MCLEAN, Va.—Hilton Worldwide recently celebrated its commitment to community service through its annual Global Month of Service (GMS), the company’s month-long, global initiative to help address social, economic, and environmental needs around the world. This year, team members united to work on 4,145 projects contributing more than 213,000 volunteer hours in 92 countries.
Community service is a tradition that has been part of the company’s identity for nearly 100 years, and throughout the year team members dedicate their time, passion, and unique brand of hospitality to create positive change in their local communities and the wider world. Drawing on the success of the company’s Global Week of Service, Hilton expanded its celebration of service to the entire month of October this year, reinforcing its commitment through a myriad of projects including environmental cleanups, providing nutritious meals to underserved communities, mentoring and training young people, providing support for veterans, and creating hospitality care packages for those in need.
“As our founder Conrad Hilton once said, ‘Think big. Act big. Dream big,’ and that is the spirit behind our Global Month of Service,” said Christopher J. Nassetta, president and CEO of Hilton Worldwide. “This year, we set ambitious goals to impact more people and communities as we came together to volunteer and celebrate our passion and commitment to serve others. Mobilizing team members to prepare food for the under privileged in India, to provide career training support for young women in Saudi Arabia or to renovate a youth center in the U.S., not only enriches the lives of those we are serving, but it also enriches our teams by fostering greater empathy and connections to the communities around us.”
Throughout October, Hilton worked with a global network of local community organizations including Soap4Hope, The Boys & Girls Club, Tomorrow’s People, Kickstart for Kids, International Youth Foundation (IYF), and St. Mary’s Food Bank. Projects were tracked through LightStay, Hilton’s corporate responsibility measurement platform used to record the company’s impact across more than 4,500 properties globally.
Highlights from Global Month of Service include:
In the United States, more than 150 team members from Hilton’s Headquarters in McLean, Virginia joined the Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Washington (BGCGW) to renovate one of the area’s largest Boys & Girls Clubs, which serves hundreds of local youth daily. Team Members painted, installed furniture and electronics, and renovated play and study areas to create a fun space for youth to enjoy.
Hilton Reforma Mexico City, Mexico launched its soap recycling program in partnership with Soap4Hope, becoming the first Hilton hotel in Latin America to implement a soap recycling program. The program recycles and donates soap to communities to help improve hygiene and prevent the spread of disease and illnesses.
In the United Kingdom, more than 55 volunteers from 11 DoubleTree by Hilton hotels from the London area joined forces to tackle homelessness by creating over 2,000 amenities packs for 40 homeless shelters. The team also delivered pro-bono consulting on efficient facilities management and cooked lunch with Beyond Food Foundation, an organization that trains people at risk of homelessness to become chefs. Five hotels committed to exploring work experience opportunities for the Beyond Food Foundation’s chefs.
In Italy, 80 team members cooked recipes from around the world with M’ama Food, a project of Hilton Milan’s community partner Farsi Prossimo, which provides refugee and migrant women from Syria and North Africa with skills and support to develop their catering business and integrate in the Milan society. All the food was donated to the local food bank. Seven properties in Italy routinely donate their surplus food to the local community.
In Kenya, the full Hilton Nairobi team celebrated their two month-long refurbishment of TOI Primary School with new sewage and drainage, complemented with the launch of Soap For Hope, which recycles hotel soap to promote hand-washing at the school. The team also distributed lunch and backpacks to all 900 students.
In Malaysia, team members from Hilton Petaling Jaya launched a computer training room at the Agathians Shelter Home for children, where they donated computers and created a fresh space to help underprivileged children learn more about digital technology. Team Members will provide ongoing computer training for the children and educate them on responsible Internet usage and ways the Internet can help them in their studies.
Team members at Hilton Adelaide, Australia partnered with Kickstart for Kids, a local organization that provides breakfast to school children, to help fund a yearlong breakfast program for 16 local schools. Team members also prepared and served lunches at the Hutt Street Centre, a frontline agency for homeless and vulnerable communities. Another major project was the Hilton Work Experience Program, which provides participants the opportunity to spend time at the hotel and experience the variety of careers available at Hilton.
Since its inaugural service celebration in 2012, Hilton volunteers have completed more than 10,800 projects worldwide contributing more than 513,000 hours of community service.
