Five ways to make sustainable change in your venue business.

Today I am delighted to have Michelle Miles from The Sustainable Wedding Alliance join us with this informative and important guest blog post - thank you for sharing your knowledge Michelle! Michelle is also an expert guru within The Wedding Venue Members’ Club which we are beyond grateful for.

Before launching into a host of practical actions, it’s important that first we look at the reason that, as an industry we need to be more sustainable, and why.

Why is it important the wedding industry becomes more sustainable? Our planet has seen 20,000 years of change in just 170. Since 1850, human activities have driven up CO2 concentrations by 48%. Without our input, it would have taken 20,000 years for levels to rise naturally by this extent.

Extreme weather events are on the rise, seasons are changing and biodiversity is rapidly in decline. 200 million people’s homes will be underwater within the next 70 years, and the deserts are growing. All while plastic production has increased and forecast to double over the next 20 years, and quadruple by the early 2050s.

Our beloved industry exists to celebrate the coming together of two people, but with an estimated spend on a wedding in the UK being £14.7bn each year, it’s a growing economy that has an opportunity to influence the way couples plan their wedding, and reduce the negative impact on our planet.

Weddings can be very carbon intensive, with the average wedding in the UK emitting 14,500 kgCO2eq. It is estimated there are 550,000 weddings taking place this year and next as part of the post pandemic pipeline. Imagine, if we could reduce all wedding carbon emissions by half… that’s a potential saving of 3,987,500 tons CO2eq! The equivalent to taking 866,847 cars off the road for a year!

As a venue working in the industry, there are two ways that you can make a positive impact:

1. by working with couples to educate them about more sustainable, environmentally positive options, and

2. by working on your business to develop sustainable, long-term strategies that will ensure you are operating in a more sustainable, ethical and conscious way.

So, let’s look at what venues can do to move their business one step forward. Sustainability is a journey and not a destination. One change today will set you on the right path to becoming a more sustainable business and attract conscious couples and suppliers that share your ethos.

What can you do today to make a sustainable change?

While it's unrealistic to think that you can become fully sustainable overnight, but all businesses can start moving in the right direction.

PUT IN PLACE A SUSTAINABILITY POLICY

Creating a Sustainability Policy will make you think about all elements of your business and the ways in which you can balance people, profit and planet. Once formed it should be a working document, shared amongst team members and your customers. A good policy will guide you through your sustainable journey, helping you to make key decisions and keep on track.

BUILDING A CONCIOUS CULTURE IS KEY

No business can be without good people, and good people are attracted by good business. Building a conscious culture amongst your team, whether for you that means staff or suppliers you work closely with, helps to build a solid sustainable foundation for your business. It will help you to forge stronger bonds with your team. People want to work at, or with, businesses with strong, clear ethical priorities.

MAKE CHANGES TO ENSURE YOUR VENUE IS AS ENERGY EFFICIENT AS IT CAN BE

A substantial part of a business’s environmental impact this comes from the energy used to run buildings and equipment. Unless you already have a super-efficient premises, a lot of this energy will be wasted – lost through gaps in the building fabric (think single-glazed windows, poor insulation, unblocked chimneys etc) or caused by old and inefficient technology such as boilers.

There is a huge opportunity for every venue in the wedding industry to reduce their carbon emissions and the cost of their energy bill by making simple changes to stop wasting energy. Although building works can be a longer-term project, there are many things that you can do today to make changes:

- Talk to your team, raise energy awareness and help them get into the habit of switching off, and don’t forget to brief new, and temporary team members when they start.

- Use automatic modes to make it even simpler. Most equipment (including computers) has settings and control options that allow you to shut them down automatically when not in use.

- Set your heating controls. If you have temperature controls and thermostats, make sure they’re well-programmed to keep the building a constant temperature, without staff members needing to tamper with the thermostat all day, as this will increase energy use. As a guide, when the building is in use the ideal temperature range is between 18 and 21 degrees. When not in use heating can be completely switched off or greatly reduced to between 9 and 12 degrees.

PUT IN PLACE A WASTE MANAGEMENT PLAN THAT WORKS FOR YOU

Waste is one of the biggest contributors to carbon emissions within a wedding, but also in a businesses. Start by doing a waste audit – What are you throwing away and where is it going? The aim should always be to prevent waste in the first place. When waste is unavoidable, follow the waste hierarchy: re-use, recycle, recovery and last and definitely least, disposal (e.g. landfill).

Talk to waste collection companies about how they can help you to implement a waste management plan, and make sure your team understand the impact of choosing the right or wrong bin!

SHARE YOUR SUSTAINABILITY JOURNEY

Don't be afraid to share your journey. Transparency is the key to building trust with clients, suppliers and attracting the right team. If they know who you are and what you stand for it can help them understand why they should work with you.

Being sustainable in business means educating and empowering those around you so that they can make better, more environmentally friendly, and ethical spending choices. Build a business that you’re proud of.

ABOUT THE SUSTAINABLE WEDDING ALLIANCE

The Sustainable Wedding Alliance was founded in 2020, it exists to drive change and create a more sustainable wedding industry. It focusses on raising awareness and tackling climate change and attitudes, by proactively encouraging businesses to develop future thinking strategies and make responsible decisions.

We are about progress, not perfection and want to encourage as many businesses as possible to make meaningful positive long-term changes.

GRAB YOUR FREE SUSTAINABILITY POLICY WORKBOOK HERE