CTWF adds Sheraton Suites to list of partners

Sheraton Suites at the Orlando International Airport became a participating partner of CTWF today bringing the total number of hotels donating discarded soap and shampoo to nine.

Hawthorn Suites loves us ... and we love them!

We had a great meeting today with the assistant general manager of Hawthorn Suites at Orlando International Airport, Mercedes Ithier-Rivera. At around 10 am five members of CTWF barged into the hotel with her Participating Partner plaque in hand and Mercedes was there to welcome us with open arms.

Bobby, our videographer, captured some wonderful footage of the plaque presentation and words of appreciation from both Mercedes and Shawn Seipler, our executive director. Mercedes gave us a tour of the facilities as we discussed the guest and environmental benefits our services provide.

Hawthorn Suites is one the first hotels to join the partnership program and is 100 percent on board with our soap and shampoo recycling efforts. It was a pleasure to finally meet Mercedes and we look forward to developing our partnership in the future.

Visit their website at www.hawthorn.com

Recycling breakthrough produces smoother bar soap

A recycling breakthrough this week allowed the CTWF operations team to produce a smoother bar of recycled soap, similar to bars found at local grocery and drug stores. These more favorable looking bars will allow CTWF to explore donation opportunities within retail channels both domestically and abroad.

Here are some tips to consider when rebatching soap. Remember, everyone has their own preferences when it comes to rebatching soap, so be sure to experiment to your liking.

• Shred the soap before you begin to melt it down by using a grater or food processor.
  
• For soap that has aged over two weeks, try soaking the shavings in water overnight by placing in a pan and adding enough water to coat the shavings, then cover.
  
• For harder soaps, instead of soaking shavings in water, try milk or coconut milk to soften it more.
  
• The moister (softer) the base soap, the easier the rebatch will be.
  
• Be very patient while melting because if you heat the soap too hot and fast you can burn the soap without fully melting it.
  
• Try to not to stir too much or too vigorously as this can make too many bubbles and cause pockets.
  
• The final complete meltdown should look like a gel but is still pourable to a degree.
  
• When the soap smooths out you can stir in any essential oils, fragrances, oatmeal, etc. that you desire.
  
• Use a hand mixer to blend the soap before pouring into a mold.
  
• Pour into a mold as soon as it gels because if you wait too long it might foam and bring about air bubbles.
  
• Let it set up a couple of days, pop it from the molds and let it age a week or two.
  

Have fun! I'm sure you'll discover, as we have, that rebatching soap is a rewarding endeavor. Feel free to post your soap rebatching comments, success stories and failures on our blog. We hope to hear from you.

1,000 pounds of soap donated by Orlando hotels

Clean the World Foundation has now collected over 1,000 pounds of donated soap and shampoo from Orlando area hotels.

Our hotel partners include Fairfield Inn by Marriott, Hampton Inn, Hilton Garden Inn, Holiday Inn Select, La Quinta Inn & Suites, Marriott Hotel and Residence Inn by Marriott.

We'd like to thank these partners for their donated soap and shampoo as we embark on a mission to save lives by recycling and distributing it to local homeless shelters and impoverished countries worldwide. These "early-adopters" are making a difference in people's lives and we congratulate them on their commitment to our recycling efforts.

Please visit their fine establishments whenever you're visiting Orlando.

Hello World!

This is the first official entry in our blog and we hope to have many more insightful and informative posts concerning our progress and performance when it comes to helping save children's lives from two lesser known but very deadly diseases — acute respiratory infection and diarrheal illness.

Clean the World Foundation is a non-profit charity organization committed to the prevention of these diseases in countries across the globe. Every year over 5 million lives are lost to these killers — with the majority of deaths being children under five years old.

Studies have shown that simple hand washing can greatly reduce the spread of these diseases, however many people cannot afford the essential items to do so. In an effort to prevent these needless deaths from occurring, Clean the World Foundation distributes recycled soap products along with appropriate educational materials to domestic homeless shelters and impoverished countries worldwide.

Each month, hotels and motels provide us their discarded soap and shampoo products. These slightly-used products often end up in already overflowing landfills and can potentially contaminate fragile groundwater systems.Once collected, these products are repurposed using environmentally-friendly and hygienically-safe recycling efforts and distributed worldwide.

We've already started collecting soap and shampoo from our participating partners in Orlando and plan to distribute shampoo to homeless shelters this weekend. Stay tuned for an update!

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