People, Planet and Profit
by Eric Hansel
November 3, 2008
Watching the Triple Bottom Line means paying attention to what's good for your property financially, socially and environmentally
Imagine
walking into your favorite casino in the near future and sitting down at an
eco-friendly casino table. As you begin
to ask yourself what is an eco-friendly poker table, you notice that there is
natural light coming through the ceilings, and you can actually tell that it is
daytime. After playing at your favorite
energy efficient slot machine, you head up to your room for a nap before going
out. Upon arrival at your room, you see
a sign in the room that talks about some of the green initiatives the property
has undertaken. This is different than the usual “save a towel” sign, this sign
talks about how the property generates all of its hot and cold water in its
cogeneration plant and how it powers all (electric) maintenance vehicles with a
solar power charging station. It talks
about the geothermal system that provides a constant climate by tapping into
the area of earth hundreds of feet below where temperature is pretty constant.
This may seem far off, but
there are casinos with these initiatives in place all over the country. For
instance, The Barona Valley Ranch Resort and Casino has changed its entire
maintenance vehicle fleet over to electric, and is in talks to power them with
a solar charging station. According to Barona GM Rick Messura, “We do a good
job of researching prior to purchase and implementation, which helps to ensure
success and ROI for our green efforts.” This is the sort of approach that works
in every other arena, so why not in the green realm? The Barona is joined by many others in the
pursuit of saving the environment while at the same time boosting profits and
decreasing costs.
At the Potawatomi Nation’s
Fire Lake Grand Casino, geothermal is the green initiative of choice. The facility uses two ponds on the property
to heat and cool the casino using the Earth’s natural resources to save energy
and help the environment. During the
summer, the ponds help cool the casino by using the earth to cool the water as
it passes through the closed loop system.
By using this system, Fire Lake Grand Casino is able to cool the 1,800
square foot building. With a below
ground closed loop system, there is no chemical evaporation in the air and no
lasting effects on the environment.
Property GM Steve Degraffenreid told me something that I haven’t heard
much, but that makes perfect sense. “You have to toot your own horn when it
comes to green initiatives.”
This notion of tooting
your own horn seems to be lost on most when we talk (market) about socially
responsible issues. There seems to be some component of guilt associated with
this based on the many conversations I have had with casino operators. It just doesn’t seem OK to talk about the
good we are doing. This notion of
altruism is an old one, but one that stands strong. The problem with this is that the industry is
in a state of flux. Revenues are down, and these initiatives are good not only
for the financial bottom line but also for what is known as “The Triple Bottom
Line.”
The Triple Bottom Line is
made up of what is good for your property financially, socially and
environmentally. “People, Planet and
Profit” is a good way to describe this. Wikipedia does an excellent job of
defining Triple Bottom Line. “The concept of Triple Bottom Line demands that a
company's responsibility be to 'stakeholders' rather than shareholders. In this
case, 'stakeholders' refers to anyone who is influenced, either directly or
indirectly, by the actions of the firm. According to the stakeholder theory,
the business entity should be used as a vehicle for coordinating stakeholder
interests, instead of maximizing shareholder (owner) profit.” It’s not that maximizing shareholder profit
is not important, but that shareholder profit should not come at the expense of
stakeholders.
These examples of
sustainability within the casino industry do not stand alone. Jenna Morton,
co-owner of The N9NE Group, which runs the restaurants, lounges and the pool at
The Palms, explained what is done with used cooking oil. About a year ago, Morton converted her car so
that it will run with this oil. While this is a small-scale solution to a
larger problem, Morton mentioned that, “The Las Vegas Regional Transportation Commission
will retrofit one of their buses to run on the oil within a year, with the goal
being to change all buses over after that.”
Can you even imagine a Las
Vegas devoid of bus fumes?
As sustainability starts
to become the norm within the industry, what else will we see? What other innovations are coming down the
pike? Will the casino industry become so
proficient at efficiency that it starts to open up new revenue streams? These questions and others will be covered
monthly in this column. If your property
has a green team, is involved in sustainable innovation, or has corporate
social responsibility initiatives worth talking about, please e-mail me at
eric@egmgreen.com.
Green Thought: “The
development of a sustainability standard for slot machines provides a greater
opportunity for both buyers and manufacturers of slot machines to make a big
contribution to environmental improvement,” said Michael Arny, president of Leonardo Academy and former chairman of the LEED
for EB (Leadership for Energy and Environmental Design for Existing Buildings).
Eric Hansel
is
the president of EGM Green, the manufacturer of the world’s first eco-friendly
casino tables. Hansel is also leading a team that is coming up with a slot
machine sustainability standard. This standard will pull 25 percent of the
energy used to power slot machines out in the first year. EGM Green also does
lighting retrofits, energy audits, and custom carbon off-set calculation and
implementation. The company also offers expertise in alternative energy from
solar to wind and geothermal. For more
information, contact Hansel at eric@egmgreen.com or (201) 927-3526.
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