. In Scandinavia several hotels have implemented ultra clean water and ozone water instead of chemical cleaning agents. This provides a safer work day, a cleaner environment and is working so well that we want to implement this in all of our hotels.

In the photo: Housekeeping at Quality Hotel™ Friends in Solna

Water

New technology reduces water consumption

For a large portion of the world's population clean water is only a dream. In the Nordics we do not have the same problem. We have plenty of fresh water, but that does not mean that we should not get involved in the issue.

Why is this important? While clean water is globally scarce, in the Nordics we want to reduce water consumption to lower the need for energy for heating and lower the need for chemicals for water purification.

What do we do? We continue our work by switching to water saving showers and sinks to lower the consumption as much as possible. The hotels are also working on overviewing their water usage procedures in the different departments.