Name: Christopher Hartzell
Title: General Manager
Hotel: Element Lexington (Mass.)
Years with Starwood Hotels & Resorts: Almost seven years.
Primary responsibilities: “Overseeing the daily operations of the hotel. Making sure our financials and guest satisfaction are top notch. Making sure people are aware of the type of property we have. Listening to our customers. Finding new products that are good for the environment.”
Hotel’s most significant environmental accomplishment so far: “Earning LEED Gold certification.”
Our hotel’s biggest environmental challenge: “Identifying additional opportunities to reduce costs, waste and save energy and water.”
What I like most about what I do: “I love the people I work with. I like being part of the process of creating a greener hotel.”
What advice I would give to a general manager considering starting an environmental program: “Be open-minded. Understand that going green costs a little more. Be open to other’s opinions and suggestions. Patience is important.”
LEXINGTON, MASS.—As general manager of Starwood Hotels & Resorts’ Element hotel in Lexington, Mass., Christopher Hartzell is in an exciting position. The hotel is Starwood’s first Element property, the first one to achieve LEED certification (LEED Gold) and the first hotel in Massachusetts to earn LEED honors. Just as important, the efforts of Hartzell and his team of associates have resulted in the property earning the highest guest satisfaction score in all of Starwood. This has all happened since last July, which is when the 123-room property opened.
Hartzell is a Starwood veteran, having worked for the company for almost seven years and most recently at the Sheraton South Portland (Maine) as general manager. When he learned that he was selected to manage the world’s first Element property, he was thrilled. It was not only the professional challenge that interested him; it was the fact that he had an opportunity to be part of an evolution of one of the lodging industry’s greenest brands.
“To be able to be the first general manager of this brand, I was honored,” Hartzell says.
For Starwood, the Element Lexington has been a test site for the rollout of not only a new and unique building design but also a long list of products and processes that ensure maximum energy and water efficiency, and associate and guest wellbeing.
Favorable Guest Response
“Guest response so far has been amazing,” Hartzell says. “We have become the trend setter for our sister properties, influencing them on how to be green while still offering a luxury level of service. We have taken Starwood’s vision and made it a reality.”
According to Hartzell, there are currently more than 60 Elements at some stage of development and by 2013 there should be approximately 200 off the ground and open. In addition to the Lexington hotel, other Elements currently open include the Element Las Vegas Summerlin, Element Arundel Mills (Md.), and Element Houston Vintage Park.
Unique to Element is its design. In the lobby guests are welcomed with a multi-storied window wall that provides a significant amount of natural light. Guestrooms also include large windows, modular furniture, swiveling flat-screen LCD televisions, large desks with open shelving, and custom-designed closets. In addition, each guestroom offers a complete kitchen that features Energy Star rated appliances and all the tools and utensils to prepare a gourmet meal. What makes Element stand out from its competitors in the extended-stay segment is its attention to resource efficiency and waste minimization. Here are just a few examples:
• Guestroom bathrooms include dispensers instead of individual amenity bottles. Bins in the guestrooms and in public areas for paper, plastic and glass make recycling easy. Filtered water is available in every guestroom, eliminating the need for plastic water bottles.
• Element Lexington is saving 942,000 gallons of potable water per year by adopting water conservation practices both inside and outside the hotel. The hotel cut outdoor water consumption in half through water-efficient landscaping and reduced indoor water use by installing high-efficiency water fixtures throughout the property. Dual-flush toilets were installed and spa-like bathrooms include oversize showers and rain showerheads that are water efficient.
• Element Lexington each year keeps half a million pounds of carbon emissions out of the atmosphere by using energy conservation measures including a high-efficiency heating, ventilating and air-conditioning system, and an environmentally-friendly lighting system powered by CFL and LED technology. The hotel also supports the development of renewable energy technology such as wind power by purchasing renewable energy credits to offset 70 percent of electricity use for the first two years of operation and is committed to offset 35 percent of annual electricity use each year thereafter.
• The hotel enhanced indoor environmental quality by using paints, adhesives and carpeting systems that minimize airborne pollutants. Element Lexington also partnered with a company to implement green housecleaning practices to reduce the use of potentially hazardous chemical contaminants.
In addition to these examples, Element Lexington purchases paper that includes 100 percent recycled content, offers priority parking to hybrid vehicle-driving guests, purchases local and organic food for its concession area, sponsors the local Lexington farmer’s market, allows guests to borrow bicycles, uses magnets instead of paper “Do Not Disturb” signs, and holds a Green Education Night every third Wednesday from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.
Hartzell says he has been interested in the environment since he was a child. Today, he is helping Starwood make history as the first company to commit to certifying every hotel in a brand—Element—to LEED standards.
Go to Element Lexington.
Glenn Hasek can be reached at editor@greenlodgingnews.com.
