It’s Easy Seeming Green

Last June, I found myself walking through a major convention facility at 5:00 a.m., happily drinking my coffee and munching on a bagel on my way to check on the install of a client’s trade show display. It felt like I was the only person in a building the size of the moon. I came around a corner and started down the final escalator of my thousand-mile walk when I just about choked on a huge bite of poppy seed bagel and veggie cream cheese. A service worker was right in front of me, pulling the tops off the recycling bins and emptying them into the regular trash.

I was blown away. You see, this facility had touted itself as being on the cutting edge. It had announced to the world that it had “gone green.” We as an industry had cheered its achievement. And now — this.

Since then, I can’t help but wonder every time I see a recycling bin, Does it matter where I toss my can of Diet Pepsi?

The answer of course is yes, it does, and most initiatives are honest. But in the rush to be green, planners must ask ourselves a hard question: is “green” really all it seems?

Is your Event Green?

This is a be-100-pecent-honest with yourself moment, because currently, being green is purely subjective, as there are no firm industry standards. In light of this, it’s important to have an internal system to evaluate your greenness.

First, take the time to do the research and set up internal checks and balances to determine what is environmentally friendly. Although the green movement is in its infancy, many in our industry have produced guides that offer a good starting point. (One of the best is Meeting Professionals International Canadian Chapters’ “VERTigo: Plan to Meet Green.”)

Also work with industry resources such as the Green Meetings Industry Council (greenmeetings.info), which can help you develop green practices across all of your meetings and events.

Second, walk through your event timeline minute by minute to uncover areas for improvement, looking beyond the basics to scrutinize everything from transportation, shipping and registration to food and beverage service, marketing handouts and giveaways.

If you determine that portions of your event are not green and there are no alternatives, don’t candy coat it or try and sweep it under the rug. Say, for example: “We understand that our transportation options don’t allow us to use busses that run on natural gas or biodiesel, but in an effort to be as green as possible, we are scheduling attendee arrivals to make as few trips as possible to and from the airport, which will reduce the program’s overall carbon emissions.”

You have just turned a negative into a forward-thinking positive.

Don’t be a Greenwasher

One of the biggest pitfalls of the green rush is “greenwashing”: over-hyping or misrepresenting the greenness of your event, product or service. For example, you announce to the world that you are hosting an eco-friendly event — simply because the hotel you’re at happens to recycle newspapers and soda cans. As a planner, you did nothing to impact the greenness of the event, but are taking credit for others’ actions.

Simply put, greenwashing is dishonest and in the long run can hurt your product or brand, especially if your competition, an industry group, or heaven forbid, the blogosphere gets hold of your deception.

Another downside to greenwashing is the indifference it engenders. Putting the green tag on anything and everything corrupts the value everyone derives from using it in the first place.

Rather than greenwash, give credit where credit is due and put a positive spin on your partners’ efforts — for example: “We are proud to choose the Mars Hotel as host of our 2008 conference because of its contributions to environmental awareness and sound environmental policy.”

If it Looks Green…

One aspect of the green event movement that is often overlooked is the “well, it seems green” scenario.

Take, for example, transportation. Let’s say you have 20 attendees arriving throughout the day at the local airport. Is it better to send a hybrid Toyota Prius to pick up attendees individually or send a 20-passenger bus running diesel fuel to pick them up simultaneously?

The sexy thing to do is to use a Prius and send out a press release telling the world how green you are. In reality, however, the diesel-belching bus making one trip probably has a smaller carbon footprint.

The “it seems green” dilemma can make your head spin, however. I once tried to evaluate whether it’s greener to offer paper conference handouts or put the presentations on USB flash drives to be given to each attendee.

My thought was that using less paper saves trees; therefore, it must be better for the environment. What we found, however, was that flash drives are produced in ways that are not green and that by using them, we might actually be doing more harm than good.

Now, it was decision time. Announcing that we were not having paper handouts would have made our client look very green and would probably not have been questioned. But, in an effort to practice what we preached, we decided on a multi-faceted approach: The presentations were e-mailed to attendees prior to the conference, thus eliminating the need for paper or flash drives; we had three USB flash drives to transfer presentations to attendees’ computers for those who did not receive the e-mail; and we purchased carbon off-set credits to cover ourselves just in case.

Complicated? No. Require a little creative thinking?

Yes. So, how do we begin to unravel the mystery of what is green and what isn’t?

To avoid the time crunch of research, hire professionals specializing in green events — they will likely have already
done the research and are experts at finding the answers if not.

You can also Google your way to greenness by using selective keywords, in addition to using sites such as Yahoo and Ask.com.

Green meeting and event planning was largely unheard of only a few short years ago, but today it is fast becoming a standard business practice. A treasure trove of resources to help you adopt green event practices is at your fingertips. Just use a little common sense and take the time to understand the pitfalls of green event planning, and you’ll be on the forefront of our industry — and help ensure that our industry is on the forefront of the green movement.