Following hot on the heels of being recognised for its environmental initiatives at the Repak Best Practice Awards for 2012, the River Lee Hotel in Cork has now won the much coveted ‘Business Hotel of the Year Award’ at the Georgina Campbell Awards 2013.
The Repak Best Practice awards for the hospitality sector were designed to acknowledge the efforts and ingenuity of businesses in the area of packaging prevention, reuse and recycling and the River Lee Hotel was recognised for its overall excellence in waste reduction and the dedication and passion shown by staff to save on energy, money and natural resources.
The annual Georgina Campbell Awards areIreland’s longest-running hospitality awards and are highly respected within the hospitality industry. The 4 star River Lee Hotel (a member of the Doyle Collection) was recognised as a key Business Tourism performer and was acknowledged for its excellent service and world class facilities.
“Winning these awards is indeed a recognition of our ongoing drive to be the best business hotel, not only in Cork but nationally, as well as striving to be as environmentally friendly as we can be,” says Ruairi O’Connor, general manager of the River Lee Hotel. “To ensure our 182 bed hotel adheres to as many environmentally friendly measures as possible, we have appointed a Green Team and Energy Champion to pilot such initiatives as our combined heat and power, a number of water saving measures in guest and public bathrooms, the replacement of all T8 bulbs with T5 bulbs saving 100Kwh monthly, recycling all recyclable products internally so that waste going to the landfill has reduced from 50% to 15%, turning off all unused appliances nightly and the introduction of sensor lights in numerous areas across the 279 sq foot hotel. Other simple measures including donating all old crockery to Penny Dinners offer dual benefits for both the hotel and a worthy local charity. We are delighted that the relentless efforts of our team to excel, despite recessionary pressures, has been highlighted with these two prestigious awards and that our commitment to providing focused, professional and consistently good service in a manner that is also eco-friendly has been recognised.”
The awards coincide with the River Lee Hotel’s sixth birthday.