Diversey reaches out to Covid-19 areas with ‘hotel discard linen’ face masks

Diversey, supported by its partner hotels, launches a Linens For Life programme in India with the objective of empowering people impacted by disasters. With this programme, Diversey demonstrates how it has successfully joined the global community in the fight against Covid-19, together with its customer hotels and partner NGOs, and supporting society as a whole.

With this programme, families can increase their income by converting linens discarded by hotels into new and useful items which they can sell. At present, there are 23 ongoing Linens For Life face mask projects in 11 nations across Asia, Europe and Latin America. About 45 hotels have partnered with Diversey in the programme that has provided over 400,000 masks to local communities and hospitals in Covid-19-affected areas.

The company has worked on this programme in countries across the world, including Greece, the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, Thailand and Singapore, apart from India, to support the lives of people affected by disaster, as also disabled children and the elderly.

Diversey-India, in association with Doctors For You, has created and distributed over 62,000 masks from the linen donated by Novotel and OYO. They have worked in Jammu and Kashmir, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Punjab and Delhi.

How the programme works

Linen that is discarded, or condemned, by hotels is collected at zero cost and distributed by Diversey’s partner NGOs, while Diversey arranges for manpower to run the Linens For Life programme, providing sewing machines, training people looking to earn money through preparing these masks and also, later, distributing them to the affected communities.

The programme also benefits hotels that partner with Diversey in several ways, such as reducing waste disposal costs, creating brand image, employee engagement, guest satisfaction and a sustainable development commitment. Not only that, but the programme also helps in protecting the environment in a big way by reducing water consumption and CO2 emission levels.

"Masks are the first line of defence against the virus and it’s critical to ensure that there’s no shortage. Thanks, Diversey-India, for allowing us to contribute to this noble endeavour," said Ritesh Agarwal, Founder and CEO, OYO Hotels & Homes

Objectives of Linens For Life

* Providing hotel partners with a meaningful way to recycle used linen that helps their local communities.

* Providing a livelihood to local communities through their creative work in converting used linen into items for sale.

* Providing linen for use during disasters to help affected people.