Giving Bag Honored With the 2025 Travel + Leisure Global Vision Award for Sustainability
I am absolutely thrilled to share the exciting news: Giving Bag has been named a winner of the 2025 Travel + Leisure's Global Vision Award! This prestigious honor celebrates our commitment to sustainability and eco-conscious practices in the hospitality industry—a recognition we are incredibly proud of.
From the USA, to France, Italy, Switzerland, Oman, Japan, Indonesia, and 15 countries in total, we cannot wait to keep bringing Giving Bag to more locations around the globe.
About the Travel + Leisure Global Vision Award
The Travel + Leisure Global Vision Award acknowledges companies, organizations, and individuals who have made significant contributions in sustainability, design, and responsible tourism. Being selected for this award showcases Giving Bag’s leadership and ongoing dedication to eco-friendly practices within the global hospitality sector.
Travel + Leisure's Global Vision Awards will be featured in the April 2025 print edition of Travel + Leisure.
Why Giving Bag Was Chosen
First, I want to acknowledge every other individual, non-profit, and company that continues to put a focus on leaving the world better than they found it. No matter how big or small your actions are, they can be meaningful. Awards are nice reinforcement, but there are many throughout the world that dedicate their life to community service and outreach, sustainability practice, and other actions that help improve the lives and wellbeing of others. Many do it just for the fact that it's ingrained in who they are at their core.
I'd like to recognize every single one of you and thank you for inspiring us all!
Our journey at Giving Bag is one that continues to evolve. As a central pillar, our goals remain to reduce waste in the hospitality industry. This includes offering unique hotel amenities and services, promoting recycling, keeping items out of the landfills, and forging partnerships with global nonprofits to donate guest items to local communities in need.
Our solution has resonated with both hotel partners and travelers who want to make an impact, with Giving Bag providing an efficient, sustainable, and charitable option for guests and hotels to donate their unwanted items. By reducing waste and making a tangible difference in communities worldwide, Giving Bag is changing the way hospitality looks at sustainability.
How the Award Will Impact Giving Bag’s Mission
While we are incredibly proud of this recognition, it’s also a moment of reflection on our journey. In 2013, Lilia, my cofounder (and wife!), and I had an idea to help travelers donate unwanted items to local charities. Like any vision, it didn’t happen overnight. It’s been a process of patience, learning, and building relationships. Much like planting a tree, we had to nurture our idea over time, watching it grow stronger with deeper roots in the global hospitality industry.
Here are some quick points of the evolution:
Giving Bag is created as part of a project at the Cornell University, School of Hotel Administration and we win a sustainability competition
We launch with our first hotel using a logo that I made in Microsoft Word.
...Jump forward 12 years...
Giving Bag has been implemented in 15 countries.
Giving Bag operations can successfully launch partnerships with 100s of hotels, and multinational corporations and brands every month.
We have multiple trusted, eco-friendly bag suppliers throughout the world
We have partners in most international and USA cities for charity coordination and donations.
We launched Impact Hotels.
As we receive this award, we’re reminded that meaningful impact takes time. The seeds we planted over a decade ago continue to blossom as this now global initiative finds new supporters, partners, and charities that want to be involved. And we’re just getting started.
How the Award Benefits Hotels and Travelers
For hotels, partnering with Giving Bag offers a proven method to meet sustainability goals and enhance their eco-conscious credentials. Not only does this help reduce waste, but it also provides a meaningful way to contribute to the community. As we’ve seen with our current hotel partners, hotels are reducing waste and generating positive social impact by offering guests a way to donate their unwanted items.
For travelers, this is a chance to enjoy a more eco-friendly and socially responsible trip. One of the key benefits of partnering with Giving Bag is the opportunity for travelers to make a difference, even in small actions like donating unused items. The beauty of the program is its simplicity—it makes giving back both easy and meaningful.
As our partner, Le Bristol Paris, a hotel within the prestigious Oetker Collection says, “Giving Bag is a very effective way to integrate both employees and clients as actors of our sustainable transformation. Giving Bag allows the hotel to act as an intermediary that allows guests to feel part of a community."
What’s Next for Giving Bag
The 2025 Global Vision Award is fuel for the fire to keep growing and expanding our impact. This recognition propels us forward as we look to partner with more hotels and hospitality companies, enhance our sustainable offerings, and explore new avenues such as cruises, residential buildings, and office spaces.
Our recent launch of Impact Hotels, a collection of forward-thinking hotels, will only continue to expand as we look to bring sustainable, eco-friendly solutions to an even wider audience. Subscribe at the link above!
In the next 12 months, we’re working to further integrate our model into new markets, offer more eco-friendly amenities to travelers, and provide sustainable solutions across new sectors. We are excited to see how these efforts will continue to benefit the local communities we work with and help reshape the way the travel industry operates.
A Heartfelt Thank You
This award would not be possible without the ongoing support and hard work of everyone involved in the Giving Bag mission. I want to thank our hotel partners, travelers, and the nonprofits we’ve worked with—your dedication to making a difference has been the fuel behind our success.
Special thanks go to my wife and cofounder, Lilia Karimi, who has been with me every step of the way. Her initial has helped us get to where we are today.
We are also incredibly grateful to the entire Giving Bag and Impact Hotels team, whose shared commitment to sustainability and local community impact continues to drive us forward. You all are integral to this success, and we couldn’t be more excited about the future.
Moving Forward Together
Winning the 2025 Travel + Leisure Global Vision Award is just the beginning. As we continue our journey, we remain deeply committed to sustainability, creating new partnerships, and expanding the impact we have on the hospitality industry and local communities. Together, we will continue to shape the future of sustainable travel, proving that small changes can make a big difference.
Thank you for being a part of this journey. We are only getting started, and we can’t wait to see what’s next.
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Find out more about our work with Impact Hotels.
ABOUT THE AWARDS: Every year, Travel + Leisure presents its Global Vision Awards, where they acknowledge individuals, products, destinations, and organizations pioneering sustainable and eco-friendly travel. These visionaries are focused on the future of travel—and are dedicated to ensuring that we, as humans, can continue to explore the world without damaging it as we go along. This year, the panel of experts—their expertise varying throughout the travel sector—nominated companies, destinations, and individuals they believe are creating meaningful change. After much consideration, they narrowed down the list to 25 winners, each making a tangible impact on how we experience the world. They hope the work inspires others to embrace more sustainable and responsible travel.