Scandic First Sustainable Key Cards

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Scandic Hotels Becomes the World’s First Hotel Chain to Make Sustainable Wooden Key Cards a Brand Standard in all Hotels. Sustainable Cards Made From Wood Gain in Popularity as an Environmentally-Sound Alternative to Petroleum-Based Plastic. Sustainable Cards, the world’s leading source of sustainable wood for hotel key cards, gift cards and retail point-of-sale signage, announced today that Scandic Hotels, one of Europe’s leading hotel chains, will use its wooden hotel key cards in all of its 157 hotels in nine countries. After using an earlier version of the wood card at some of its properties for over 7 years, Scandic Hotels have now decided to implement Sustainable Cards new patent pending version of the decade old Swedish invention in all of its hotels. Scandic Hotels, headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden, and long regarded as an industry leader in sustainability, has established the Nordic birch wooden key cards to be a new company-wide brand standard, effective this November. The wooden cards perfectly complement our rigorous sustainable practices, says Inger Mattsson, Manager Sustainable Business at Scandic Hotels. We try to make pro-environmental choices in all that we do in our hotels, she adds. We are honored that Europe’s most respected environmental hotel chain would choose our cards, says Peo Akesson, CEO and Founder of Sustainable Cards, which is committed to reducing harmful plastic waste in the world by promoting the use of environmentally-sound, alternative wood products in the hospitality and retail industries. Scandic has always been on the forefront of environmental issues in general and wooden key cards in particular, but we are especially pleased that Scandic Hotels has now established a chain-wide standard of using our product, he adds. The wooden hotel key cards are being manufactured in Hede, Sweden, where the company’s production facility is located. The card is manufactured using Nordic grown Birch from sustainably managed forests and contains mostly unaltered plant material. The manufacturing process for wood cards uses small amounts of water and energy when compared to how plastic is created. Using wood cards therefore helps reduce CO2 emissions and the need for petroleum-based products. The cards work just like plastic but they help environment instead of hurt it. “They’re durable, reusable and reliable,” says Akesson, who notes that the key cards have been successfully used in Europe for the past decade. Independent environmental research firm, Natural Capitalism Solutions (NCS), recently verified that cards made with Sustainable Cards’ patent-pending ProSum wood materials are more sustainable than the most prevalent card types in the industry, including PVC, recycled PVC, PET-plastics, bio-plastic and other alternative petroleum-based cards, says Akesson. Our conclusions were based on the fact that Sustainable Card products are principally comprised of renewable, naturally grown and sustainably harvested birch wood, manufactured with very low levels of synthetic inputs in facilities which maximize renewable energy, utilize low amounts of water, and produce comparatively less waste, says Jeff Hohensee of NCS.