Monthly Archives: December 2011

Australian Amenity Company wins award at IHMRS & BDNY

Concept Amenities, a global leader in the supply of environmentally responsible guest bath amenities, received the Editors’ Choice Award, for their Jean-Michel Cousteau collection of hotel guest amenities, during Opening Ceremonies of the 96th annual International Hotel, Motel + Restaurant Show® (IHMRS) and 2nd annual Boutique Design New York (BDNY), Sunday, November 13, 2011, at New York City’s Jacob K. Javits Convention Center.

The Awards recognize best new products within the categories of design, equipment & supplies, guest amenities, tabletop, and technology, as well as an eco-friendly equivalent to each of these categories.

Editors from leading hospitality trade publications reviewed nearly 150 submissions of the latest products for the industry, and selected winners based on innovative product design, how a product answers a particular industry need, creative use of material or construction, and development or use of a new technology.

Judges for the 16thannual IHMRS Editors’ Choice Awards were Michael Birchenall, Foodservice Monthly; Kris Burnett, Hospitality Upgrade; Glenn Hasek, Green Lodging News; Fred Klashman, Total Food Service, Dennis Nessler, Hotel Business; Michelle Renn, Hotel Online; Andrew Sheivachman, Hotel Management; Len Vermillion, Lodging; Ed Watkins, Lodging Hospitality; and Jeff Weinstein, HOTELS.

Read full article

Housekeeping. The heart of hotels

So you think housekeeping is a dead-end job? Well, think again. It puts you at the profit centre of the hotel and can be a fast route into senior management. Ben Walker reports.

Today, Vivien Sirotkin is at the top of the corporate ladder. As director of hotel operations at Q Hotels she is one of a relatively small number of UK female board directors (only 12% of UK company directorships are occupied by women and that percentage drops to just 6% in the hospitality sector, according to People 1st).

During a glittering career of high achievements she was the first woman to manage a five-star hotel in Europe (Gleneagles 1988-1991), the general manager of Cliveden (2001-2) and vice-president of Guinness Enterprise Holdings USA (1991-2).

The secret of her success? She insists that much of it is down to her housekeeping background: “A start in housekeeping is as good a start as you’ll ever get in hotels. Cleaning rooms is hard work and if you can motivate and manage a housekeeping team, then you can probably motivate anyone.” Vivien’s view wouldn’t be so surprising were it not for housekeeping’s persistently lowly ‘Cinderella’ status within the industry.

While Vivien was finishing her degree in hotel and catering administration at Surrey University, an international hotel company made a recruitment visit. With blatant discrimination they said they were only looking for one male trainee (“I was very upset about that,” she remembers) but added that there was a trainee opportunity in housekeeping.

Read the full article

 

 

New product from Gilchrist & Soames

For the environmentally conscious out there, Gilchrist & Soames have added a new product to their range, the BeeKind ™ paper bottle.

The BeeKindTM Collection paper bottle is a 59% reduction in packaging material by weight and a 92% reduction in waste space compared to rigid plastic bottles. With honey and certified organic extracts of red clover, calendula, lemongrass and chamomile, BeeKind is soothing and stylish.

For more information contact Amenities Australia at sales@amenitiesaustralia.com

Sala Bai charity night raises another year of tuition for young people in Cambodia

Lycette & Associates was present at the Friends of Sala Bai charity night on 29 November. It was a fun night to catch up with colleagues and friends and help raise essential funds for the Sala Bai Hotel School in Siem Reap, Cambodia. Associates Ariane Lellmann, Tim Millett, Principal Liz Lycette and Business Development Manager Josephine van Damme were there to enjoy the night.

Friends of Sala Bai Australia is a not-for-profit organisation supported by individuals, companies and other community based organisations whose sole purpose is to raise funds in support of Sala Baï. Each year, the school, trains 100 young disadvantaged Cambodians to the four main professions of the hospitality industry: restaurant waiter/waitress, cook, receptionist & housekeeping attendants. During the 12-month training, the school covers all the training fees (lessons, school supplies, books, uniforms), and daily expenses (accommodations, food, bicycle, insurance and medical expenses) for the students.

The training lasts 11 months from September to July.  The 12th month, August, is dedicated to assist the students to find their first employment.

Every year The ‘Friends of Sala Bai Australia’ pledge $50,000. This money will cover the fees for the students for 1 year as mentioned above. The organisation raises funds and support for Sala Bai Hotel and Restaurant School on an ongoing basis. The students of the Blue Mountains International Hotel Management School are a major contributor to the Friends fundraising activities and they presented the friends of Sala Bai with $ 25,076.00. All present on the night contributed to this wonderful cause by buying raffle tickets, wine and champagne during the special wine auction. Everyone was a winner in the raffle and Fritz Gubler donated his wonderful new Champagne books, everyone received a copy and everyone made a donation. They raised $ 26,315.00 on the night and with the funds from the Blue Mountains Hotels School the friends of Sala Bai were able to fulfill their pledge. There are now enough funds for another year of tuition.

We look forward to the next Sala Bai event. For more information on the Friends of Sala Bai Australia visit: www.friendsofsalabai.org or the Sala Bai Hotel School visit www.salabai.com

Michael, Josephine, Ariane, Liz, Tammy and Tim

Tammy, Ariane, Tim Liz, Josephine and Michael

 

 

A Thanksgiving message from Clean the World – 9 million bars of soap distributed

Clean the World reflects and gives thanks for the incredible movement that has begun and the results it has achieved.

To date, millions of bars of soap have been collected and distributed by Clean the World and our more than 1,200 hotel partners across North America — more than 9 million bars of soap to be exact!In 2009, we set out to solve a problem: How do we prevent partially used hotel soaps and bottled amenities from being discarded in landfills, and instead distribute these lifesaving hygiene products to those in desperate need all around the world? Little did we know that in solving this problem, together with the worldwide hospitality industry, we would lead a Global Hygiene Revolution! The industry has responded in an incredible way. And we are thankful!

And in establishing our leadership in this field as the first and foremost recycler of hotel amenities, we have learned about individual hospitality industry efforts, such as Rosen Hotels in Orlando, Fla., with their in-house program that delivers recycled soap to Haiti.

Most recently, the Hilton Worldwide – Global Soap Project social enterprise has been formed to ensure that Hilton soaps are recycled and distributed to those in need on a regular basis. This is great news for the children and families who will receive recycled soaps. Our efforts created demand for these hygiene products, and success always invites imitation.

Clean the World has also collected and either recycled OR re-purposed and re-distributed more than 500 tons of plastic bottled amenities from North American hotels. And so many more hotels are making it a regular practice to partner with local shelters, missions, and food kitchens to make sure that all of those little bottles of shampoo and bath gel that still have product in them, are being used to the final drop.Ladies and Gentlemen- We have started a Global Hygiene Revolution! And hotels across North America are now faced with awonderful decision: to recycle their soap and bottled amenities after use or send them to landfills. Why is this a “wonderful” decision? Because as the tremendous, positive response continues, it will lead to more children receiving soap worldwide!And the revolution is still in its infancy. We’ve only just begun. In 3 years, Clean the World’s soap distribution efforts (9 million bars) combined with others such as Global Soap (150,000 bars) have no doubt resulted in an incredible amount of recycled bars of soap delivered to children and families around the world. But in that same time that we have operated, more than one Billion bars of soap have landed in North American landfills. Yes, Billion with a “B”! And millions of pounds of plastic have unnecessarily arrived there as well.We cannot stop what we have started! We must continue to adopt and implement soap and plastic bottle recycling programs. Some may say that these programs come at a cost and therefore cannot be implemented today. Indeed there is a cost to participate: from the time and talent it takes each housekeeper, every day to collect these items, to the $0.02 per day cost to operate Clean the World’s Hospitality Recycling Program OR the shipping and material cost to operate other programs.If you cannot justify the expense today, please budget for it in the future. For such a small financial outlay, these programs are making an incredible impact! As one who has had the privilege and honor of personally delivering tens of thousands of bars of soap to children in tent cities in Haiti and in homeless shelters across the United States, the impact is being felt and is realized daily!We call upon the global hospitality community to keep the movement strong! One way to do so is for all hoteliers, meeting professionals, and soap and bottle recyclers to continue to communicate the impact that we are all making. Communicating quantifiable results to the industry and public is a great way to do this. It is one of the most effective ways to create awareness and drive positive results from our collective customers. Clean the World will begin posting on the home page of our site the actual amount of diverted landfill waste (soap and bottled amenities), as well as the amount of recycled and distributed hygiene products.And in December, in addition to regular Impact Statements provided to our hotel and meeting professional partners, we will provide our partners web tools to assist in effectively displaying and communicating the actual sustainable and socially responsible impact that they have made.In 3 years, and with 1.7 million pounds of inbound product collection, Clean the World has processed and distributed more than 85% of the collected product with outbound trucks, pallets and boxes of product daily! On behalf of those receiving the soap and bottled amenities that we deliver, we applaud Clean the World hotel partners and all who are using some method to recycle these desperately needed hygiene products. And we offer special thanks to the more than 5,000 volunteers who have dedicated their time and talent to make Clean the World a success in such a short period of time.Thank you to the Clean the World Hospitality Partners who have joined, and continued to join, our Global Hygiene Revolution: Walt Disney World Resorts, Central Florida Marriott Business Council, The Peabody Orlando/ Memphis, and Caesars Entertainment; Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, Carlson Hotels, Best Western International, Marriott Vacation Club International, and Joie de Vivre Hotels; Mandarin Oriental, Larkspur Hotels,  Preferred Hotel Group, Lakeview Hotels and Resorts, and Bellstar Hotels and Resorts; Canalta Hotels, Concord Hospitality, Hersha Hospitality, Kana Hotel Group, and Kelco Management; Wynn/ Encore, Venetian/ Palazzo, The City of Laguna Beach, Calif., and the Las Vegas Strip; all of the Meeting Professionals, the 165 individual Marriott properties, the 100 individual Wyndham Worldwide properties, and the 100 individual Hilton Worldwide properties; Gilchrist & Soames, Marietta Corporation, and LATHER.

Now, look what you’ve done!

Happy Thanksgiving,
Shawn Seipler
CEO, Clean the World

For more information on Clean the World visit www.cleantheworld.org or email info@cleantheworld.org

  

 

 

 

 

 

Bali December Housekeepers workshop

Earlier this month Agnes and Liz conducted the first ever 2 day Housekeepers seminar in Bali through the Bali Hotel Association. The Housekeeping Management Skills Training workshop focused on “profit and people” with the 35 participants coming from all over Bali; large 5 star Hotels, smaller 3 and 4 star operations and villas.

Some feedback after the 2 days included such comments as

“It was great workshop – lots of ideas, best practice, informative and useful, everyone was fantastic”
“zillion thanks to Liz and Agnes for great knowledge sharing 2-day workshop.”

The Housekeeping Managers now have a full tool box to complete their action plans and implement changes in their operations. Everyone particularly enjoyed the opportunity to network and share ideas.

Agnes used her fluent Bahasa Indonesian to guide the participants along, also helped with the handouts being in English and Indonesian.

L&A look forward to conducting more workshops in 2012 partnering with the Bali Hotel Association including a planned Supervisory Skills workshop for Rooms Division which will be conducted entirely in Indonesian.

For more information on housekeeping workshops contact Josephine van Damme by email josephine@lycetteandassociates.com or visit our

website http://www.lycetteandassociates.com/housekeeping-courses-training

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mandarin Oriental Hong Kong Christmas decorations

The Mandarin Oriental in Hong Kong always has amazing Christmas decorations and this year is no exception. I like to share this this picture with you.

UKHA events for 2012

2012 bookings so far

  1. 24 January –Share knowledge day
  2. 7 February – County Linen – Gina Good Hall
  3. 13 March—TBA
  4. 10 April -   Calibre
  5. May  WGC
  6. 12 June —The Grove – Sponsored by the Hotel
  7. September – BBQ – Royal Jersey
  8. October –  Business Lunch
  9. November— Christmas Fair
  10. December – Dinner dance

NEW = Hotel Olympic—Sponsored by Calibre and Richard Haworth (Oct TBA)
Summer Ball – 20 June 2012 – De Vere Oulten Hall Hotel, Leeds – Hosted by the Northern Region

For more information visit www.ukha.co.uk

SEQPHA November Breakfast at Jupiters

It was a great breakfast at Jupiter’s and a big thank you to Sheila who hosted the morning and kindly filled in for Libby who is on a Managers conference.  Thanks also goes to Mark Glancy from D-Tec for giving an informative talk on bed bugs and to our guests, Sandy Sneddon and her husband Ian who take the Leukaemia patients and parents out every Wednesday night in Brisbane for dinner, they do such a wonderful job, it is an escape from the Hospital walls, and they get to meet other families in the same situation.  Sandy thanked SEQPHA for the support – SeaWorld tickets, Currumbin are putting on a night for the families, Versace have given a complimentary High Tea for a patient to use and Dreamworld offered a family to have the Breast Cancer breakfast last month and to stay in the park for the day.

Ken Holmes from Currumbin updated everyone on the Koala situation, and pointed out that SEQPHA have contributed over $5,000 to the park.  There is a surprise for Libby when she returns from Boot Camp.  The next baby girl Koala to be born will be named Libby!

Finally a big thank you to the suppliers for donating prizes for the raffle, SEQPHA raised over $300 for charity. The sponsors were Sewroo, Sandy Sneddon, Burleigh Textiles, Coomera Laundry, Frenkel Textiles, White Magic, and AHS.

 

 

Housekeeper development workshops in Dubai and Abu Dhabi

Development programme for Housekeeping Managers 

Take note: L&A’s popular Housekeeper development programme is scheduled to be held in Dubai and Abu Dhabi this month.

This programme will benefit Executive Housekeepers, particularly those newly appointed to the position, their Assistants and Senior Housekeeping Managers

Course facilitator Liz Lycette will take you through a programme designed to improve performance of housekeeping staff by targeting three critical areas of operation:

  • Profits – improve cost control systems and effective utilisation of resources
  • People – staff retention, effective leadership skills, personnel management / development
  • Product – achieve and maintain consistency in presentation standards and property upkeep

The cornerstones of the training will include:

  • Facilitation in English
  • Theory, supported by a presentation, comprehensive hand-outs
  • Group discussions, case studies, role plays, practical work exercises
  • Workbased Project initiation through personal development sheets
  • Mini trade show with suppliers and networking opportunities

Venue details Dubai

Raffles Dubai
Sheikh Rashid Road, Wafi, P.O.Box 121800
Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Tel: +971 4324 8888
Fax: +971 4324 6000

Venue details Abu Dhabi

Fairmont Bab Al Bahr
Between The Bridges
P.O. Box 114304
Abu Dhabi, UAE
Tel +971 2 654 3019
Fax +971 2 654 3323

Workshop details and fees:

  • Workshop Dubai: Tuesday 13th to Thursday 15th  December, 2011.
  • Workshop Abu Dhabi: Tuesday 20th to Thursday 22 December 2011.
  • Each workshop day runs from 09.00 – 17.30, including 1 hour for lunch which will be provided.
  • The investment is US$850 per person only! (Full 3-day programme inclusive of all course materials, including morning, afternoon tea and lunch) A minimum of 20 attendees is required for each course to take place

Registration

Full registration and payment of US$ 850.00 will be available online at the L&A Website: http://www.lycetteandassociates.com/housekeeping-courses-training/ 

 

Course outline

Topics and learning outcomes of workshop Day 1
Financial Management

  • Financial concepts and basic accounting terminology
  • Different types of Hotel budgets
  • The Rooms Division P&L structure and components
  • The Housekeeping P&L
  • Manage your monthly P&L results and learn practical tools to control and monitor costs, next years budget

Topics and learning outcomes of workshop Day 2
Housekeeping staff management and training

  • Create a practical training manual
  • The Expectation talk
  • Correcting poor performance
  • Develop a mentoring programme
  • Avoiding the leadership deficit – delegation skills
  • Topics and learning outcomes of workshop 

Maintaining quality products and services Day 3 

  • Performance standards and non conformance
  • Understanding quality habits
  • Meaningful measurement – numerical audit systems for checking guest rooms
  • Understand and practice problem solving techniques
  • Introduction to innovation and trends in Housekeeping

Mini Trade Show with suppliers & Networking event – afternoon tea with the Housekeeping fraternity of the UAE!

For more information contact Josephine by email: josephine@lycetteandassociates.com