5 Tips for a More Sustainable Event

With global conversations increasingly focused on climate change and resource conservation, reducing the environmental impact of events is no longer optional. Event planners understand this charge and are seeking ways to deliver memorable events while prioritizing sustainability.

Among North American meeting professionals surveyed in the American Express 2024 Global Meetings and Events Forecast, 69% said that sustainability is extremely important for their organization, and 70% said that sustainability has been strongly adopted in events. Still, nearly a quarter said that a lack of sustainability knowledge, skills, and resources is a big challenge.

Here are five strategies that can help you host more sustainable events.

1. Reduce Single-Use Items

The reliance on single-use items, from plastic cups to tote bags, is one of the most visible sources of waste at events. Efforts to lower the waste you generate are likely to be noticed and appreciated by attendees.

Many suppliers specialize in innovative reusable cutlery, plates, drinkware, and packaging. Consider talking to your existing vendors and seeking out new ones to add to your list.

You can encourage attendees to take part in the event's sustainability focus by inviting them to bring reusable containers for water or coffee and providing refill stations. Incentivize participation by offering discounts on paid services or perks such as entry into a prize draw.

Although paper products can be recycled and reused, going paperless can help stop the environmental impact at the source by saving energy from the paper’s production and transportation. Reduce your reliance on printed materials and use an app for schedules, maps, and communication. Apps also can provide a richer attendee experience, through personalized notifications and messaging options, to help boost engagement. A venue’s electronic signage can display real-time information, which may eliminate the need for paper programs entirely.

2. Repurpose Ingredients to Reduce Food Waste

It is reported that food waste is a pervasive issue, including at events, where large amounts of leftover food are typically discarded. By making food management a priority, you can help minimize the environmental impact of your event.

Meeting planners should work together with their hotel Event Manager and culinary team when designing menus. Consider reducing the variety of commonly over-produced items like breads, fruits, and grains. Hotels may also be able to repurpose ingredients across multiple dishes to help create minimal waste.

Events are likely to have leftovers. You can work with your hotel to develop a plan for donating excess to local food banks or community organizations so food is not thrown away or ask about other landfill diversion options such as composting.

3. Choose Venues with Strong Sustainability Credentials

The sustainability of your event can start with the venue you choose, as you take into consideration the environmental impact along with cost, location, or aesthetic appeal.

Including sustainability questions in the RFP can help illuminate expectations throughout the venue selection process. Utilize industry standardized questions related to topics such as energy, water and waste reduction, responsible sourcing, and renewable energy use to help understand what each hotel is doing to reduce their environmental impact. And when reviewing venues, look for third-party sustainability certifications, such as Green Key Global or The Green Key, which are operationally-focused sustainability certifications, or building-focused certifications, like LEED.

4. Prioritize Local and Responsibly Sourced Materials

By making thoughtful choices about the origin of the products used at your event, you can enhance its overall sustainability.

First, think local. Many elements of your event—including décor, catering, signage, and structures—can be sourced from businesses near your site as a way to help minimize the environmental impact of shipping items from faraway places.

Next, source sustainably harvested, organic, or fair-trade certified materials whenever possible. Food may be the first thing that comes to mind, but responsible sourcing extends to a variety of other areas. For example, you could rent furniture and temporary structures made of bamboo or reclaimed wood.

To help planners in their sourcing decisions, Marriott produced a Responsible Sourcing Guide in 2021–22 with criteria and third-party sustainability certification information that encourage responsible sourcing in key areas, such as animal welfare and low-impact agricultural practices.

5. Understand and Measure Your Environmental Impact

When discussing your event’s needs with the hotel, ask about the ability of the hotel to provide impact reporting on the sustainable practices they have implemented and/or footprint data associated with the event, as well as any major initiatives they may be a part of to reduce their environmental footprint behind the scenes.

For example, hotels in the Marriott Bonvoy portfolio are actively focused on their carbon footprint reduction, as part of the company’s science-based target and net-zero journey. A champion of climate action, the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) develops standards and resources to help organizations achieve emissions reduction targets; as of April 2024, Marriott is the largest global hospitality company to receive approval from SBTi.

When it comes to reporting on an event’s sustainability impact, Marriott’s Connect Responsibly program - available at hotels from participating brands globally in fall 2024 - provides planners with a detailed Meeting Impact Report and sustainability impact metrics tailored to their event. These include property-specific sustainability practices implemented during the event and the calculated carbon and water footprints of the event.

The Meeting Impact Report also provides planners with a list of vetted and third-party verified carbon offset projects that their event can support.

To enhance transparency with attendees, you can share your event’s estimated and final footprint values, including the implemented sustainable practices and any funding of a carbon offset project, which may help build credibility and educate attendees about the actions being taken collectively to reduce the event’s environmental impact.

“We understand that sustainability is a priority for our customers, which is why we created this robust program,” says Jennifer Kellogg, Vice President of Meetings + Events for Marriott International. “Now, event planners can focus on working with our hotels to deliver memorable experiences while using strategies that can help minimize their environmental impact.”