How to Make Your Event More Sustainable

Hosting an event can have quite a significant environmental impact. The carbon emissions caused by travelling guests and deliveries, the resources required, and the waste produced means events are often far less green than they could be. 

The good news is that the changes required to make an event sustainable aren’t difficult and are easily implemented into almost any function!

Hire rather than buy

Often, items bought for events such as furnishings and decorations just get thrown away once the event is finished, especially if it takes place in a hired venue. If you want to make your event more sustainable, you should consider hiring your props and decorations rather than buying them. This is a great way to reduce waste and should reduce your overall costs too. You can get started by taking a look at our range of sustainable hire items.

Use artisan-made décor

Décor that is mass-produced also comes with a higher carbon footprint, and these operations rarely prioritise using sustainable materials and often produce a lot of waste. Artisan-made products don’t suffer from either of these factors as they are made using traditional methods, often using local resources that need to be sustainable.

Stay local

There are many benefits to having a local event and using local suppliers where possible. One immediate benefit of staying local is you reduce the emissions of the travelling attendees and any deliveries from suppliers. By hiring a local venue, you will also be supporting your local community and any local vendors you use.

Avoid any waste and opt for reusables

When we try and live more sustainably, the first thing most people change is the amount they waste, meaning they try not to buy more than they need and recycle anything that can be recycled. If you want to make your event more sustainable, you should adopt this same mindset.

Avoid any single use-products and try and recycle as much from your event as possible. You should aim to reuse anything that you do buy rather than hire for use in future events. If you have no need for the items, you could always donate them to someone else.

Reduce energy and water consumption

Just like avoiding waste, reducing the amount of energy and water you use is a sustainability method that can be employed in all areas of life. Unfortunately, these are not factors that we often think about when planning an event, but an incredible amount of resources are used in an event with lots of guests. Use only the power you need to for the event’s duration or, if possible, use a renewable source of energy.

Go plastic-free

The amount of single-use plastic that is piling up in landfills and polluting the ocean is monumental, so one of the best ways to make your event more sustainable is to go plastic-free. Try and avoid any plastic in your décor and, if you are serving food and/or drinks, hiring glassware and crockery rather than using disposable plates and cups will make your event much more sustainable, and will also look more impressive to your guests.

 

Making simple changes during the organisation of an event can go a long way to making it more sustainable, and most of these can be carried over into everyday life too if you want to reduce your environmental impact.