Sands China to extend its eco-friendly products and services

Jaehong Choi

Sands China Ltd. held its 2016 Sands Supplier Excellence Awards at The Venetian last week in a bid to recognize the partnerships with its major suppliers.

Held for the fourth consecutive year, more than 300 service providers and suppliers were nominated for this year’s awards by Sands China’s business units and employees.

The nominated companies represent industries such as construction and development, furniture and equipment, facilities and services, food and beverages, and many others.

According to Jaehong Choi, vice president of procurement and supply chain for The Venetian Macao, the gaming operator seeks to continually educate its suppliers to explore eco-friendly products.

As Sands China acquires and puts sustainability measures into place under the Sands ECO360° global sustainability strategy, Choi noted that the casino developer would increase the percentage of eco-friendly products purchased.

According to him, 60 percent of the products and services, which are graded as eco-friendly, are already being purchased for categories including F&B and lighting facilities.

“Moving into next year, we will increase the target number a little bit more. We will continue to educate our suppliers [to] provide green products for us,” he assured the Times. “We will extend more areas [and] categories of products or services [for us] to purchase green products,” he continued.

As Newsweek magazine named Sands China one of the top green companies in the world earlier this year, the vice president noted that Sands China is keen to maintain its leading position in the territory, as a ‘green’ company and will consequently extend its need for ‘green’ products.

This year, the annual event invited micro suppliers, aside from the Small and Medium Enterprises and large companies. This year, dozens of the company’s new suppliers are categorized as micro suppliers – an effort to help develop small local businesses.

According to Choi, Sands China is launching a new system, and one of its key focus will be working with local suppliers to further develop their connections with large scale businesses.

“We’d love to see those micro suppliers down the road to become SMEs. [The scheme] is meaningful to our organization [so] we will be very bullish next year in terms of developing local suppliers,” he added.

Held at the end of each year, the awards are a global initiative of Sands China’s parent company, Las Vegas Sands Corp.