If one is to look for a bright side of a sluggish national and local economy, perhaps it is the opportunity for companies – large and small – to find new ways to operate just that much more efficiently.
We applaud, for example, the hotel and restaurant owners — members of the Rhode Island Hospitality and Tourism Association — who are seizing such an opportunity.
About 75 of RIHTA’s members are pooling their purchasing methods to buy natural gas at a sharply reduced rate from HESCO, a Houston, Texas company. By buying in bulk the businesses – most of them hotels and restaurants – are saving between 20 percent and 40 percent on their annual natural gas expenditures. For a large hotel such as the Crowne Plaza, in Warwick, that equals tens of thousands of dollars. Even for smaller operations, it can mean enough in annual savings to stave off other cost-cutting measures, such as eliminating a full-time employee – or a couple of part-timers.
The program offered by RIHTA has been in place for several years, but has become increasingly popular of late, with the tourism industry feeling the pinch of the sluggish economy.
Its success should teach us all a lesson.
We hear a lot about bulk-buying opportunities, and proposals to reduce duplicative spending. School districts and those in the health care arena talk about it all the time. But too often, such proposals don’t get past that talking stage, falling victim to bureaucratic red tape, a highly charged competitive spirit, or something else.
Bulk-buying opportunities can’t work in all cases. But in those where there is a potential for real savings, buying in bulk should be explored. Past economic dips have taught us here in the Northeast that we have to be especially aggressive in looking for an edge, in protecting ourselves when times are tough.
Those companies participating in RIHTA’s natural gas program are doing the right thing – setting an example for others to follow.
