Sands Cares Global Hygiene Kit Build Preview: Clean The World Global CEO Discusses the Partnership with Sands

In 2014, Sands’ initiation of the Sands Cares Global Hygiene Kit Build with Clean the World marked a pivotal development in its relationship with the global social enterprise.

Sands had begun working with Clean the World in 2011 for recycling of used soap and amenities at its resorts and wanted to further support the organization’s mission to bring safe water, sanitation and hygiene to people in need around the world.

The company kicked off its first Sands Cares partnership in 2014 with a $1 million donation for the global hygiene kit build, and funding also underwrote the purchase of equipment at Clean the World’s Las Vegas facility to establish recycling capability near its hospitality partners in the city.

Since that first build, Sands’ Team Members in Macao, Singapore and Las Vegas have built more than 1.1 million hygiene kits for distribution to people facing hardships and crises in their regions, and Sands and Clean the World have partnered to launch a number of other programs through Clean the World’s affiliate, The WASH Foundation.

As Las Vegas and Macao Team Members embark on their annual Sands Cares Global Hygiene Kit Builds in November-December, with Marina Bay Sands already completing its build earlier this year, Clean the World Global CEO Shawn Seipler looked back on the kit build program’s evolution to becoming an integral part of Clean the World’s mission, as well as the organization’s 15-year relationship with Sands.

What role do the kit builds play in the Clean the World and WASH Foundation mission?

Seipler: “When we started Clean the World in 2009, our product was a recycling service for discarded soap and bath amenities for the hospitality industry. While that solved an important waste problem for hotels, it was always a back-of-house program. We were getting a lot of feedback from our meeting planners and convention partners about developing an initiative that would really engage guests, attendees and employees in giving back.”

“Around this time, I was invited by our partner World Vision to the opening of its newest distribution center in Pittsburgh and watched as attendees built boxes of supplies including hygiene amenities and lotions for AIDS caregivers in Africa. I thought, let’s do this with hygiene kits. We held our first hygiene kit build with our own team at a Thanksgiving event for the Salvation Army in Orlando.

“One of the things we initially liked was including handwritten notes in our kits, which has always been an integral part of the program. When our build participants get to the note card station, that’s when everything clicks … that’s when they really understand who they are building this kit for … and it’s incredible to see the emotions from people when they get to that point. It always becomes everyone’s favorite part of the build.

“Sands was an early adopter of our hygiene kit program and is one of our longest-running build partners. To have the support of a company of this size, scope and quality has absolutely contributed to its success. Being able to tell other companies and organizations that Sands hosts annual build events has opened a lot of doors for us, and today we build millions of kits at thousands of events every year, and this program drives half of our top-line revenue. Sands’ continued participation has been a game-changer.”

What other programs has the Sands-Clean the World partnership birthed?

Seipler: “When everything was shut down in 2020, we lost almost all of our revenue. No one could stay at hotels, so there were no amenities to recycle, and organizations couldn’t host group events to build kits. We had handed out a billion hand washes at that point through our soap and hygiene product distributions, but we were about to go down.

“I had called Ron [Reese, Sands senior vice president of global communications and corporate affairs] to tell him we wouldn’t be able to do what we had discussed with Sands’ funding that year, and he said, ‘Shawn, I just need you to produce 30,000 hygiene kits for us to distribute to our charity partners in Southern Nevada. Can you figure that out?’

“At that point, no one was going anywhere, but we knew we had to come up with an idea, and that’s when the Soaps Saves Lives boxes were born. We made hygiene kits at our homes for Sands, and we got the idea to bring builds to people’s homes and create virtual assembly events based on that experience.

“The Soaps Saves Lives program saved Clean the World during the pandemic – I think we did $4 million to $5 million in business that year with that product, and it’s still going strong today. We have this program today because Sands said to us, we need you to figure out a way to make 30,000 kits to help our community partners. This year, the Soap Saves Lives program comes full circle as Sands’ corporate kit build will be a virtual/take-home event.”

“We’ve also launched other ‘first’ programs with Sands such as our Fresh Start Mobile Showers that offered people experiencing homelessness a place to access hygiene. Our first mobile shower unit was in Las Vegas – the Sands Cares Fresh Start Mobile Shower Powered by Clean the World. The program ran for nearly 10 years, provided more than 100,000 showers and distributed nearly 150,000 hygiene kits.

“We also co-created The Drop By Drop Project with Sands – it’s an initiative that provides grants for water stewardship and conservation projects in Sands’ regions of Macao and Singapore. Over the past seven years, Sands’ Drop By Drop Project grants have supported programs to restore aquatic ecosystems, advance water-efficiency technology, strengthen resilience to floods and droughts, and raise community awareness of water and conservation issues.”

What is the overall impact of the Sands-Clean the World-WASH Foundation partnership?

Seipler: “The hygiene kit build program and Sands’ early participation in it, along with its financial support now totaling $6.5 million, changed the trajectory of our organization. We are a global social enterprise today that recycles soaps, hygiene amenities as well as plastic from more than 8,500 hospitality partners, and we’ve diverted more than 15 million pounds of waste from landfill and distributed over 100 million bars of soap.

“With respect to the impact of the hygiene kit program, I think the most important value is that it reminds us of our purpose ever day – protecting the health and well-being of people who are facing or working to overcome significant hardship. Through our distribution partners, completed kits go to shelters or relief organizations for people who are experiencing homelessness, or they go to communities that have been impacted by natural disasters – all people whose lives will be better protected through access to hygiene supplies.

“Early on, Sands understood how the hygiene kit program not only helps the person who we’re giving the kit to, but it helps the person who builds it … it helps the company that hosts the build. It gives people the opportunity to do something they feel good about. That’s what we wake up every day to make happen.”

Sands’ partnership with Clean the World and The WASH Foundation is part of its Sands Cares priority on hardship relief in its communities around the world. To learn about other hardship relief and Sands Cares’ initiatives, read the company’s latest ESG report:  https://www.sands.com/resources/reports/.