At the Royal Oak Hotel we are committed to continuous improvement of our environmental strategy.
Food
We try and source all our ingredients from companies within a thirty mile radius. This not only cuts down on our carbon footprint, it also ensures that our guests get the freshest local ingredients on the market. We have found some amazing small traders this way and can work with them to ensure their small-holdings and farms have an economically stable future. Look out for the featured farms on the blackboards in the restaurant and have a look at the short film Vicki made when she visited our Egg Lady…..
Soapy Stuff
we use Era Eco Collection toiletries in our rooms – they’re paraben free, and are totally recyclable as the tubes are compostable! Bedroom handsoaps are vegetable based & wrapped in recyclable paper
Paper
As part of our awareness policy for the past ten years instead of sending Christmas cards by post, which involves paper & printing, we email our Christmas wishes to our mailing list & donate the saved cost to our favoured charity, Plan UK.
Founded nearly 70 years ago, Plan is one of the largest child-centered community development organisations in the world. The scope of Plan’s activities is far-reaching. Their work affects the daily lives of countless ordinary people, from the children, the parents and the villages they help, to the supporters who give their contribution. Visit them at www.plan-uk.org
We also recycle all our paperwaste onsite;
Recycling on site
We have a Re-cycling Centre with units supplied by Conwy Borough Council for Glass and Paper and Cardboard Recycling, situated in the rear car park – please come & make use of this facility.
Linen Policy
We have a Guest Reuse Scheme in all our bedrooms. If guests want fresh towels daily, they can put them in the bath for our housekeeping team to replace – if not leave them on the towel rail for reuse – simple!
Refurbishments
We have ensured that all refurbished areas are fitted with compact fluorescent low energy lighting, all new toilets are low-flow and use half as much water to flush as standard toilets, and our building materials from the wood on the floor to the slate bar tops are all locally sourced.
#PlasticFree
In 2023 Eryri National Park made a commitment to launching Plastic Free Y Wyddfa with the ambition to creating the worlds first plastic free mountain
Michelle is the Community Lead for Plastic Free Communities, Betws -y Coed and District, a network of towns and villages all connected to the mountain through hosting visitors. She says:
“Betws-y-Coed is known as the Gateway to Snowdonia, and pretty much anyone traveling to Eryri for a walk passess through here or its surrounding villages. Our community has a lot of accommodation providers, places to eat, or buy your supplies for a day on the hill. Whether that be food and drink supplies, or new walking boots, or that forgotten rain coat, or hat.
The aim of our Plastic Free Community is to reduce the availability of single use plastics to those visitors”.
Snowdonia Hospitality & Leisure is now a SAS Plastic Free Champion
We sponsored the free plastic re-fillable bottles for the yearly Snowdonia Challenge run by Breese Adventures.
We’ve also looked at the way we use plastic in the hotel, from what we buy to how it’s delivered and whenever we can replace with an environmentally friendly option. Our latest plastic free options are bamboo toothbrushes amd coffee cups made of plants… find out more at www.vegware.com
Big Hanna Composting Project
In 2014 we were invited to apply for the Rural Conwy Hotel Composting Pilot Project. We were chosen over a number of hotels to host the project that initially ran until November 2014. It was such a success that we’ve developed the food waste scheme even further.
In the short term our aim was to reduce the amount of waste we send to landfill and as a business benefit from reduced waste costs. When the compsoting pilot project ended in stepped Veolia – they pick up our food waste & turn it into a valuable resource, by using anaerobic digestion to create green energy. Helping us reduce the environmental impact of our business and meet sustainability targets.WIn-WIn!
We calculated that 70% of the waste we generate on site is from food, mostly from the plate after service. With the moisture content the weight is considerable in terms of what we are charged to send to landfill. Our medium term goal is to reduce the amount of waste being transported on the area’s roads, cut disposal costs and provide more soil-improving additives for gardens by making our own compost.
Our long-term aim is to use the food waste we compost to grow our own produce. We believe that by introducing our home grown produce to the menu it will provide a unique selling point that our customers will truly appreciate and enjoy.
Think Globally – Act Locally
This was the message we all first encountered on our TV screens and here at the Oak it is now the way we think about what we do everyday with every action we take.