Great Green North?
Taking a break from the daily San Francisco routine, we headed down to Los Angeles for a conference known as Canada Marketplace where we search for the anything significantly Green in the Great White North. We did discover some hotels, restaurants and other things making that movement in the green direction but that will have to wait for another post.
In this one, we focus on the marketplace itself. This year, they ventured into that Green netherworld to make the conference greener. They even hired a Green conference consultant but we could track down this consultant so we had do go it alone.
We thing we see when we check in is a giant sign from Travel Alberta about how they have purchased carbon credits. It’s no secret of what we think of carbon credits (low on the green totem pole). We’re more about actually doing something to make a change instead of just buying something.
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To their credit, the conference meals used only china and linen for meal service. No Styrofoam or plastics but they did have those paper cups (see photo). They provided pitchers of water for the tables and not pre-fill water glasses. They served fair trade coffee. (We don’t think it was organic though). They provided condiments in bulk instead of those silly small packages.
The various meetings sought to recycle their waste products which they should be doing anyway. Forget the recycling, don’t bring the press kits, flyers and paper handouts en masse. Maybe everyone isn’t into the give away flash drives but some vendors (like the representative from the sustainable minded Butchart Gardens) simply had a laptop, a few display items and a few business cards. To us less is more and it doesn’t take a lot of paper items to impress us.
As for the conference location, certainly the Beverly Hilton needs to make many steps before we can even call it Green. Our invitation told us to request “Access to the Green Room” at check in but then the nice woman checking us in offered up that deer in headlights look. Later we find out that this “green room” provides: towel and sheet reuse program, low-flow toilets and water conserving showerheads, bio-degradable cleaning products, and provides the option to not receive the daily paper. Yes, those green options floored us as well. Maybe they could add a recycle container in the rooms or would that be too crazy? The fact that they donate un-used amenities to a local charity did strike a light green chord with us. Ahhh, maybe they are learning.
Hi Keith,
Thanks for taking the time to look at the greening measures for Canada Media Marketplace. I am the ‘green consultant’ you refer to and regret I did not get to connect with you on site at this event about the work being done to make the Marketplace more sustainable.
Media Marketplace is starting the journey toward being more sustainable. The initiative came about through feedback from the partners participating in the event who wanted to see Marketplace reduce its environmental impact. Partners were so committed to the idea that they have financially supported some of the work, particularly the B.C. Sustainable Tourism Collective and Tourism New Brunswick.
I believe our team will be the first to admit we are not a perfect model, but we are committed to making on-going improvements to do better. As part of this process we are constantly asking the question: Can what we are doing at Media Marketplace be done in a more sustainable way? We have asked these questions about many things this year – considering what we print, how food is served, how we transport people, what experience they have in their guest room and where we can make decisions that ensure these things can be done in ways that are less wasteful, more energy efficient and work to conserve water. We also consider as a last step what happens to our waste, and how we can be accountable for travel emissions that we cannot avoid. We also thought carefully about name badges, lanyards, paper, food and yes, even those paper cups you point out!
In considering all these things we often have to explore what is most feasible from an environmental and economic perspective. Sometimes a balance has to be struck between the two, but not always. For example the CTC decided to source many materials this year that were environmentally preferable in spite of additional costs, such as our partner binders, conference bags, name badges, lanyards and paper – all of which had between 30 – 100% post-consumer content. Where one-time use signage was needed we opted for paper-based recyclable alternatives instead of foamcore which has been traditionally used. Any foamcore signage on site was re-used from previous events, as were banners that were used in the décor. We also provided fair trade, organic and local food options were possible, and requested any seafood purchased meet ‘good’ or ‘best alternative’ requirements according to the Monterey Bay Seafood Watch program. The paper cups you see were an option requested by us for their recycled content and used in place of the polystyrene option that the property traditionally provided. We would have rather for-gone these, but larger cups were requested by attendees and partners, therefore we opted for the next best alternative as larger china cups were not able to be purchased by the facility.
We are working to engage our partners in greening as well. This year began with providing ideas on how partners can reduce their impact. More information on this can be seen at: http://www.canadamediamarket.org/ctc/greenpartners.asp. A lot more partners this year opted for demonstrating collateral using online methods – about 40% over last year - instead of providing a lot of print materials. There is definitely more work that can be done here and we will work to take additional steps in 2009.
I also would like to add a few notes about the Beverly Hilton and their willingness to work with us on a voluntary basis to make this event more sustainable. As a result of requests by the Canadian Tourism Commission, the Beverly Hilton established a green team to mobilize and implement our requested practices. It is worth noting that all of these practices were outside of the contract, which had been signed with the Hilton before the start of the green initiative. In its first few months the Beverly Hilton green team has identified what practices they have in place that meet the GreenSeal hotel standard and opportunities to work toward meeting that standard. The team has managed to expand their property recycling program in an effort to ensure their 2007 recycling diversion rate of 26% is increased. They have decided to arrange for separating and hauling of paper, plastics, glass and cans and a pending stream for cardboard. We tracked the waste streams for Media Marketplace 2008 and estimate we were able to increase diversion to approximately 42%. It’s not 100%, but it is a big step forward. All of this was provided to us at no charge to CTC, despite additional cost to the property.
In addition to waste management the Hilton did work to train housekeeping staff to take additional measures to green our guest rooms. As a new program it takes time to train staff to change habitual practices so appreciate there will be hiccups as you experienced. Anticipating this we did ask partners to be our eyes and ears in providing feedback on how consistently green room services were provided. In only a few cases partners indicated lights were left on and linens were changed. Where this happened feedback was provided to the Hilton. In addition all guest rooms had their temperature adjusted 3 degrees closer to the outside temperature to curb energy use. All of these were new steps for the Hilton that I hope they will continue to build on.
For our part we are learning about the need to contract for these kind of practices and ensure compliance by the property is measured. We have developed green language for our contracts and will be using this for events beyond 2009. Our goal is to do what we can to reduce and reuse and then ensure we recycle. As a fourth step we have set the precedent of an offset to be accountable for our emissions footprint.
Hopefully this helps to share a bit more fully the ‘story’ of greening Canada Media Marketplace 2008. Look forward to checking in with you next year.