Promotion of responsible drinking in hotels

This study reports on an intervention programme to promote responsible drinking in hotels. The licensees of eight hotels agreed to participate in a trial of measures designed to assist patrons to avoid drink-driving, and seven other hotels were used as controls. The interventions acceptable to licensees comprised commercial-quality promotional material with the theme "0.05 Know Your Limits", and a breath analysis machine and poster on its use. Patrons leaving the hotels on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights were interviewed and breath-tested. Although the intervention material had been seen by one-third of patrons in the intervention hotels, there was no significant difference between them and control hotel patrons in either median BAC or the proportion who were going to drive with BAC over the legal limit. There was poor compliance by hotels with the intervention procedures, indicating that a major impediment to the implementation and evaluation of programmes to promote responsible drinking is a lack of motivation by many licensees, despite support by some licensees and the Australian Hotels Association.