AccorHotels reveals the positive impact of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) under its PLANET 21 Research Program, the group’s internal sustainability management system. In celebration of its 10 year commitment to the ISO 14001 certification, the internationally recognized standard for environmental management systems, AccorHotels has led two innovative studies that assess the benefits of CSR on guest satisfaction and hotel performance. The surveys were conducted by Accenture and Ernst & Young (EY) in 2015 and revealed three key findings on the positive impact of CSR: increased guest satisfaction; improved hotel profitability; and increased loyalty of key BtoB customers.
“We have been committed to sustainable development for over 20 years and always believed that, as well as being essential to preserve our ecosystem, sustainability initiatives are a competitive advantage for the company. That’s why we decided to collect additional empirical evidence to prove this,” said AccorHotels Sustainable Development Director Arnaud Herrmann. “This positive impact on both hotel business performance and guest satisfaction is a great encouragement to continue our CSR policy, while our PLANET 21 program is nearing completion with promising results.”
Key findings:
- CSR has a positive effect on guest satisfaction:
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![](https://press.accor.com/americas/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/1454701198_2.png)
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Chart captions: ISO 14001 certification has a stronger, more positive correlation with satisfaction than the renovation date of the hotel. A hotel’s PLANET 21 level even has a stronger link with satisfaction than the average room price.
(Source: charts extracted from the Accenture survey conducted in May 2015, pages 14 and 18)
- CSR has a positive effect on hotel profitability:
Cédric Vatier, managing director at Accenture Strategy, comments, “AccorHotels decision to invest in sustainability programs has a positive impact on its carbon footprint, but also contributes to the business performance of the company.”
The Accenture survey proves that AccorHotels benefits from uniting its employees and partners behind objectives that meet sustainable development requirements, while also generating business value for the company. In North America, Novotel Toronto Centre is the first hotel in Canada part of the AccorHotels group to be a fully certified ISO 14001 facility, having recently obtained their certification following a full audit in June 2015.
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![](https://press.accor.com/americas/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/1454701128_1.png)
(Source: charts extracted from the Accenture survey conducted in May 2015, page 19)
- CSR is an increasingly important criterion for AccorHotels’ key and strategic BtoB customers:
A growing number of BtoB customers consider CSR an additional criterion when selecting their supplier. An internal survey verified by EY reveals that 70% of potential customers communicate their CSR requirements during the RFP process, as well as during day-to-day business relationships. As a result, AccorHotels’ CSR commitments give the group perferred partners status for its BtoB customers and enable it to generate additional turnover.
Click here to find out more on PLANET 21 Research.
Methodologies:
- The BtoB survey dated May 2015 assesses the corporate social responsibility expectations of AccorHotels’ BtoB customers. A total of 45 of the group’s most important accounts, located on the five continents where the group is active, answered an online questionnaire between December 2014 and January 2015. The results confirmed the trends already identified in a survey conducted in 2012. These two surveys were both verified externally by EY.
- The Accenture survey concerned a sample of over 1,200 hotels out of the more than 3,600 AccorHotels establishments. The survey excluded countries with fewer than 20 hotels. The survey provides a statistical analysis of the influence of several sustainable development indicators (certification year and level, etc.) on profitability and guest satisfaction.