LAS VEGAS
Organizers of IMEX America, the IMEX Group, have announced key results from the inaugural Las Vegas show’s first sustainability program. The report was conducted by IMEX America’s sustainability consultants, MeetGreen.
During the debut of IMEX America in October 2011 in Las Vegas, the IMEX Group set out to collect extensive baseline data against which it could set sustainable benchmarks and report environmental achievements and progress over future years. The measures included creating programs and partnerships with all major constituents of the trade show including sponsors, exhibitors, attendees, and vendors/service providers. They also incorporated a range of other business activities such as back-office functions.
As promised, the IMEX America show featured a number of meetings sustainabilty best practices at the Sands Expo and in various partner hotels. They included the use of show badges and hosted buyer luggage tags made from recycled paper, badge lanyards made from plant silk and sustainable badge holders. Show bags were reusable and made of recyclable polypropylene, exhibitor waste baskets were reused or recycled, signage was sourced within 100 miles of the event and 99 percent of those signs are now being stored locally for re-use next year. Additionally, a three-minute anti-idling policy was put in place for all hosted buyer transfer buses. The audio visual company also agreed to source the most efficient lighting and presentation projectors available as well as participating in a lamp-recycling program.
IMEX America attendees also helped to provide 563 needy children with enough soap and 280 children with enough bottled amenities for a month’s worth of basic hygiene needs. This was made possible through IMEX’s partnership with Clean the World, a non-profit organization based in Florida that collects gently-used soap and used bottled toiletries from hotel rooms and then recycles, sanitizes and donates them to children in over 42 countries. Las Vegas hotels participating in the IMEX America Clean the World Program included headquarters hotel The Venetian, The Palazzo, Wynn, Encore, Caesars Palace, Paris, Planet Hollywood, Cosmopolitan, Bellagio, Hard Rock, MGM Grand Las Vegas, the Mirage Resort and Casino, Mandalay Bay, Mandarin Oriental, ARIA Resort and Casino, and Vdara Hotel and Spa.
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