The chain’s two properties in Vancouver will go smoke-free next month
Jim Fitzgerald, with files from Bruce Constantineau
Sun
Two Vancouver hotels will be part of Westin Hotels & Resorts’ smoking ban that will see its operations go smoke-free next month in Canada, the United States and the Caribbean — and add $200 to the bill of anyone who violates the policy.
The hotel chain is banning smoking indoors and poolside at all 77 of its properties in North America, said senior vice-president Sue Brush. Smokers will have to go to a designated outdoor area, she said.
In Vancouver, the move will affect guests at the Westin Bayshore Resort & Marina and the Westin Grand Hotel.
Westin Bayshore general manager Mark Andrew said 20 per cent of his property’s 511 rooms had been set aside for smokers but as of next month, all hotel rooms will be non-smoking.
“Cutting out smoking is going to be a very positive thing because I get far more complaints from guests who were put in a smoking room than from those who were put in a non-smoking room,” he said.
The two Westin Vancouver hotels will be the first major downtown properties to initiate a total non-smoking policy next month, although the 129-room Listel Hotel on Robson Street introduced a smoking ban in January 2003.
Pan Pacific Hotel general manager Steve Halliday expects the non-smoking ban will eventually become an industry standard.
“We still have to take care of our guests that want smoking privileges but I think eventually we’ll all go that way,” he said.
American Hotel & Lodging Association representative Enica Thompson said Westin is the first major American chain to go smoke-free and predicted that “many of the other hotel chains will probably want to see how it works out for Westin” before following suit.
Eight Westin hotels were already smoke-free, and at least five per cent of the rooms at the others had been set aside for nonsmokers, Brush said. But market research found that 92 per cent of Westin’s guests were requesting nonsmoking rooms, and some of those who couldn’t get them were “quite upset,” she said.
Brush said customers will be advised about the policy at check-in. If a guest violates the rule — “when we can observe it by smelling it or whatever” — a $200 fee will be added to the bill.
“It’s really a cleaning fee,” she said. The 2,400 smoking rooms in the chain are undergoing deep cleaning and air purifying before the Jan. 1 changeover,” The smoking ban will apply to hallways, lobbies, and restaurants, except for the eight restaurants that are run by outside companies and not under Westin’s control, Brush said. “They will be invited to participate,” she added.
The policy will not extend to Westin’s overseas hotels or to other chains, such as Sheraton, that are under the same parent company, Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. Westin was the brand that “had the least amount of smokers to begin with,” Brush said.
She said there might be a dip in business at the beginning of the year as smokers go elsewhere, but Westin expects to quickly replace that business with travellers favouring the new policy.
© The Vancouver Sun 2005
