The U.S. hospitality industry generates 440 billion pounds of solid waste every year, a large chunk of it being leftover soap that guests leave behind. Cheddar News speaks with Shawn Seipler, CEO of Clean the World, who is on a mission to reduce trash and save lives by recycling the amenity. 

Cheddar's News Wrap

Company Recycles Leftover Hotel Soap to Donate It to People in Need

our next guest, everybody uses that small soap bar in the bathroom when staying at hotels. Right. But that tiny toiletry comes with a big problem. Most guests leave behind half huge chunks that add up to billions of tons of waste. But one company is on a mission to save lives and space in landfills by recycling and reusing the leftover. Amenity. Trying me now to discuss is sean simpler ceo of clean the world and Sean your company has partnerships with a big hotel chains across the world picking up leftover soap. Can you explain what you do and how you came up with this idea? Yeah, ken. Absolutely. So uh about 8000 hotels across the globe folks like Hilton and four seasons, they, they work with clean the world. And so 13 years ago I was in a hotel room four nights a week and I wondered what happened to the little bar soap and little bottles shampoo when I was done using it, I called the front desk at a hotel and they said we throw it away. So I kind of did some research and figured out that if all hotels were doing that across the globe, we were throwing away millions of bars of soap every single day out of hotels globally. So I kind of went on a track to try to figure out how to recycle soap and did that. But the real ah ha moment for us came when back then In 2009 there were 9000 Children under the age of five dying every day to pneumonia and diarrhoeal disease and number one and number two leading cause of death amongst Children worldwide. But all of these studies show that if we just gave them soap and taught them how and when to wash their hands, we could cut those deaths in half. And so that prompted us to start a company in a single car garage in downtown Orlando florida. Today, 13 years later, 8000 hotels operating our program all across north America, europe UK asia. And uh, we're recycling soap to save lives. So who are your biggest partners? And how much does it cost for this service? So our biggest partners, we have brand standards with Hilton, for instance, across north America in europe. We have partnerships with four seasons with caesar's uh, sands Wynn encore. And we have a lot of, you know, Marriotts and high it's in uh in Wyndham's. Uh and so we have in the 13 years that we've been operating, we have diverted over 25 million tons, sorry, £25 million 70 million bars of soap that have been handed out locally, homeless shelters, relief organizations, food pantries and globally to 127 countries across the globe. So how much do you charge these hotels for your service? The hotel's generally pay somewhere between 50 cents to 80 cents per room per month. So a 100 room hotel would pay 50 to 80 bucks a month. That's the entire recycling program. And we partner with ups is carbon neutral shipping program. So that includes all of their shipping. So we're shipping empty bins to a hotel when the room attendants are cleaning the rooms, they're collecting the used soap and bottles, putting it in a bag that's making its way down to a bin. And when their bins are filled, they access their clean the World app to get a a prepaid shipping label sent to them as well as a new empty bin at a shift to their hotel. And it's, it's kind of like the old netflix model for those of you remember that model where it's full bins coming to us and empty bins going back. And, and with that we're working with these hotels and these room attendants every day to deliver an awesome green sustainable program. But also a socially impactful program that is literally saving lives. Speaking of saving lives. Dude, your soap right now, is it going to folks like those in Ukraine? How many bars of soap do you think in your lifetime you've sent out to different countries? Yeah. So we have sent over 70 million bars of soap uh, to uh, to folks across the globe. 127 countries and very active in humanitarian, uh, efforts in disaster. So very active for instance, in 2010, the Haiti earthquake, we've assisted Syrian refugees. Somalian refugees, we assist with soap on the southern border of the United States. Uh, and then, you know, when typhoons happen in hurricanes and earthquakes. Uh, that is a time when folks need hygiene. They need access to soap and toothbrush and toothpaste and, and those items that we deliver today. We're working on a major project with one of our awesome partners to deliver, I believe 50,000 to 80,000 hygiene kits, uh, into Ukraine or into the bordering countries, maybe Poland maybe Romania. But we're working right now to get product in to that that area as well. But we've just seen an incredible result Prior to covid hitting. So leading up to 2020 We saw a 65% reduction in the death rate, Two Children under the age of five dying to hygiene-related illnesses. And in that time we were the only company to send out 70 million three bars of soap were part of the United Nations global wash cluster were driving global strategies, hygiene water in the like. So it's at times like this place like Ukraine desperately we need to get hygiene products in because that just very simply save lives simply because somebody can wash their hands and give their baby a bath. So we have a mini version of the soap saved live box here in studio. So I'm gonna build one, take me through, where would this go? And how quickly will it get there? What would be inside? Yeah, awesome. So you're you're working on a soap safe lightbox. And so corporations and individuals, they can get those boxes and sent to their homes. Uh and so what you're doing is you're getting an empty bag and you're putting in a clean the world recycled bar, soap, shampoo, toothbrush, toothpaste. Sometimes we'll have bomba socks in there, we'll have hand sanitizer lotion. Uh and then once you build those kits and when folks go to clean the world dot org, uh they can get one of those soap saved my boxes. But once you're done building those kits, you can then donate them to a local homeless shelter, a local food pantry, women's shelter. We've done over five million of those hygiene kits locally and globally. Uh and we also assist. We have an awesome program that runs across central florida, Vegas, Seattle arora where we give showers to the homelessness, the fresh start washing wellness mobile hygiene unit. And we really help folks get on the continuum from homeless to home by providing an awesome shower experience, along with wraparound services that would deal with job placement, temporary housing, mental health. And those hygiene kits were given to those folks when they're taking that shower as well. Alright. Sean slippers, Ceo of clean the world, what a little things make a huge difference. And if you want to know more about the company or order a soapbox that saves lives your first check out the clean the world dot org website slash soap saves lives. It obviously affects a lot of people.