Starting this year, Iberostar Hotels & Resorts will be replacing its traditional polyester uniforms with an alternative material made entirely from recycled plastic. Following tests and trials the new fabrics scored high on durability and comfort, and will be gradually introduced into the company’s complete portfolio of more than 120 hotels.
The new uniforms will keep the design created exclusively by Davidelfin for Iberostar Hotels & Resorts, but from now on they will be developed from recycled plastic bottles. With this initiative, the company will be contributing to the removal of around 470,000 bottles from the oceans and landfills and will reduce its use of the more contaminating traditional polyester by more than 90,000 feet.
Recycled polyester is a fabric made from plastics collected from both land and sea. Iberostar’s new uniforms, which have been tested and introduced at the Iberostar Paseo de Gracia Hotel in Barcelona and the Iberostar Sábila on Tenerife, will include garments made of microfiber and twill, both made from recycled polyester.
Sustainability is one of Grupo Iberostar’s core values, and making the shift to sustainable uniforms is another step in the company's "Wave of Change" program, the movement led by Gloria Fluxà, VP and chief sustainable officer for Grupo Iberostar.
Wave of Change is in line with SDG 14 of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals, "Life Below Water," and is based on three action lines: reducing consumption of single use plastics, promoting sustainable fishing and improving coastal health.
This measure is the latest in a series of initiatives to be launched by Grupo Iberostar, which includes the elimination of single-use plastics from all of its rooms, replacing them with more environmentally-friendly materials. This objective, which has already been achieved in Spain, is now being extended to other areas of its hotels and, in 2019, will be applied to the rest of the more than 120 hotels the company operates around the world. Actions such as these have enabled Iberostar to reduce the amount of plastic waste it generates each year in Spain by 300 tons, a figure projected to increase once the actions are extended to the other countries and further improvements, such as the new uniforms, are introduced.