Green Events

Think of it this way: An average corporate meeting flies in anywhere from 500 to 3,000 employees to a specific destination (large conventions bring in 10,000 to 25,000 people to any given city). For this one meeting:

• Each one of those people flew to the meeting, using, on average, 800 lbs of CO2

• Each attendee averages four bottles of water per day; for a three-day meeting of 3,000 people, that's 36,000 bottles of water!

• Each person receives a newspaper at their hotel room, and only 20% of those are read; and at most meetings, none are recycled.

• It takes an unimaginable amount of water, chemicals, and energy to clean each hotel room. For one hotel guest for a two-night stay, it takes 24 gallons of water just to clean the linens; not to mention the water and chemicals used to clean the room.

• Meetings materials consume immeasurable amounts of paper and ink.

But a lot can be done to turn this around; from the smallest efforts to the large, when dealing with multitudes of people any little bit helps.

• One of the easiest and most economical ways to cut back is to eliminate the option of bottled water at your meetings. Offer pitchers of water instead; this saves water, plastic, and fuel needed to make the bottled water.

• Print all of your meeting materials on recycled paper, and use vegetable-based ink.

• Negotiate recycling pick-up into your hotel contract. Provide clearly marked recycling bins throughout your meeting space; include plastic, aluminum cans, glass, paper, and newspaper.

• Eliminate newspaper waste by forgoing the option to have newspapers delivered to each guest room. Provide newspapers at your Hospitality Desk for your guests who would like one.

• Order organic and locally-farmed food for your menus.

• Familiarize yourself with endangered or unethical fishing. Remove halibut, orange roughy, tuna, red snapper, and Chilean Sea Bass from your menus.

• Remove single-packet servings from all buffets and beverage stations; i.e. instead of single-packet ketchup or sugar packs, provide larger bottles or jars.

• Instead of plastic hotel key cards, have specially made cards made of corn; and personalize them with your company logo.

These are just a very few of the unlimited ways you can make an impact on our environment at your meetings. With a little bit of self-education, creativity, and effort, you can make a huge difference; while also showing your attendees or customers that you care about our planet. It's a win-win situation; so start some new (better) habits today!