{"id":10967,"date":"2016-05-04T16:17:06","date_gmt":"2016-05-04T15:17:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/travindy.com\/?p=10967"},"modified":"2022-08-23T12:59:33","modified_gmt":"2022-08-23T11:59:33","slug":"roi-tool-helps-tourism-businesses-destinations-determine-green-good-business-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/travindy.com\/news\/2016\/05\/roi-tool-helps-tourism-businesses-destinations-determine-green-good-business-2\/","title":{"rendered":"ROI tool helps tourism businesses and destinations determine \u201cIs Green Good for Business?\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"ROIW<\/span>e\u2019ve all heard this claim by marketers \u2013 Consumers crave responsible travel choices that are socially responsible, environmentally conscious, and economically beneficial to local communities. <\/i> However, even with all the surveying and statistics<\/span> that back up this claim, the tourism industry has been reticent to ingraining sustainability into their operations. Why? One reason is because there is no reliable benchmarking data that shows<\/i> exactly how greening a tourism company or destination\u2019s offering will affect the financial bottom line.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s face it. Tourism businesses and destination have to make investment decisions on a regular basis. Whether it\u2019s the development of new products or new incentives to hire the best guides or the creation of the best marketing campaigns that will capture the imagination (and wallets) of travelers, investments are constantly occurring.<\/p>\n

For tourism businesses that must prioritize strategies, owners and other tourism stakeholders must understand, beyond reading the occasional anecdote<\/a> about an individual company\u2019s experience, the actual return on investment<\/b> (ROI) of going green.<\/p>\n

Certainly, for larger tourism companies or ones with owners or employees with financial or accounting backgrounds, my research has shown that if<\/i> ROI was calculated, it was based on capital investments made into operations. In other words, projects such as renewable energy, water conservation, waste management, food and beverage sourcing were what was considered sustainable investments. However, the consistent issue was that ROI, calculated under those parameters, was negative for at least two years.<\/p>\n

So, as a tourism business owner, would you want to wait two years or more to break even on your green investment<\/i>? Probably not, because other investments into your products, staff or customers might could yield higher returns more quickly.<\/p>\n

This is one important reason there has been resistance within the tourism industry to giving sustainability a closer look.<\/p>\n

However, there is a flaw in how ROI is being calculated. It is not holistic. Just looking at operational investments misses up to 40% of the calculation.<\/p>\n

Specifically utilizing an environmental scorecard approach<\/a> for measuring ROI, I built upon these operational elements by:<\/p>\n