General Manager update

Green Key Global is a international organization (US and Canada) that ranks hotels on 9 areas of sustainability (energy conservation, water conservation, solid waste management, hazardous waste management, indoor air quality, community outreach, building infrastructure, land use, and environmental management).  This encompasses all facets of our business from our hotel meetings to our hotel sleeping rooms.

A Four Green Keys designation is described by Green Key Global in this way:  “A hotel that has shown national industry leadership and commitment to protecting the environment through wide ranging policies and practices.  Mature programs that involve management, employees, guests, and the public have shown substantial and measurable results.

If travelling green is important to you, and you need hotel accommodations Indianapolis, then we invite you to stay with us or check out our environmental statement above. 
 

Now that we are on the other side of the process of making us the most newly renovated hotel in downtown Indy, I can share the green processes we used to lessen the impact to the environment. While we were able to incorporate several practices and introduce several products that were eco friendly, we also ran into several challenges that kept us from implementing everything we wanted to do with regard to this topic. So any suggestions of what we can do moving forward would be greatly appreciated.

Any time you do a renovation you have to balance what you need to do and what you want to do.   Here’s our scorecard:

1.        We were able to donate about 16,000 square feet of carpet and padding to another business.

2.       That which we weren’t able to donate, due to condition or lack of interest, we sent to Kruse Carpet Recycling Center. This amounted to about 51,000 square feet of carpet and padding

3.       We refurbished and reupholstered out common area seating on the second floor landings rather than replace the entire furniture piece as the frame was still in very good shape

4.       We were able to utilize Sherwin Williams Harmony line of zero VOC paint for all accent painting done in the main lobby and in the elevator landings on each floor, and in the restaurant. 

5.       Much of our fabric in our new guestroom and lobby seating was made with 100% recycled fibers.

6.       Any plastic or cardboard packaging that came with the new furniture was recycled this amounted to a tremendous amount of cardboard and the single stream recycling option from Waste Management made this a easy process and they were very helpful in working with us to remove the tremendous amount of cardboard that came with the packaging of our new guestroom chairs, lobby furniture, and restaurant seating. 

7.       We introduced dimmable CFL fluorescent bulbs into our restaurant area, and have experimented with LED lighting solutions in our lobby. To date the LED lighting solution does not deliver on adequate illumination in the lobby and we are told in about 3-4 months a satisfactory LED lighting will be available to replace a 250w flood lamp, which is our primary lighting source for the lobby. We are anxious to seeing this work.

I guess most important of all we were able to demonstrate to our management design company that several low cost/no cost sustainable solutions are available with a project like this and hopefully we can prod other hotels to take some of these same steps.

The Hilton Garden Inn Indianapolis Downtown is the most newly renovated hotel in Indianapolis downtown.  These changes make us one of the best hotels near Indianapolis Convention Center and Lucas Oil Stadium.  As of today all projects are complete. The project required some great coordination by the housekeeping, maintenance, and front desk staffs to ensure that our guest service did not suffer during the renovation. We accomplished this by keeping any work well away from any guests that might be staying in the hotel at the time this work was completed.  The results of the renovation are terrific.  The designer took our comments about ensuring our desire to continue giving great hotel accommodations Indianapolis.

Already we are getting very positive feedback from frequent guests about the enhancements made to the décor as well as our conversion to the GSS bedding system. In addition to replacing the carpeting throughout the entire building, we added a new soft seating chair and ottoman that compliments the existing décor as well as being a comfortable place to watch the big game on our LG flat panel televisions. 

I am by no means a great photographer, and these photos don't do the changes justice.  The most dramatic change is to our lobby and restaurant .   As an important historic hotel of Indianapolis, we had to ensure that the changes were in keeping with the great flavor of the Fletcher Trust Building.  The new colors compliment the historic flavor of the building while adding a new design element . The restaurant design enhancements have opened up the area to a more relaxed atmosphere. Whereas the feel of the restaurant was classic and established, maybe even a little boring before, the new semicircular booths, additional flat panel TVs, and lighting enhancements give the area a trendier atmosphere that is more fun to hang out in.

Let me know what you think, or better yet stop in and see for yourself.