On December 10th, the St. Louis Area Hotel Association (SLAHA) held its annual meeting at Live! by Loews. After a great networking opportunity with a selection of champagne, mocktails, and hot apple cider, the St. Louis Fire Department Honor Guard kicked off the formal event with the Presentation of Colors and the National Anthem.
After a warm welcome by Vikki Boyer, Executive Director for SLAHA, a delicious lunch was served. During lunch, attendees received an update from Jorgen Schlemeier, Governmental Affairs Representative for the Missouri Hotel & Lodging Association, on Missouri sales tax revenues, ADA website lawsuits, proposed Airbnb tax changes, and a potential ballot measure over paid leave.
Then, introduced by Gogo Navapant, Executive Officer at SLAHA, the keynote speaker, Rod Wheeler of the Global Food Defense Institute, took the stage and delivered an entertaining, but cautionary speech about how to better protect oneself and one’s business against foul play when it comes to our food supply. Wheeler spoke about terrorist attacks that could include adding contaminants to food ingredients during the manufacturing process. He also added interactive segments throughout where he, for example, asked the attendees whether they’d call the FBI, the FDA, the local police, or their customers first, if they’d found a note that suggested their food supply in a factory had been tampered with.
In order to learn exactly what to do in this case and how to prepare and proceed in the event that any of your ingredients have been compromised in a food-processing factory or a public kitchen, check out Rod Wheeler’s new book Food Defense: From Regulation to Reality, published by Publishing Concepts, LLC.
