The Travel Foundation

Message in 1100 bottles at WTM

Visitors to World Travel Market 2011 saw a very visual demonstration of some of the impressive work Thomas Cook UK & Ireland and the Travel Foundation have carried out this year.

The specially commissioned 'Message in 1,100 Bottles' sculpture - a ‘homage in plastic’ to Rodin’s famous sculpture, The Thinker, was designed to get the industry thinking about how making small changes can not only help minimise the environmental and social impacts of holidays, but also reduce operational costs.

A waste reduction project, funded by Thomas Cook and delivered by the Travel Foundation and the Cyprus Sustainable Tourism Initiative (CSTI), was introduced in June 2011. Among its many successes, the 203-room Ascos Coral Beach Hotel in Paphos reduced the number of plastic bottles it hands out by introducing reusable drinking cups and offering refills throughout the property. Previously, the hotel had distributed more than 1,100 plastic water bottles each day for guests during the holiday season.

A total of 14 hotels in the Agia Napa and Protaras resorts and 12 in the Paphos region are taking part in the project and have, to date, saved almost 500,000 plastic bottles and more than 85,000 plastic bags from going to landfill.

You can read the full press release here.