It's not as difficult to green your holiday event, or make it more eco-friendly, as many people imagine. Even if you do just one thing to green your event, you can feel good that with just that one thing you helped preserve our planet. Below we offer 7 tips for greening your holiday event this year.
7 Ways to Green Your Holiday Event This Year
If you want to use disposables to reduce the cleanup at your event, buy biodegradables or compostables or disposables made of 100% recycled materials. We buy ours--the brand name is Terraware--at Whole Foods and they are more attractive than the standard disposables as they come in a pretty ivory shade. But there are other biodegradables available in stores and from the web. Seventh Generation sells recycled paper plates that are fine for casual events.
To really make a difference, use real dishes, glasses, and/or cutlery--In fact, the use of real dishes takes ANY holiday event up a notch in attractiveness and panache. If you're on a budget, during holiday time many stores sell "catering" sets of dishes, generally white or white with a gold or silver band, specifically for holiday gatherings, and you can buy great all-purpose stemware all year round at IKEA (as we do). I guarantee you that these little touches will make your holiday party the most memorable in your group! Small touches but your gathering will be the one that will stand out. And you will be saving many trees this way!
Have an old-fashioned Christmas tree with no lights, only ornaments--We began doing this years ago and people always comment that our tree looks more "Christmasy" and less "commercial" than trees with lights.
At your holiday party put out a bin or box for empty bottles and cans in your beverage area--if you make it easy for people to recycle like this they will. You can even dress up the bin or box with a big bow.
If you have someone manning or helping with the beverage table, pour from cans or big bottles of soda and big bottles of water into guests' glasses rather than buying a bunch of cans and giving each person a can of soda or individual bottle of water--this helps cut down on the landfill waste tremendously! This professional bartender's trick also helps reduce wasted soda or water.
Use small plates for the food, even a dinner, as people waste less food if you give them smaller plates. With large plates, people load up and half of them throw part of that food away. Guests can always return to the buffet if they're still hungry.
If any food is left over after your event and you don't want it for whatever reason, please donate it to a shelter rather than throwing it away.
If we all do at least one thing to green our holiday gatherings this year, we will have made a difference in preserving our planet for the future.
Warm wishes,
Kristina
Kristina Ríos de Lumbreras, Ph.D.
Director of Sales & Operations
Fandango Catering and Events
(713) 522-0077
(281) 796-9841
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