WASTE MATTERS AT MARRIOTT BONVOY PORTFOLIO’S OF HOTELS & RESORTS IN THAILAND & CAMBODIA
Marriott Business Council Thailand marks World Environment Day on June 5th with a series of innovative food waste initiatives, including the upcycling and recycling of used coffee grinds
Bangkok, Thailand: Something sustainable is brewing at Marriott Bonvoy’s portfolio of hotels and resorts in Thailand and Cambodia! As the planet prepares to mark World Environment Day on June 5th, 2025, Marriott Thailand Business Council has revealed a series of eco-friendly activities to eliminate food waste across the kingdom, including a coffee upcycling initiative.
Under the “Waste Matters” program at JW Marriott Hotel Bangkok, BBCO coffee bar is harnessing the natural benefits of its used fresh coffee grinds. These nutrient-rich waste products are already donated to Bangkachao Farm for composting and organic farming, and now, the baristas at BBCO will offer coffee grinds free-of-charge to guests, who can use them to fertilize their garden, repel bugs, or even exfoliate their skin! The hotel also works with a local research studio to help transform food waste into green building materials.
Fresh coffee is a focus of food waste reduction at many other Marriott Bonvoy’s portfolio of hotels in Thailand, including The Ritz-Carlton, Bangkok, which donates its used coffee grinds to One Bangkok for landscape gardening, Marriott Executive Apartments Sukhumvit Park, Bangkok, which is creating a sustainable coffee scrub for its hotel associates, Renaissance Phuket Resort & Spa, which has launched a coffee scrub promotion at its Quan Spa, and Renaissance Pattaya Resort & Spa, which has already successfully converted 524kg of coffee into garden compost in 2025. Upcycling activities are also being adopted at Courtyard Siem Reap Resort in Cambodia, where coffee grinds are used to nourish the lush tropical gardens.
At The Westin Grande Sukhumvit, Bangkok, a holistic food waste program sees fresh coffee grinds infused into a natural fertilizer to nourish the hotel’s gardens, and other organic waste either transformed into fish food or collected by the local authorities for municipal composting. The St. Regis Bangkok works with a local company to responsibly process its food waste, Bangkok Marriott Marquis Queen’s Park creates soaps, glasses, food trays and other innovative products from old oyster shells, and Vana Belle, a Luxury Collection Resort, Koh Samui crushes up eggshells to fertilize its gardens.
Le Méridien is fully committed to sustainable operations in Thailand. Le Méridien Bangkok has its own composting machine to process organic waste onsite, and Le Méridien Suvarnabhumi, Bangkok Golf Resort & Spa has adopted a series of initiatives, including a “Waste to Energy” project that incinerates waste to eliminate toxic gases and reduce the impact on landfill, plus the recycling of coffee grinds to make an organic body scrub and plant fertilizer. In Thailand’s far north, Le Méridien Chiang Rai Resort has a comprehensive food waste program that includes the transformation of used coffee into scrub soaps for the spa, food scraps, fruit peel and eggshells retained for fertilizer, and the donation of surplus high-quality breakfast items to feed underprivileged local children.
All of these initiatives are guided by “Serve 360: Doing Good in Every Direction,” Marriott International’s global sustainability and social impact platform. By integrating eco-friendly practices into its daily operations, the group is striving to reduce food waste by 50%, water intensity by 15%, and carbon intensity by 30%. Marriott has already abolished single-use plastics, and is in the process of rolling out EV charging stations across Thailand. Ultimately, the company is striving to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
Celebrated annually on June 5th, World Environment Day was launched by the United Nations to encourage awareness and action for the protection of the environment. It is supported by many governments, non-governmental organizations, and businesses, including Marriott International.
To learn more about Marriott’s commitment to sustainability, please visit www.Marriott.com/Serve360.
