• Helps travelers to book a greener trip

• Promotes hotel and B&B green

practices to over 260 million monthly

TripAdvisor users

• Largest green hotel program in the

world with over 7,000 properties in

North America and Europe

• 100% free for hotels and B&Bs

• Developed with support from:

• How do guests react to green

initiatives at hotels?

• Important implications:

– ROI of hotel investment

– Marketing & communications

• Limitations of existing research:

– Surveyed non-travelers

– Surveyed people not at green

hotels

– Social desirability bias

2

Understanding guests

Badge on hotel geo listing

Green filter to sort hotels

Showcasing hotels on TripAdvisor

Collecting customer reviews: over 30,000

TA Review Form

• 60% of all green reviews related to

four attributes:

– Recycling

– “General” green comments

– Towel reuse

– Linen reuse

• Many others were rarely or never

mentioned, including:

– Light bulbs

– Toiletries

– Landscaping

– Renewable energy

– Opt-out housekeeping

Guest notice a limited set

of green attributes

• The more visible and interactive the process of collecting recycling waste,

the higher the number of comments

Visibility matters

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

Guest room bins Housekeeping Back of house Offsite

% of green

reviews that

mention

recycling

Guests focused on what’s present

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Present

Absent

• Most commonly mentioned as “absent”:

• Re-usable crockery/cutlery i.e. using disposable products

• A no-smoking policy i.e. smoking!

% of times

attribute is

mentioned in

review as

present or

absent

• Guests prefer all types of green initiative to be present rather than absent

• Did not see the expected negative response to certain attributes such as

towel reuse

Guests positive about all green initiatives

0.0

0.5

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5

3.0

3.5

4.0

4.5

5.0

PRESENT

ABSENT

Sentiment towards

attribute (when

present or absent)

from 1 (very

negative) to 5 (very

positive).

• When commenters mention organic/local food in their green review, on average they

increased their overall TripAdvisor rating of the property +0.4 points out of 5

(statistically significant)

• No other green attribute has that effect

Sustainable food increases TripAdvisor rating