TOWARDS GREENER GATHERINGS: BRIDGING THE GAP BETWEEN AWARENESS AND ACTION IN SUSTAINABLE EVENT MANAGEMENT

The events industry provides an integral service to society but fails to understand and incorporate the three pillars of sustainability. The purpose of this paper is to identify the cause of the lack of awareness and motivation from event managers to make their events more sustainable. Utilizing both dated and recent research papers to understand the gap of awareness, the data demonstrated that there is not a clear understanding of sustainability from a holistic perspective. The most notable issue was the focus on environmental sustainability and the lack of awareness of social and economic sustainability. This paper analyzes one specific event, the Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Scottsdale, Celebrate Youth Gala, and dives deeper into how the event can be made more sustainable. The findings demonstrated that event managers often are unaware of the sustainable options available to them and the costs associated with them. This paper offered recommendations for event managers and started the necessary conversation to create change within the industry.