Small changes for a more sustainable event

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Lee:

Welcome to the Event Martech Podcast. This is your host, Lee, and on today’s show we have the one, the only, it’s Mr. Lee Hird from Zentive Agency. Buddy, how are you doing today?

Lee Hird:

Yes, really good, thank you. All good, thank you for having me. How are you?

Lee:

Oh, I am tip top and champion. Lee, mate. I am admiring that map behind you. Folks, if you are listening to the audio, jump on over to the YouTube channel and take a look at this week’s episode because there is an epic map which I believe you made by hand.

Lee Hird:

I did. I made by hand. It’s made out of eleven and a half thousand pieces of Lego. It took me an insane amount of time. Definitely will not be doing that again for a while.

Lee:

So folks, you’ve just got to honour Lee’s effort there and come and check out the screen over on YouTube. Oh, look at that. Let’s make that full screen. It’s amazing. So, Lee, for the folks that don’t know you, could you give us a little bit of a mini bio of who you are, a little bit about Zentive and maybe something interesting that you think not many people may know about.

Lee Hird:

Sure. So. Yeah. I’m Lee Hird, co founder of zentive agency. I’ve got over a decade of experience within the events industry itself and I have a huge passion for leading the organisation of global events in terms of industries I’ve worked in, it’s been a huge mix over my career, but predominant industries so far have been pharmaceutical, medical and automotive. Since 2021 time, my business partner and I have been developing and building Zentive Agency as a sustainable event management company and as a brand. Essentially, Zentive is built on three different pillars, which are sustainability being one of them, CSR and technology. And essentially we encompass this into the whole plan of the event, from the initial event brief we get from the client all the way through to being on site and the post event itself. And it’s also intertwined within the ethos of our company and our values. And we find that a lot of the clients we work with also have sustainability as not just a value that they’ve brought on over time with how the times have changed in the world, but it’s been a value of the company since the start. And a lot of them are huge environmental friendly companies, eco, waste solutions and everything like that.

Lee Hird:

The companies we work with are predominantly sustainable in how they work and the services and operations they deliver.

Lee:

That’s awesome. And how about that interesting thing that you think not many people know about you? I mean, we’ve already guessed you’re into Lego, so you can’t use I was.

Lee Hird:

Going to say the interesting thing about me is that I spend a lot of my time doing Lego. Behind me over here, I’ve got the Statue of Liberty, I’ve got the really? Wow Dubai. I’m about to start on a new Lego, which is TBC, but I think it is going to be the McLaren F1 car.

Lee:

That’s amazing. You should start your own YouTube channel just dedicated to that. So let’s look mate at sustainability. And my first question here is how would you define sustainable event management and why is it important in this day and age?

Lee Hird:

Yes, I think if you start with the latter fact of it and why it’s important, I think we can all see what’s happening in the world today in terms of the climate being predominantly one of them, what’s happening with the temperatures around the world and the global emissions. And ultimately at the moment, countries are working together to try and reduce their own global emissions. And that doesn’t start at the top level, it starts at the bottom level and what we do as individuals on a day to day basis, which then contributes to the bigger picture. So in terms of the significance of sustainability overall, it’s huge right now and not just on an environmental factor, but also on a social factor as well. And just touching on that sustainability again, it was just last night I went kayaking out on the canal that’s just outside my apartment and the canal itself, it was just littered in plastic bottles. They are everywhere. And I think the more we can do as an individual and as companies to help change that, to reduce plastics, to reduce carbon emissions, to look at the waste flows of everything within an event can significantly affect in the long run the bigger pictures of overall, the country’s emissions and everything like that.

Lee Hird:

In terms of defining a sustainable event overall, I think it’s an event that considers every single element of the event itself and how that is intertwined with sustainability. So that doesn’t just mean looking at the food and beverage, et cetera, it’s looking at the materials your suppliers bring. So what is your set made out of when they do the set build, how is that going to be used afterwards or is it going to go to waste? Looking at the transport options you have, the energy that the building is using. So in terms of venues wise, we tend to look at sustainable venues and venues that will actually work with us from that point of view. And I’ll come to this later on in the podcast. I will touch on it in terms of what venues we actually look for and what we look for in a venue to make it work for us as well as for the client as well. Most importantly, I think, as we all know, food and beverage is a huge component in any event when it comes to sustainability and the waste streams of that. So I think looking at your whole supply chain and making sure that they have the same values as you really does link into what makes a sustainable event.

Lee Hird:

Truly sustainable.

Lee:

So I think what we’re saying here is, number one, we can see what’s going on in the world right now. We just need to look at the news. Secondly, that we are all responsible, not just the big powers that be, but equally our own small achievable actions as individuals can significantly help change the world. And as event organisers, we can do that also. And then when it comes to the event management side of things, we’re looking at everything from our suppliers to our venue, even through to the food that will be consumed at the event. And even the potential wastage as well. So it’s recognising that we’re responsible humans and applying that to everything that we do.

Lee Hird:

Exactly, yeah. And it’s just looking at everything from a holistic point of view. So what we tend to do is on every kind of weekly meeting with clients, we’ll have a section about sustainability and we will always talk about it on every call so it doesn’t drop off anyone’s minds. It is still, for some clients, it is still quite a new thing for them getting into. They know what it is, they know what they want to do, but they don’t yet have the policies and procedures internally to support them on that. So they look to us to provide that support, essentially.

Lee:

Yeah. Okay, well, let’s do that then. Let’s look, for example, at imaginary event organiser. They’ve done events in the past and they’ve finally recognised that they need to be more sustainable or essentially have a sustainable event. What initial steps should they take?

Lee Hird:

Yes, I think initially what you need to do is look at the previous events you’ve put on, see what location you’re holding them in, if they’re global events, look at the travel side of things. And one of the main thing that we do when we initially start is when you have a conference taking place, look at where the attendees are coming from. Majority of the attendees are coming from Eastern Europe, then host it in Eastern Europe. So you’re reducing the travel immediately of those that actually need to travel the furthest to get to the event. And the same goes for if majority are in South America, host it in a country where majority of these delegates are coming from. On top of that, obviously, now, in this weird wacky event world, post COVID, we have hybrid events, which again, reduces the need for travel. Yes, it reduces energy consumption that you have at the event, but ultimately the large proportion of carbon emissions on any event is flights and travel. So essentially, look at who you’re actually going to invite in person to the event, what their purpose of being there in person, and if actually it would make a difference to one, their contribution, but two, their takeaways from the event, if they actually attended it remotely, virtually from the other side of the world.

Lee Hird:

So looking at them options is a great way to start thinking about your past events and then how you can actually change them initially moving forwards on how you can make it a more sustainable event in the future. Now, on the back of that, one thing that we always say here is you can’t reduce what you don’t measure. So essentially, if you have done events in the past and you haven’t measured either carbon emissions or the sustainability of it, then that’s something that you should start to implement as soon as possible. We measure carbon emissions of all of our events, whether the client requests it or not. We measure the carbon emissions on our side, so essentially, event and event, we can look and from our side, we can then start to reduce the carbon emissions, essentially of each event, looking at the six different areas that we work with.

Lee:

So when I look back at my own event back in 2022, I can instantly see that there were areas that I can absolutely improve on. For example, the location that we were in was a little further away from the train station. Just a small example than I would have liked, which meant an awful lot of people were getting taxis to the location. We could make either two changes there. Number one, we could move to a location nearer major transport, or secondly, at least provide some sort of carpooling or a shuttle service, et cetera, from the train station to get people. So it doesn’t have to be huge and scary and overwhelming. You can already start to make small changes and all of those small changes, I guess, are still steps in the right direction. No matter how small a change you think you’re making, you’re still making an impact as opposed to just ignoring it.

Lee Hird:

Yeah, 100%. And like you said, it can be a bit daunting and overwhelming at first when you look at it as a wide event, but when you go down into the transport, the materials, the venues, it actually starts to make a lot more sense. And as you mentioned there, there are companies in the UK that solely offer electric cars as transfers. Uber now do electric cars. You can encourage your attendees to take electric cars from the train station should you not be able to get a venue closer. Encourage them to travel together and just encourage them from the initial registration point of view when you’re communicating to them to just think about it from a more sustainable point of view and just be aware of what they are doing on an individual basis.

Lee:

What are some of the challenges you’ve encountered in sustainable event planning?

Lee Hird:

I think the main one we encountered to begin with were suppliers being able to provide us the data we need in order to produce our carbon calculations, to then measure the carbon of the event. So what we tend to do is when we get an inquiry through and it’s for several locations. We’ll do an estimation of the carbon calculation of each of them locations and the travel for the attendees, which initially helps us choose the most sustainable location, essentially. So you can pick a venue that you would essentially fly to, or you can pick one where majority of attendees can take the train to. Especially a good example of that is if you have an event in Paris, instead of booking flights for delegates from London and surrounding areas, put them on the Eurostar. It uses 70% less carbon emissions than taking a flight, essentially per person. So it’s a great way to initially start that. As I mentioned, the main kind of thing is suppliers looking at your supply chain. We’ve had venues in the past as well that have been unable to provide us with their energy that we use for the event or their waste management streams.

Lee Hird:

And again, I think it’s because it’s not necessarily new, but it’s getting the processes in place and the suppliers doing that in order to support you. And that’s where it narrows down the fact that us working with venues that have sustainable accreditations or are built sustainably, they already have them processes in place, they’re aware of that and they have it from day one. So essentially, looking at that and working with suppliers who are aware of sustainability, who put it into their values and their daily work, essentially, it will help you overcome the challenges of getting that data, essentially from the outset and throughout. One of the main challenges, I think in terms of the whole industry as a whole, event management is obviously travel and flights. There is no electric flight at the moment exactly, so travel is always the largest part of emissions for any event. So again, that comes down to looking at what location that you’re using to reduce the overall travel for your attendees that are coming to the event.

Lee:

I guess a good example there then is I run my event in the UK because that’s where I’m based and I have about a 30% listenership on my podcast. That’s not this podcast, but my 30% listenership on my agency podcast is in the UK, so we get to do a nice small UK event, but several people from the US do fly over to join us. 70% of my audience is actually US based and many folks in the US have asked when will you do an event in the US? We want to come, but it’s cost prohibitive for them, obviously, to all fly over, but equally, if they all did fly over to the UK, that’s going to be terrible with regards to carbon emissions, et cetera. So I’m now thinking as you’re talking, this really is my wake up call to probably kick off the USA version of my event because I can fly over versus everybody else trying to come. To me, that would be a significant change now on that. How do you get attendees, I mean, this is attendees talking to me. How do you get pay in from attendees and partners?

Lee:

How do you get them involved so that they can help make the event as sustainable as possible?

Lee Hird:

So I think it comes down to three things informing them, educating them and communication. They are the main three things when it comes to getting buy in from partners, from attendees in order to support you. What we found when we first started off is if you just took a load of questions on the registration site to do with how they’re travelling, where they’re coming from, what kind of car is it, et cetera, they don’t want to answer them, you will get pushed back immediately. And the same goes with at events. If you’re going to go for a vegetarian menu to reduce the carbon and the travel with red meat and food, et cetera, you’re going to get complaints. However, if you inform attendees of why you’re doing it, what the benefits of that is, and you educate them on the outcome of it and how they are helping to a bigger problem, then you tend to find that they’re more willing to give over information. It’s not personal information, let’s just put that down. It’s not personal information, it’s more about their travel and getting them buying, et cetera, but they’re more willing to work with you and help make the event net zero or carbon neutral, et cetera, if they know exactly what they are doing.

Lee Hird:

I think that’s of anything, if you’re going to buy, for example, a house and you don’t know what you’re buying into, you’re not actually going to put your money down or you’re not going to go and even view it, let’s say. But if someone informs you and educates you on exactly what it is about that house and why you should buy it, et cetera, as they do, then I’ll go and have a look. Oh, I’m interested, I’ll put an investment down on that. So I think, as I said, the three main things are informing, educating and communicating with all attendees, partners and clients.

Lee:

Awesome. Now, earlier you mentioned measurements on that. What could we be measuring to see how successful we’ve been?

Lee Hird:

Yeah, so as I mentioned, you can’t improve what you don’t measure. So what we do from our point of view is we have six different areas that we measure which come down to the venue, the transport, food and beverage materials, energy and the carbon offset, essentially. And all that comes together to help us, essentially that will help us post event. We’re measuring the success of an event and determining how sustainable the event actually was. Now, essentially on top of that, you can also measure the impact the event has made in terms of positive impact socially on the location that you go to. For example, if you’re hosting an event such as a conference or even an incentive trip, instead of just doing a team building challenge that takes place in the hotel or the venue, let’s say. And it’s something that just your general circus skills, anything like that, look at doing something that actually makes a positive impact on the local community you’re in. So an example of this would be a zero waste cooking challenge and your groups can cook together and learn how to cook with zero waste. And essentially at the end of the challenge, that food would then get distributed to either homeless shelters or a food bank or something like that, and that would then get distributed out to those that most need it.

Lee Hird:

What you could also do is we find quite a lot of our events take place in lower income areas, so we tend to look at different charities around the area that work with either lower income families or groups that aren’t majority represented in the world. And we tend to work with them and speak to them of how we can get them involved in the event itself. So whether it’s a service that they supply to us and we then contract them and bring them on board for that, or again, whether it is a team building activity and we are pushing stuff out into the local community, helping their economy, helping the local businesses, essentially to be able to grow. And essentially what you are aiming to do and measure is that you’re leaving more of a positive impact in the destination that you are hosting the event than the negative impact of travelling there.

Lee:

Yeah, that’s good. So measurements go way beyond just how much carbon are we emitting here? These are measurements way beyond that. Now I’m thinking again about my event and I accidentally did some positive things. I only selected local printers, so we used local printers and suppliers, we used a local hotel, they also only used local produce, et cetera, in the food that they made. It was a buffet, but where we were, there were other events happening in other spaces, so most of the food, I believe, got used up, et cetera. So not great. I didn’t do it on purpose and I would have probably had a further conversation to say, what can we do with the wasted, et cetera. But those are, again, just some examples of, yeah, that was actually a positive impact and something that is measurable. We can look at that and we can say, right, well, how can we improve on that from last year if you don’t measure? Like you said, you can’t improve on the previous year.

Lee Hird:

Yeah, and I think just touching on that food side of things that you mentioned as well, in terms of measuring the food and beverage and the waste, et cetera, one thing that we try and do is obviously, hotel buffets are great, they cater to everybody, but portion sizes are not monitored. They always cook way more than what you need. So it makes sure that everyone catered for in lieu of that. If you do a plated sit down meal, fair enough, you may need longer for your breaks, but who doesn’t love a break in a conference? Sometimes they can go on for a bit long, so you’re waiting for that break. It brings in better networking time, gives you time to talk to people and have a bit of a relax. But if it’s a sit down meal, you’re actually managing the amount of portions of meals you’re producing, you’re managing the amount of food that is being produced as well. And drinks which ultimately from the get go will reduce the waste and the surplus of food on that event. So you’re not left at the end of the event with 20 portions of food that’s left over from above that haven’t been used.

Lee Hird:

You’re maybe left with one or two from no shows should you obviously hit your deadline of reducing your numbers as and when needed.

Lee:

The other option is to go to the buffet and responsibly eat everything that’s left.

Lee Hird:

I mean, I’m guilty for going up for seconds and thirds of the buffet when it’s there. There’s no stopping me, which is not great on the portion control, but yeah, there are ways and things of thinking around it and putting other practises in place to ultimately from the start of your planning process, reduce everything that is to come.

Lee:

Now, we’re having a great conversation here, and what’s happening is you’re sharing some excellent ideas and some insights. And I’m then also thinking about my past events and I’m seeing where sometimes I was successful or other times places that I could actually apply. Some of your ideas and advice to improve on 2020 Four’s event, which is when we’re doing our next event, what are some of the best ways to kind of keep on top of this sort of advice?

Lee Hird:

Yeah, so obviously industry news is the main thing. There’s always if you go on C&IT and M&IT, there are articles on there different agencies, different professionals and experts writing about sustainability, how you can make your events more sustainable. A main one for me that I use is Isla. They are a great company to go on their website, they have tonnes of resources that you can use, they have templates that you can download off. I’m not sure if you need to actually sign up as a member to use the templates, but essentially they have loads of resources on there, everything and it breaks it down into different elements. Know the materials, as I mentioned, your food, your venue and it gives advice. The Isla team are on hand to support you as well. There are also forums and networking. So again, Isla huge shout out to them on this podcast. They have monthly meetings where if you are a member of Isla or a member of Trace, you get together with other members, you discuss what’s happening in the industry, you discuss sustainability and how you can all work together. And I think the main thing to take off the back of that is the good old saying of a problem shared is a problem halved.

Lee Hird:

And if we’re all working together and sharing the problems, we can overcome them quicker and we can help reduce overall the event, industry’s emissions and contributions to climate change. We can reduce it down and hit our goals in the long term as an industry.

Lee:

Amazing. I actually, when you said that little Bit had the song we’re all in this Together going on in my head, it was like a Homer Simpson moment when suddenly I’ve got an entire orchestra in my head when you were talking, I’m like, yes, that was cool. So I’ve got kind of one last kind of wild card question, to be honest. Throughout this whole conversation, we’ve talked about reduction. How do we offset?

Lee Hird:

Yeah. So essentially, we have partners that we work with and in terms of offsetting, you can either do that as an agency, yourself or your clients, if they’re already on the ball with sustainability and already putting it in their processes, may have their own offset programmes that they work with. There are tonnes out there that you can use. A lot of our clients use Earthly. They give you a cool little tool that when you actually set up your carbon offsetting programme, it produces a little island for you. And each programme that you use to offset will then get a little inhabitants placed on this island, essentially, and it will tell you how much you’ve offset there with that company. And essentially, you can build your own little community on the island of all the companies that you have used.

Lee:

Kind of like sounds like SIM City, but good for the planet.

Lee Hird:

Exactly that. Yeah. So clients have them, we have one inventive agency as well. And essentially, once you have collected all your data from the event and you’ve produced your carbon calculation report, you then take the measurements, you speak with the different providers and then essentially to offset it’s a set amount based on your calculation and it will have be a number of trees over a number of years. Or you can use renewable energy, environmental waste programmes, et cetera. So there’s a whole load of things that you can use to actually offset the reduced carbon that you have produced during the event. And if you want more information on that, then feel free to come and come and chat to us about that. We do have a sustainability just a little plug here. We do have a sustainability consulting department incentive as well. So we have our consultants in house that can work with you to make your business more sustainable and help you when it comes to reducing offsetting and measuring everything from the outset and throughout.

Lee:

As I said, well, I’ll completely allow that plug because that’s very useful information as well. And on that, mate, what are the best ways of getting in touch with you? And then we shall say goodbye.

Lee Hird:

Yeah, so best ways is on LinkedIn. You can connect with me. It’s Lee Hird on there. Zentive agency on LinkedIn as well. If you give us a follow, you’ll see our news and updates on there. We post regular blog posts on there, as well as links to industry news, what is happening, or you can drop us an email at hello@zentiveagency.com. And finally, I think everyone’s aware we have the website out there as well as with most companies. So that is just zentiveagency.com, mate.

Lee:

Thanks so much for your time, folks. Remember zentiveagency.com and we’ll make sure that all the links to everything that we’ve talked about are down in the description. If you’re watching on YouTube or in the show notes if you are listening on the podcast. Lee, mate, thanks so much. Take care and have a great day.

Lee Hird:

You too.

Lee:

Cheerio.