OUR SUSTAINABILITY JOURNEY Looking after you, our community and our environment

Every little change we make helps us to play our part in a more sustainable future for everyone. We understand how everyday operations at The Francis Hotel can impact the local community and we take the responsibility to mitigate that impact very seriously.

Our vision for 2025 and beyond is to maintain our Green Tourism Gold accreditation. As we take further steps along this journey, we will continually look to improve, make sustainable choices and embed sustainable practices across everything we do and the way that every person in our team thinks.

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ENVIRONMENTAL COMMITMENT

Work diligently to measure and minimise our waste and conserve natural resources, particularly through energy and water conservation.
Partner with Greenview who monitor our energy and water use and calculate our waste. They help us to record our sustainability initiatives and also work out our energy usage per bedroom and per guest to enable us to set specific energy saving targets.
Reduce use of pollutants and harmful chemicals both outside and inside our hotels. Wherever possible making sure cleaning materials are eco-friendly.
Make a commitment to measure and reduce our carbon footprint working with the Hotel Carbon Measurement Initiative to calculate the carbon footprint of hotel stays at our hotels.
Consider the opinions of our guests and employees when examining our environmental programmes and procedures, and to actively encourage feedback from our stakeholders.
Identify areas for improvement and innovation at each hotel and support the efforts of our onsite green teams.
Value the cultural heritage of our hotels, allowing us to give our guests an authentically local experience.
Encourage our guests and our team members to travel sustainably and enjoy the bio-diverse areas we are located close to.
Sourcing eco-friendly in-room products including bamboo tooth brushes and bamboo shaving kits.

SOCIAL AND CULTURAL COMMITMENT

One of our core values is to put our hotel at the heart of the local community, creating initiatives that nurture and take care of our teams whilst also supporting the local businesses and community around us. These include:

Providing a safe and secure working environment for our teams and offering them the support they need to work effectively. This includes:
- Enhanced team benefits for maternity/paternity leave, contributions towards leisure passes, food bundles and free hotel breaks.
- Support for the equal treatment and rights of people.
- Hiring team members without any discrimination on the grounds of age, race, gender, religion, disability or status.
- Access to training courses with extensive opportunities to develop.
A commitment to actively engage with the local community by supporting local events such as the Bath BID’s recent ReBalance Event and donating toiletries to the Genesis Trust in Bath.
A continued drive to source products locally, wherever possible and to ensure all suppliers have their own green and ethical procurement policy. Including offering British made organic toiletries and amenities from 100 Acres in all guest rooms.
A dedicated green, social and charity team to drive forward and communicate all new initiatives.

Sourcing locally

Our menus are crammed full of quality ingredients produced by suppliers based locally to Bath. On our drinks menu you will find Fairtrade Café du Monde Coffee and Fairtrade local Gillards of Bath loose leaf tea. This responsible sourcing makes a significant reduction to our carbon footprint and contributes back into our local community and regional economy. It also means the dishes on our seasonal menus are bursting with quality flavours which adds to the overall dining experience.

There are a growing number of guests that have special dietary requirements due to medical conditions or lifestyle choices. Being a destination that attracts many multinational travellers, we have seen a growing demand for special diets for religious reasons as well. As an inclusive restaurant we are always happy to cater for any special and religious dietary requirements and do everything we can to meet your needs. Speak to a member of the team if you have any questions about our menu options or have a special dietary requirement.

Giving back with your feedback

Feedback about your visit means everything to us. It helps us to know what we are doing right and learn from any mistakes we may make. And, every time you give us feedback (good or constructive) either via an online site or by direct email to us, then we will plant a tree with our partner More Trees and support their tree planting and community programmes in North Haiti, East Kenya and Madagascar. It is a little way of us continuing to make small steps towards a greater change for our planet.

With guest experience, community and sustainability such a key part of everything we do, our give back for feedback initiative combines all three elements seamlessly together. Ask a member of the team about this initiative during your next stay or head to a review site now to leave a review.

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Green tourism

To promote a greener, cleaner environment for people, places and our plants we are involved with the Green Tourism Accreditation programme. The Green Tourism programme is acknowledged worldwide as an indicator of a good environmentally friendly practice. We are proud to hold the Gold Green Tourism award for our hard work.

Green Tourism Focuses on:

Reducing energy use.
Saving water.
Efficient and eco-friendly waste disposal.
Ethical buying.
Staying local and seasonal.
Minimising food miles.
Promoting biodiversity.
Adopting a smart, sustainable outlook from top to bottom.
Helping to conserve local heritage.

Find out more

Community support

The Francis Hotel plays a really important part in the local community. We are key partners to VisitBath who drive visitors into our local region and we actively support local initiatives such as Bath BID’s recent ReBalance Event. We are also proud to work alongside local and cultural attractions to create exciting stay experiences for visitors to Bath to encourage them to explore the city and we are a key partner to Bath Festival. This event brings some of the best new authors, books and musicians to Bath over a 10 day festival to celebrate their work and we are a the main accommodation partner to the festival.

Charity support

We care about the local charities in our community and are keen to play our part to support local charities. We recently made a donation of toiletries to the Genesis Trust in Bath. They are a fantastic organisation that offers practical help to people who are hungry, homeless and vulnerable, both immediate and longer term to help them rebuild their lives.

How you can play your part

You can help us and play your part on our journey. Here are some ideas of how including suggestions on low-carbon-impacting activities during your stay:

Where feasible, travel to the hotel by train or local bus. We are just a short walk from Bath Spa train station which connect quickly to London mainline stations. We are also walking distance from the main bus station which can connect you the rest of the UK.
If you are hiring a car, choose electric. Many Bath car parks provide EV charging points.
Travel around the local area on two wheels. We can help arrange bike hire for you during your stay through one of our carefully selected partners. Take the stunning Bath to Bristol cycle path and visit our neighbours or take the two tunnels.
Separate your waste. We provide bins that make it easier to separate your waste so that we can recycle anything paper, plasic or glass.
Enjoy our local region and explore new area. And there are lots of beautiful parks and gardens to roam right in the heart of the city. Take a look at some of our favourite places to visit by clicking here. If you want to go further afield, the Cotswold Way is just a little drive away.
Dine with us and enjoy our locally sourced produce. The team cannot wait to welcome you.

This policy is designed to act as a framework to enable all stakeholders to use as guidance across all general hotel operations. Stakeholders include both internal and external team members as well as hotel guests (where applicable).

Ask a member of our team if you have any questions on our “green” journey or ,to give us feedback about any of our green initiatives or ideas that you might have, simply click here to share it with us.

Let us know if you have suggestions of areas where we can improve to ensure that we both meet and exceed your expectations. Or, complete our feedback form by clicking here.