Living more sustainably and reducing your footprint now extends to your next stay at Oaks, as we collect your used soap and recycle it, helping to save children’s lives through improved hygiene and reduce landfill in the process.

We’ve partnered with not-for-profit organisation Soap Aid to become the newest Hotel Champion for their ‘Hotels to Hands’ initiative. Soap Aid sends critical soap to communities both locally and around the world who are facing major hygiene challenges.

As handwashing with soap can reduce over 40% of diarrhoea cases and save lives, each bar counts.

Your used bar of hotel soap is part of an estimated 4kg of hotel waste soap created per room each year. This contribution by each hotel room provides 63 bars of recycled soap per year, providing 3 children with critically needed soap for a whole year.

Recycling this waste soap also has direct benefits for the environment. By collecting our waste soap, we are saving millions of bars of soap from overflowing landfill and reducing the use of raw materials.

Oaks first joined the Soap Aid movement back in 2015 when our Melbourne properties pledged to support the cause.

In 2017 alone, our Melbourne hotels collected over 550 kilograms of hotel soap, which was recycled into over 5000 new bars, and in turn, provided hundreds of children in disadvantaged communities with soap for their basic hygiene.

The Hotels to Hands initiative is now rolling out to our more than 50 hotels and resorts across Australia and New Zealand, and we’re in a good position to make a significant difference. Our target is to collect and recycle 26 tonnes of waste soap per year, which will ultimately supply over 10,000 children with soap for 12 months.

Soap Aid has an overall target of collecting 430 tonnes of soap and delivering 4.3 million bars of new soap to 200,000 children each year! This might seem ambitious, but it’s achievable, with your help.

Oaks’ partnership with Soap Aid supports our brand commitment to corporate social responsibility and sustainability.