Sustainability in Hospitality with Joe Sykes, Co-Founder of ecommit

In this episode of Hospitable, we sit down with Joe Sykes, Co-Founder and Director of ecommit, to explore the critical role data plays in driving sustainability within the hospitality industry. Together, we delve into how hospitality brands can leverage data to create awareness around CO2 emissions, ensuring that sustainability efforts move beyond mere buzzwords into actionable strategies. Joe shares insights from his journey, starting from a family-run restaurant in the Netherlands to building a platform that helps businesses offset their carbon footprint through clear, impactful data.

Throughout the conversation, we discuss the importance of small, manageable changes and how collective efforts can make a significant impact. We explore the balance between unavoidable and avoidable emissions, and how hospitality businesses can contribute to sustainability without sacrificing operational efficiency or guest experience. Joe emphasizes that while data is essential, it’s only valuable when acted upon, and he illustrates this through practical examples from his work with ecommit. The conversation highlights how data-driven, transparent sustainability practices can lead to lasting change, both for businesses and travelers.

Whether you’re a hospitality professional or someone passionate about sustainability, this episode offers valuable insights on how we can all take meaningful steps toward greener travel experiences. Don’t forget to like, subscribe, and share for more thought-provoking discussions on making hospitality more sustainable and human.

Timestamps

[00:01:16] Data's actionable importance in sustainability.

[00:04:19] Sustainable travel experiences.

[00:09:19] Unspoken expectations in sustainability.

[00:11:37] Hospitality's role in sustainability.

[00:17:37] Small changes, big impact.

[00:20:05] Small habitual changes for sustainability.

[00:23:00] Unavoidable emissions in hospitality.

[00:25:55] Data in the hospitality industry.

[00:30:42] Theory versus execution in sustainability.

[00:33:34] Perfection vs. Imperfection in Impact.

[00:36:51] Future collaborations and meetings

Quotes
00:02:31 - "Data is king. But I always ask, is data still king if you don't do anything with it?"
00:07:40 - "That's not very hospitable."
00:10:34 - "It shouldn't be thrown around as a buzzword. It should just be covered. It should just be done, right?"
00:12:41 - "But I think that in all those small things do add up to make big impact."
00:16:30 - "You basically would need the surface area of the state of New Jersey to compensate those emissions of the complete hospitality industry in the US."
00:19:23 - "the impact of doing a few small things is huge."
00:20:59 - "It's only small changes that can have actually the biggest impact, right? Because it's small changes by many people, not just by a few, right?"
00:25:09 - "First is awareness, then it's identifying what is unavoidable."
00:26:22 - "Small small things can result in very big things."
00:30:07 - "I think highlighting that and knowing what's unavoidable versus what is avoidable, and then creating that visualization."
00:34:06 - "Perfect gets in the way of good."
00:35:43 - "Perfection creates inaction, doesn't it?"
00:36:58 - "It's data-driven automated climate impact. So it's going to be reportable. It's all going to be fantastic." 

Connect
ecommit: https://ecommit.nl/
Joe Sykes: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joe-sykes-335779ba/
Omniboost: https://omniboost.io/
Rob Napoli: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robnap/
Rob Napoli: https://www.robnapoli.com/

Show Produced by: Niranjan Deshpande (Nick), Broken Frames Studio, www.brokenframesstudio.com

Creators & Guests

Host

Rob Napoli

Rob is the Global Head of Brand at Omniboost and US Commercial Lead. He is passionate about sports, travel, and where to find the best whiskey bar in Manhattan.

Guest

Joe Sykes

Director & Co-Founder at ecommit

What is Hospitable?

Hospitable is a podcast that discusses how to make hospitality MORE human through technology.

Hospitable focuses on discussing the leading challenges facing the hospitality industry and to explore the latest trends, technologies, and best practices that are shaping the industry. Each episode features interviews with hoteliers, restaurateurs, chefs, industry analysts, and other experts who share their insights and experiences on topics such as customer experience, sustainability, innovation, staffing, and more.

Hosted by Rob Napoli

00:00:00:02 - 00:00:03:24
Joe Sykes
Data is king. Is data still king if you don't do anything with it?

00:00:04:04 - 00:00:11:19
Rob Napoli
Some of our strongest memories are tied to travel experiences. How do we continue to do that and make that sustainable? And how do we make it not a buzzword.

00:00:11:21 - 00:00:25:00
Joe Sykes
Why can't we leverage technology to make sustainability and carbon offsets traceable and reportable and trustworthy with sustainable? Shouldn't be thinking about it. Should be thrown around us as opposed to it should just be done.

00:00:25:02 - 00:00:32:21
Rob Napoli
When you think about hospitality as a whole, how do they leverage that data to unlock the value of you know, CO2 emissions and sustainability, carbon offsetting?

00:00:33:01 - 00:00:48:21
Joe Sykes
Initially, it's using the data to create awareness. And first of all, the awareness come in other corporate level. At the hotel level. Can't bother the customer at what cost them are reducing their CO2 footprint. Is this putting in my business in some cases?

00:00:49:01 - 00:00:55:01
Rob Napoli
Small changes can make big impacts. There's little things we can all do, and it's not as heavy as people think it is.

00:00:55:03 - 00:01:14:11
Joe Sykes
You've got to think of it as an engineering problem in a way. We've got a problem on small pieces and then it's actually doable. There's also a sustainability. It's made very heavy because it's small changes by many people, not just by a few.

00:01:14:13 - 00:01:37:00
Joe Sykes
Yeah. So my, co-founder, she's known Kees for, I think about five years or something. Then she was a lawyer for about 20 years, and, I think she helped Kees with a couple of things. They kept, up to date. They stayed in touch. I didn't know Kees personally. However I

00:01:37:02 - 00:02:01:20
Joe Sykes
Come from the same area of Terneuzen in Holland. Their Kees is sort of being a local hero in my eyes. Yeah. So, Verena my co-founder knew Kees. Then I think about two years ago, our companies, about two and a half years old. Right? So I think about two years ago, we started talking the Kees

00:02:01:20 - 00:02:23:17
Joe Sykes
We went to Terneuzen and just discussed the possibilities and just. Yeah, the opportunities that are possible. Right from that, we still had to do a load of building testing. Getting out in the marketplace and actually seeing what, what is important and what isn't important. Right. Because when you start, something is very different from reality, from what you got in your head.

00:02:23:18 - 00:02:48:10
Joe Sykes
So, yeah. So basically, I think the gist of it is, and that's where I'm going to also get into probably, in the podcast later is, Data is King, right? You guys are in the, in that in the business of data. And but I always ask, is data still king if you don't even do anything with it.

00:02:48:12 - 00:03:20:05
Joe Sykes
Right. If it's not actionable or you do take action data, it's like, oh yeah, it's good to know. But what now? Right. Yeah. And that's where we are looking for, companies like Omniboost to have basically massive piles of data and connection points, okay. To really leverage, that end of it in the terms of how much CO2 does the hotel state emit in what hotel and you can get really specific with it okay.

00:03:20:06 - 00:03:42:11
Joe Sykes
Regarding the data but you can also go specific with it regarding, climate financing or carbon offsetting And that is where we come in. So basically we are a platform that allows data aggregators, to compensate emissions of their customers, okay. Or completely reportable traceable. And that is are you a space. So that's our technology.

00:03:42:11 - 00:04:07:15
Joe Sykes
And but we also have some sort of a consulting, partnership because it's still very nascent, really, to, compensate CO2. What does that mean? Some people think, oh, there's just been some bad news about it as well. So, a lot of good things happening. But we really think that the kick started for the market that we're in and to unlock the value is in data.

00:04:07:17 - 00:04:18:23
Joe Sykes
Yeah. So that's where it really ties in. And that's I know why Kees is very, what's the word enthusiastic about partnerships.

00:04:18:23 - 00:04:34:06
Rob Napoli
Okay. I mean Kees by nature is enthusiastic. And when he gets super excited about something, it just gets loud. So, I mean, honestly, I think that's a great kickoff to the show, right? You know, that piece of that data is king. And that's what we're here to talk about today. Joe, appreciate you coming on.

00:04:34:06 - 00:05:05:11
Rob Napoli
Joe. Sykes is the, co-founder and director of a company called ecommit, which is helping, really educate the market on, sustainability, CO2 emissions. And as you're kind of talking, you know, there's the data side of things and there's the consulting side of things. And I think really it's more the education because as we know in this world, sustainability, CO2 emissions, all that is buzzwords where we're talking about, yeah, high level conversation about climate change.

00:05:05:11 - 00:05:15:10
Rob Napoli
There's tons of opinions. I, there's tons of conversations, across this scale, across the world on making our planet better, making it more sustainable.

00:05:15:12 - 00:05:44:07
Rob Napoli
Creating, It's hard to say without using the word sustainable, which is such a buzzword today. Right? I know I get, you know, creating more sustainability, but also in a way, especially as it relates to hospitable hospitality. And people love to travel. They want to experience the world. Our world is meant to be explored, right? Some of our strongest memories are tied to travel experiences to experiences being somewhere, doing something, a feeling, a smell, a sound.

00:05:44:09 - 00:06:06:17
Rob Napoli
And so how do we continue to do that and make that sustainable? And that's what I was really excited for this podcast. And you mentioned data is king. Yeah, I did a whole conversation on data as Omniboost is data unification platform data can tell many stories. Data could tell you the wrong stories. We don't utilize the data to understand why you have data, what that data is saying, how it's utilized and how it's properly taken on.

00:06:06:17 - 00:06:28:08
Rob Napoli
So all that's to say, really excited about this conversation and we kicked off with a bang. So, you know, I think the first great question, that as you are kind of really leading this charge on the education side, let's talk a little bit about ecommit. Why was it founded? And you know, especially from a hospitality standpoint, how are you looking at it?

00:06:28:10 - 00:06:35:11
Rob Napoli
Hospitality. And that includes travel, hotels, all those things. How is that a player in the space?

00:06:35:13 - 00:06:56:18
Joe Sykes
Yeah. So I'd have to go back a little while. Because I actually come from a family of third generation restaurant owners, and I think in 2015, I was 19 and I went into the, family business, a restaurant. I stayed in there for about three years. And so a lot of, opportunities regarding, labor.

00:06:56:22 - 00:07:18:10
Joe Sykes
Saw the labor shortages in restaurants and hotels. So I set up a robotic, kitchen venture in 2019. I think about six months later or something. And we were talking to the biggest hotel chains in the Netherlands. And I think a month later, Covid hit, and it's you know, the story.

00:07:18:13 - 00:07:21:00
Rob Napoli
A little bit of bad timing, right? Good idea. Right.

00:07:21:02 - 00:07:43:08
Joe Sykes
Really bad timing. Exactly. So then, so. Okay. Right. So, take a few steps back, went back to the from the business, which was like we had no customers, basically. Right? I mean, you could imagine I remember standing, in the restaurant, somebody calling and saying, you have to close to the restaurant within 20 minutes, right.

00:07:43:08 - 00:08:09:07
Joe Sykes
Then there's like a hundred people sat there dining. That's not very hospitable. Right. So you could ask them to leave. And then and I think within 12 hours, I set up a delivery system and we were rocking and rolling, doing and doing deliveries. And whilst we were doing the deliveries, I think, I brought the first delivery as well, which wasn't a good experience because it eventually led to the following.

00:08:09:09 - 00:08:36:22
Joe Sykes
You know, we had about ten guys driving up and down all around the, the region, you know, with not electric cars. Right? Because for your, because you see a lot of EVs, but in the Netherlands, which is one of the leading countries and usage of EVs, it's something like 4% methane and 96% ice, which is just the reality of this of the situation, although we seen a lot of these being pushed.

00:08:36:22 - 00:09:12:19
Joe Sykes
So I was thinking whilst delivering and driving I was thinking alright. How can we get a sort of sustainable, delivery and sustainable experience to a customer, without breaking the bank on electric vehicles? Right. And that basically let me down the rabbit hole of, sustainability and specifically, carbon offsetting. Okay. So, I think many months later, I ran into a data issue with my robotics.

00:09:12:21 - 00:09:39:20
Joe Sykes
The, I had this Ha moment where I thought, wait, why can't we leverage, technology to make, sustainability and carbon offsets traceable and reportable and trust trustworthy and all that so that was, well, where, where I began and, I think in the, by the end of 2021, I had my first little team together.

00:09:39:20 - 00:10:08:17
Joe Sykes
And then I met my real co-founders, Verena who's been in a lawyer for, 20 years, like I mentioned. And it was an immediate click from the start. So and then we went, oh, so my point and that doesn't only apply to hospitality, but if you think about sort of unspoken expectations, I think you just mentioned, that earlier on, an unspoken expectation is my room must be spotless.

00:10:08:22 - 00:10:29:16
Joe Sykes
I don't want to be saying it or thinking it. Right. It's an unspoken expectation. So I mean, another unspoken expectation is safety in a hotel, for example, right. You expect it to be safe. You don't. You shouldn't be thinking about it. Well, we think the same thing with sustainability. You shouldn't be thinking about it shouldn’t be thrown around as a buzzword.

00:10:29:18 - 00:10:51:11
Joe Sykes
It should just be covered. It should just be done. Right. So it's the unspoken expectations that we want to fulfill, but we want to do it according to all the new upcoming legislations, laws, expectations, because it is really being driven from government, down. Right. So it all has to be compliance and that sort of stuff.

00:10:51:11 - 00:11:19:23
Joe Sykes
So it all ties into, hospitality because hospitality touches everything, right? Everybody, pretty much everybody in like in the Western world has been to a hotel, right. So it touches everything. And that's why I think, the data can be leveraged to its maximum in hospitality industry for, you know, carbon offsets, climate financing, however you want to call it. So, yeah

00:11:20:00 - 00:11:41:15
Rob Napoli
It's interesting too. You know, I also, you know, we were talking a little bit before that, you know, the region you came from in the Netherlands. Same region where, you know, Kees and the headquarters of Omniboost resides down in that in Zeeland Which is always fun because you I work a lot with, the Dutch consulate here, and, you know, a lot of Dutch people in New York when I talk about.

00:11:41:15 - 00:11:47:04
Rob Napoli
Oh, yeah, I work for a Dutch company like. Oh, yeah, Amsterdam, like, no Utrecht, Rotterdam, The Hague. No,

00:11:47:06 - 00:11:50:11
Rob Napoli
Down in Zeeland, they are like Ha?

00:11:50:13 - 00:12:16:16
Rob Napoli
Like, what? Yeah. I know, kind of weird. So it's always kind of, fun and really cool that, you know, there's those times that, you know, we look at this idea of, using these buzzwords of sustainability and the unspoken expectations. Right? The room being clean. That's kind of missing a certain. If I'm in a resort on a beach and I come in sandy taking a shower, whatever I do not my room clean like I'm traveling for work.

00:12:16:18 - 00:12:33:03
Rob Napoli
You know, those are for, you know, I can hang the sign up like you. I need to turn my room over if I'm going to be there for two nights. It's a workshop. Like, there's kind of those differences where you know, we know as humans we can make a difference, right? Practical things too. Right? Like water usage and being smart.

00:12:33:03 - 00:12:40:18
Rob Napoli
There's little things we can all do. Right. But I think that and other small things do add up to make big impact.

00:12:40:20 - 00:12:41:20
Joe Sykes
Yeah.

00:12:41:22 - 00:13:11:06
Rob Napoli
But those are little things that are helpful. But we got to think about the bigger issue, the bigger problem. And what does the data telling us and where can we leverage that across different places. And you kind of made a good point. Hospitality, travel is so important and impactful to many people. And I think there was a stat just recently, the Sunday after the 4th of July was one of the biggest days for American, airports

00:13:11:08 - 00:13:31:12
Rob Napoli
More people traveling, than I think over the last decade on a single day crossing airports. And to think that, you know, it's shows even while prices are rising for travel, hotel prices are rising. All this people are still wanting to get out and explore and do and be. And we think about generationally. We think about younger generations.

00:13:31:14 - 00:13:55:02
Rob Napoli
There is much more of a, look and feel or, a call to, you know, being more sustainable, offsetting our footprint and wanting to stay with brands, you know, spend their money with companies and brands that are working to do that. So let me think about it from a hospitality standpoint. You kind of brought up the unspoken expectations, but we talked about data, data as king.

00:13:55:03 - 00:14:10:01
Rob Napoli
How do hospitality brands, how do you know even airlines, when you think about hospitality as a whole, how do they leverage that data and what is it that they can do with data to unlock the value of, you know, CO2 emissions and sustainability, carbon offsetting?

00:14:10:03 - 00:14:30:03
Joe Sykes
Yeah. So it's a good question. See what is you see a lot happening right now. Is this first of all the collection of the data. Right. And it being put on dashboarding. So to create awareness and a step number one, if we don't know we're not aware. And then you can go many ways with it.

00:14:30:05 - 00:14:44:09
Joe Sykes
And what you see right now there's a lot of push on reducing CO2 emissions at all costs. Right. And that is where one stop goes. I actually forgot your question.

00:14:44:11 - 00:15:03:14
Rob Napoli
Yeah. No problem the question kind of goes into we're talking about the data emissions. We're talking about hospitality brands and industries. And we have this data. How do we actually use that data to unlock, the value of it. So, you know, I love this story. I thought of education and awareness. I think the first part is awareness.

00:15:03:14 - 00:15:14:08
Rob Napoli
And there is a lot of awareness in terms of where think about anybody, maybe not awareness that there's options or there's data out there. So yeah, how do we use this data to unlock the value of that?

00:15:14:10 - 00:15:39:24
Joe Sykes
Yeah. So initially it's using the data to create awareness. Right. And first of all that awareness to come in at a corporate level or at the hotel level. Right. Because it can't bother the customer. Right. So that is an important thing to note. We don't want to overload the client or the guest with too many sustainable, you know, talk basically.

00:15:39:24 - 00:16:09:06
Joe Sykes
Yeah. Right. So the question is, okay, now how do we create impact using the data? So it's interesting because I've got some numbers here and if you look at the average emissions of a hotel stay, this is just across the US. You're looking at 16.1kg per night. That's what it's up. And so in 2022, right, U.S hospitality industry sold approximately 1.2 billion nights.

00:16:09:08 - 00:16:43:15
Joe Sykes
Right. So that equals 19,320,000,000kg of CO2 emissions. Okay. What does that even mean? Right. And I would like to translate it in the form of how many acres of trees would you need to basically compensate for those emissions? Right. Trees are the lungs of the earth. They take in the CO2. So you basically would need the surface area of the state of new Jersey to compensate those emissions of the complete hospitality industry in the US.

00:16:43:17 - 00:17:07:12
Joe Sykes
Right. So that's a lot. But it's also not that much. It's about half the size of the Netherlands. And the Netherlands is not a very big country, you know, say the least. So first of all it's creating this translation of CO2 expert jargon to things people understand. Okay you know what the state of new Jersey is.

00:17:07:13 - 00:17:30:09
Joe Sykes
You know what a tree is, right? That is the type of impact. We can have. But then the question is at what cost? Right. Because I talk to I go to many companies from small to very large. And, you know, people want to reduce CO2 footprint. That's great. Right. But it comes at a point where at what cost to my reducing my CO2 footprint, right?

00:17:30:11 - 00:17:49:23
Joe Sykes
How much is this costing me? Is this putting me my business in some cases. Right. That can't be the you know, the goal, right? The goal is to work with sustainability, meaning what is the essence of sustainability? That you're sustainable and that you're going to like your business also effects right? It can't be one way street.

00:17:49:23 - 00:18:23:23
Joe Sykes
So if you look at, you know, what would be necessary to, on a per night basis regarding climate financing to compensate for those emissions. You're talking about the 0.7% increase in, ADR across hotels, right? So to accomplish this goal. So we're looking at like a dollar per night on an average ADR of, $148 or something in the US.

00:18:24:00 - 00:18:52:10
Joe Sykes
So it's really a fraction, because if you look at the inflation levels we've been having in the last three years, right. That has zero impact on like on the environmental, whatever. Whilst a 0.7% increase actually can create a massive impact. It's not it's a 0.7% increase to basically save the state of new Jersey. I mean, you can't really look at it that way. But yeah, just to visualize.

00:18:52:12 - 00:19:09:23
Rob Napoli
Yeah, I mean, visualizing it impact is that kind of what you're saying is that small changes can make big impact. And I think the awareness is that now, I do think this is kind of a scary thing like, okay, CO2 emissions, sustainability. We're looking at this is a heavy, heavy thing.

00:19:09:23 - 00:19:33:07
Rob Napoli
And it's going to cause I need a higher team around this. And you do this, do this has any input on these strategies when in reality there's things that need to be implemented. But the impact, the net impact of doing a few small things is huge. And it's not as heavy as people think it is, even though it feels like, oh, we need to be carbon neutral, we need to offset, we need to do all these things.

00:19:33:07 - 00:19:58:24
Rob Napoli
It feels heavy because the weight of the conversation at a global scale makes it feel heavy for brands to think about versus the way you just kind of rope it out. And it's it really almost makes sense. Like, okay, we did X on each day, $1. It changes a lot of things. Right? The impact of that could be, you know, quite high at a very low cost versus like most of thing.

00:19:58:24 - 00:20:16:10
Rob Napoli
Oh, it's going to cost like, you know, a thousand per year just to make that kind of impact when it's not. And that's really interesting because even for me in my brain, it seems like before we got to this call, it just seems like it's a heavy subject. It's, you know, it's a lot that you have to do versus like the practical thing.

00:20:16:12 - 00:20:36:23
Joe Sykes
No, absolutely. And that's why, you know, you've got to think of it as an engineering problem in a way. Right? You've got cut a problem on small pieces and then it's actually doable. Right? Then you can actually work with it. Of course, if we want to, you know, build the Hudson, bridge, then, you know, then it's going to be a hard thing to put there.

00:20:37:00 - 00:20:56:20
Joe Sykes
Put that bridge in that in one go. No, it's going to be made in pieces. It's different engineering companies working on it. It's a joint effort. All small pieces coming together and creating something. So this also with sustainability it's made very heavy, you know in the media for example, and by government. It's made very heavy subject.

00:20:56:22 - 00:21:09:21
Joe Sykes
But basically we've been talking about throughout this podcast is it's only small changes that can have actually the biggest impact. Right. Because it's small changes by many people, not just by a few. Right?

00:21:09:23 - 00:21:27:12
Rob Napoli
Yeah. And I think by this kind of awareness piece and obviously we'll get it to, you know, companies leveraging kind of what you all are doing. But there's also the side of, you know, the listeners out there, those that are staying at hotels and traveling, you know, there's little things that we can do. Right? We talked about not having the room turned over every night.

00:21:27:12 - 00:21:50:19
Rob Napoli
You know, being just more thoughtful on little things like keeping water running all the time and things of that nature. Like it's really interesting to think that they're small habits, ritual changes that individuals can do in their daily lives as they're traveling, when they're out and about, that work well with what hospitality or hotel brands are already trying to put in place and the options that you have just to be more sustainable.

00:21:50:19 - 00:22:04:12
Rob Napoli
And those little changes as little habitual changes for us can make a big impact as well. In combination with what the brands are trying to do from a global or a local scale, depending on if it's a regional brand or a big global corporate. Right?

00:22:04:14 - 00:22:38:07
Joe Sykes
Yep definitely. And I also think regarding light corporate guests for hotels and in the hospitality industry, they are basically they need some type of way to get a reporting on things like this. So they need data because this like my world is legislation almost right it's a constant new stream of expectation from government to actually show what is your CO2 footprint.

00:22:38:09 - 00:23:02:20
Joe Sykes
Right. And it goes all the way down like here in the Netherlands. We now have reporting standards per car basis for a company. Right. So it goes that far. And this is not going to stop. Right. It's only going to get more. So if we can create awareness on hotel level, what we can then also create, awareness at the customer level, right at the guest level.

00:23:02:22 - 00:23:23:00
Joe Sykes
Then you have the full picture. But that's a step by step process that is not realized in two years or maybe even maybe five years. Right? Really, the first step now is action. Making the data's actionable. Now we have the data. So that's basically what we will be doing together Rob

00:23:23:02 - 00:23:46:07
Rob Napoli
Yeah. So we said we talked about first step being awareness. Right. And so making people aware is a big conversation piece. But then you know we have we're starting to look at this data. What is kind of the next step. So we think about from awareness and to actually educating and leveraging data. How hospitality leverage that data and what are the tools I obviously ecommit has a tool for that.

00:23:46:07 - 00:24:02:24
Rob Napoli
Like what talk through that a little bit like now that we have awareness, what's the next practical step that I think that where we kind of our today we're in that kind of spot of being maybe becoming more aware and taking a look at what our next steps. But I think maybe the data is not fully there.

00:24:02:24 - 00:24:14:23
Rob Napoli
So like, what's that next step from awareness and where is the impact that you really look to make with ecommit as we look at, you know, the second half of 2024 going into 25, from an impact level.

00:24:15:00 - 00:24:41:15
Joe Sykes
Yeah. So the first thing after awareness, after actually having the data is to identify, hey, what are, unavoidable emissions. What can and can't I avoid. So that basically means, you know, how much can I reduce my electricity footprint or whatever, right. It gets to a point where it becomes very difficult to reduce more.

00:24:41:19 - 00:25:09:10
Joe Sykes
So you got to first know, okay, what parts will I never be able to solve right through reduction? Because if you have that, that is actually now you've got the piece that makes it that you can work with immediately, right through platforms like AWS, through carbon credits, and through data basically. So first is awareness, then it's then identifying what is unavoidable.

00:25:09:14 - 00:25:38:20
Joe Sykes
And then you've got to make it turn it into, language and visuals that the guests understand. But you also got to understand which guest you are showing this, right. This is not for everybody. Like that's why I specifically said corporate guests, they would be the very next step into visualizing, the footprint or the offset, CO2 offset for a given night, reporting on it, etc..

00:25:39:00 - 00:25:48:21
Joe Sykes
That's where the next value unlock is. And it's not, the definition, the yeah. Normal consume. I don't know how you.

00:25:48:23 - 00:26:27:24
Rob Napoli
Yeah. It's not. Yeah, And I think the interesting thing here to right is there's some really cool things that can be done from a standpoint of like corporate travel retreats, and events like, hey, here's the event they're doing. And then by making these decisions, here's how you're impacting or how you're creating positive impact by having this type of event at this location, with this or with these things aligned as you can, then you can actually kind of show that you can still have great experiences, you can still be hospitable you can still have the party, have the travel, have the corporate retreat, but also within that showing what you're doing, offset by

00:26:27:24 - 00:26:45:17
Rob Napoli
being there, doing those things, you're actually kind of showing both impacts the business and to the planet. And I think that's a really interesting piece, being able to show that and share that and create that, you know, that tie together that we're all working together to still have great experiences, but make positive impact in what we're doing and how we're doing it.

00:26:45:19 - 00:27:02:23
Rob Napoli
I think that is really kind of cool is the thing that we don't realize is out there and could be done, or maybe we do, and it's just not highlighted the right way where it just becomes. And it is partly because from a media level, it's a very big, heavy conversation. But there are some really cool things that I think could be shown.

00:27:02:23 - 00:27:11:03
Rob Napoli
Share and done. That, that create big impact and great ways, that are, you know, at that basic level.

00:27:11:05 - 00:27:38:05
Joe Sykes
Exactly. You know, small things can result in very big things. And that is the cool thing about it. And that's why this is actually only possible through the usage of data. Right. You can actually only guarantee a certain experience quality and stuff behind it with sustainability. If you have data right and you know how to translate that into action. So, data is king.

00:27:38:07 - 00:27:58:00
Rob Napoli
Yeah. So how do we get the data? You know, I think that's a good time to talk about obviously, you know, Omniboost data unification platform. We you know, we have tons of data. There's tons of different data aggregators out there. There's different platforms, especially in hospitality PMS, you have POS you've got staff planning, you've got, inventory I mean, you have all these different tools that provide data.

00:27:58:00 - 00:28:10:15
Rob Napoli
So let's talk about like, data is king. What does the data come from? How does how does data get leverage it? How should hospitality be thinking about data, that we can actually utilize that to tell the story.

00:28:10:17 - 00:28:39:18
Joe Sykes
Yeah. So the data streams are coming through, for example, the hospitality industry, through the connections of Omniboost Right. It provides a whole range of different activities, basically. Right. And any given activity has a certain emission. Not every activity has an emission. But you'd be surprised almost every activity does actually have a certain emission factor. And what's cool on with what you can do with it is there is something called the GHG protocol.

00:28:39:18 - 00:29:11:02
Joe Sykes
And all that protocol is there is emission factor database has been built, open source that you can actually translate into to getting the right emission factors, but that specific country for that specific activity for that specific year. So now you can make it very reliable, that you can make the data very reliable so that you can basically these days engineer, despite know, quite easy to get the right data.

00:29:11:04 - 00:29:38:04
Joe Sykes
Right. So it's just a calculation. So once you have the calculation, the question is what are we going to do with it. Yeah, there is a whole range of options. But the first thing is and I'm just basically repeating myself that is to really identify the unavoidable emissions, because we also don't want to stop, the hospitality industry of any company to reduce their CO2 footprint.

00:29:38:04 - 00:29:47:17
Joe Sykes
Right. It can't be. Oh, yeah. I just offset my CO2 and I don't reduce CO2 footprint anymore. It's got to be a balance.

00:29:47:19 - 00:30:06:23
Rob Napoli
Absolutely. I think that makes sense. That understating what is unavoidable versus avoidable because there are things like in order to have a hospitable experience, in order to live on this planet, in to do things, there are actions that have to be taken in order for us to live. I breathing. Okay, to live on this planet.

00:30:06:23 - 00:30:33:02
Rob Napoli
So I think highlighting that in knowing what's unavoidable, what versus what is avoidable. And then, you know, here's options to actually counteract what's unavoidable. And I do think that is something very unique and interesting that we don't talk enough about is that, hey, look, there's unavoidable emissions. We know that these are things. Let's identify those and then create a strategy, a plan and opportunities for, positive impact in other areas.

00:30:33:02 - 00:30:54:04
Rob Napoli
Right. This is unavoidable. But we can do this to that. And creating that visualization, we started off talking about yeah this big number and it's like scary. It's like, oh it's like a forest the size of new Jersey okay. That's understandable. Right. Less deforestation, more planting trees like there's things that like your brain can pick that up really easily from there.

00:30:54:06 - 00:31:08:09
Rob Napoli
So it's not necessarily like you are I'm sure for you it's like your brain works a thousand miles a minute, but you have to be able to bring that back to. Yeah. They're listening is like, okay, this is not my world. But we want to make sure that our brain is doing something about it and bring that level down.

00:31:08:10 - 00:31:24:20
Rob Napoli
It's like, oh, okay. As a person that I can do as a company, this is what I can do as a group of people. This is what we can do. And that becomes really exciting and more bite sizable, right? Like it's actually we can take this on and do something about it. Is that what we're doing actually has an impact positively.

00:31:24:24 - 00:31:45:04
Joe Sykes
Yeah. No, absolutely. And that that is also one of the things where you see a lot in my industry is it's a lot of, you know, business jargon, a lot of sort of, professor type talk. And you know what? At the end of the day, the rest of the world, it's got to be going to be on one line, right?

00:31:45:04 - 00:32:06:21
Joe Sykes
You've got to be able to translate it into some type of comprehensible thing, because otherwise, you'll yeah, you'll never get anything done, basically. Right. We'll just be talking amongst the professors and say how cool everything is. But, yeah, I think the important thing is to be able to make that translation and also understand the roadmap of that translation.

00:32:06:21 - 00:32:29:01
Joe Sykes
Right. Who is the target audience of that matter of tomorrow and not trying to get it all in one go, basically, because it's also what you see a lot is okay, you know, also small companies who feel forced to do things and they've got no, you know, don't have any money or, you know, time, whatever.

00:32:29:04 - 00:32:48:16
Joe Sykes
Like it's made too big. And that's basically what you've said at the beginning as well. It's you know, you've got to be able to pull that open and small digestible pieces make sense of it. And it's got to be scientific. What we really ditched the scientific talk about it because it just doesn't really help.

00:32:48:18 - 00:32:53:06
Joe Sykes
The acceleration of the sustainable activities is not interesting.

00:32:53:06 - 00:33:15:12
Rob Napoli
I mean, it's interesting you bring this up because with a lot of these bigger topics, we think even, you know, AI, ML, we have, sustainability. We think all these kind of hot button topics that we're being talked about and all these different spaces are places is it's they, you know, the chicken or the egg conversation of theory versus execution.

00:33:15:14 - 00:33:40:02
Rob Napoli
We spend a lot of time talking theories. And what if, you know, if this happens then this versus okay, we know that this is the problem and this is heavy for everybody. But when we look across the world and we look at different countries, people's different things, you know, that message can't hit everybody. It's not like, you know, humans are so unique and different that you can't give one message and say, all right, this is it.

00:33:40:04 - 00:34:04:03
Rob Napoli
We have to be able to tailor that message to different groups or people, to different industries, different impacts, because everyone's going to look at it differently. And when we actually can bring that down to earth and make that execution of all. And I think this is where many businesses and even coming from Omniboost standpoint, there's things that we talk about with our different business strategies, where it's a lot of theory and it's hard to execute where it's like, you know what, let's just go.

00:34:04:07 - 00:34:30:24
Rob Napoli
I'm a big fan of like building out and just going and getting something 80% done, testing it right. Perfect gets in the way of good build, something good, test it, iterate, make it better, make it great, take great, iterate, test it and make it better. But you'll never get perfect if you try to wait for perfect in any business, you will fail because perfection is, in my opinion, there is.

00:34:31:03 - 00:34:45:14
Rob Napoli
There's very few things that is perfection, and even in perfection is a flaw, right? You think of diamonds. We all think of diamonds as perfection in some of the coolest diamonds. But the reason why they're the coolest diamonds they have one small flaw so it's perfect because of the flaw.

00:34:45:16 - 00:34:45:21
Joe Sykes
Yeah.

00:34:45:21 - 00:35:17:20
Rob Napoli
Can we stop thinking about trying to make everything perfect? We make things good and we let good turn into great. That's where we can make bigger impacts. It sounds like from this conversation, that's what you're trying to do with ecommit And what's exciting is a little teaser. Some of the stuff that Omniboost and ecommit is working on together from a standpoint of how do we make actionable insights from data, how to use that to educate people the right way and create small, sustainable things that make positive impact.

00:35:17:22 - 00:35:37:24
Rob Napoli
And if we just really work through that and we put good out, good turns into great. And that's why I think so many companies fail to do because they want to be perfect and perfection it's a bit of a myth in my opinion. No, I don't want to be controversial, but I, you know, it's just bringing that back in kind of full lifecycle for me.

00:35:38:01 - 00:35:42:24
Joe Sykes
Well, perfection. creates an action, isn't it

00:35:43:01 - 00:36:07:10
Rob Napoli
I love that perfection creates that action. Absolutely. Yeah. Joe we could talk forever, but I know it's getting late and I appreciate you for taking so much time. You know, excited. About some of the stuff that we are kind of working on. I think what ecommit is doing a what you it kind of a story of going through it from, you know, small town in the Netherlands into a family restaurant, into a robotics that failed, not failed let's say

00:36:07:10 - 00:36:22:20
Rob Napoli
Great idea. Bad timing. It it's turning that into a bigger thing. But really thinking. And I think it's really interesting. I think the cool thing is you could be very theoretical and be like, oh, I'm in this space trying to change the world. But what y'all really doing is focusing on how do you bring that back down?

00:36:22:20 - 00:36:41:03
Rob Napoli
And that was what the idea of this podcast, talking hospitality, how do you bring it to a single industry? And we showed how a single industry can make a huge impact through small changes. And one of the biggest industries in the world is hospitality. And if the hospitality industry can do small changes to make big impact, think about what we could do.

00:36:41:03 - 00:36:58:20
Rob Napoli
If we message that, and we bring that to every type of community, every type of company, every type of industry, and we change the messaging to make it fit for them and show them how it's done, what that impact look like in a decade from now, in two decades. Right. That's really exciting stuff now.

00:36:58:20 - 00:37:20:02
Joe Sykes
Totally great. So I'm also very excited on the upcoming partnership with ecommit and Omniboost. You know, I've been looking forward to this for a few years, basically. Right. We've built a company up to 20 people now. And, we're going to do some amazing things. So, you know, it's data driven, automated climate impact. So it's going to be reportable.

00:37:20:02 - 00:37:26:02
Joe Sykes
It's all going to be, fantastic. So, yeah. Thank you very much, Rob.

00:37:26:04 - 00:37:43:04
Rob Napoli
Yeah, Joe I appreciate it. We're excited for you. I think you're in a great space. And now growing from growing to 20 people, the next milestone up to 50, 50 to 100. It's all new challenges, new things. But, you know keep the momentum going. Really excited to have you on the podcast. But for those out there listening, how can they find you, Joe?

00:37:43:05 - 00:37:53:02
Rob Napoli
What's the best way if they want to learn more about you, connect with you a lot about what you ecommit, where, what you know, shout out where they can find you. I'll make sure to drop it on the show notes for them. But where, where can they get ahold of you at?

00:37:53:04 - 00:38:06:03
Joe Sykes
Yeah, the best way to search us is on LinkedIn is, ecommit and there's a lot of information there. That and, our website, you can find us on Google very easily. So, that's it.

00:38:06:05 - 00:38:24:07
Rob Napoli
Also, I'll make sure to have those linked into the show notes. Joe, I appreciate you for taking the time, my friend. Really excited for, you know, future conversations with you and the team and the stuff I get to do together. I'll be back in the Netherlands here, most likely in a few months. So maybe, we meet up in person, for a drink.

00:38:24:09 - 00:38:44:03
Rob Napoli
Just over virtually for recording. So appreciate you, Joe. Thank you for listening. It's been another episode of Hospitable. As always, be tier one like, subscribe, reviews. All the things to help us out. If you, have topics or people that should be a guest on the show, are you or someone to be a guest? Let us know.

00:38:44:05 - 00:38:48:12
Rob Napoli
My information is the show notes as well. And until next episode, stay hospitable. Thank you.