MICEBOOK - LUXE REPORT 5 - Flipbook - Page 16
The Sustainability Debate
Sustainability continues to be a hot topic for debate in the events
sector. While its set to become an increasingly important deciding
factor as corporate companies strive to meet ambitious carbon
reduction targets over the next few years, it’s yet to be among the
top three priorities for many luxury planners.
We asked our LUXE participants when they expect sustainability
to become a top three deciding factor for luxury events/incentives.
Responses were mixed with 43% of buyers and 42% of suppliers
optimistically saying within the next 12 months, and 29% of buyers
and 26% of suppliers predicting it will be within one to two years.
The rest believe it will be either 2-3 years or more than three years.
Alderman believes that for pure incentives, sustainability is
unlikely to become a top three deciding factor. “I think it is a
consideration in every conversation, but incentives are about
rewarding people for doing a great job and making every winner
feel like they have had the best time of their lives. So,
I don’t think that sustainability will ever
trump destination, experience, hotel and cost
in the incentive world.”
Yellow Fish director David Heron says that sustainability is already
a top three consideration for some clients but agrees that it
depends on the event. “I think for conferences and other business
events, sustainability is probably in the top two. But if we’re
specifically talking about incentives, I think Graham is right, it
won’t trump experience and destination. But sustainability can still
be considered when choosing the destination and designing the
experience and I do think it will just become the norm and be part
of every consideration.”
He adds that sustainability has been an important part of the
qualifying criteria for several of the agency’s recent pitches. “You
are scored against a number of criteria, and quite a large
percentage of that is weighted on sustainability, so if you are not
including it as part of your pitch, you could potentially lose that
business opportunity.”
Tsierkezos agrees, adding: “As a client, if you have two similar
proposals and one is focused on sustainable experiences and
suppliers, and the other isn’t, I think you would be more likely to
pick the sustainable one.”
It’s important to remember that sustainability isn’t just about the
environmental impact of events and measuring, reporting and
reducing carbon footprint.
There is a huge social
sustainability element, around
community engagement and
working with destinations,
suppliers and hotels that are
investing into areas that
desperately need it. Heron says
that is the area he sees the
biggest opportunity right now
because you “can tangibly see
the difference you are making
with your own eyes.”
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Many of the agencies at LUXE agreed that
suppliers could do more to communicate what they
are doing around sustainability. “The hotels don’t
shout enough about all the things they do. If they
keep bees on the rooop or grow their own
vegetables, it’s helpful to know to this as it could
help us sell their properties beer,” says Alderman.
However, it can be a fine line between including
sustainability information for clients that are
interested, and not wanting to be seen to be
pushing it on those clients that are not there yet.
“We’re hearing lots of talk about sustainability from
corporates and agencies, but it’s not coming
through on a lot of briefs yet. We do talk about it
and promote all the good we’re doing, but there is a
business reality in all of this, as we could risk losing
briefs if we get too edgy and adventurous. It’s a
soly, soly approach,” says Richard Holt, Group
CEO of event and destination management
company, Concepts Collection.
The Gen Z Effect
The recent 2024 Trends Report by the Incentive
Research Foundation (IRF) highlighted the fact
that traditionally, most incentive programs have
been designed to appeal to baby boomers and Gen
X. But as the workforce is geing younger
(millennials and Gen Z are expected to account for
about 60% of the
workforce by 2025),
“programs are being
fundamentally
reimagined to motivate
employees with values
and preferences that are
oen much different from
the previous generation.”
This is clearly resonating
with our LUXE
participants, as 71% of
buyers and 89% of buyers
said that they are adapting
how they design luxury
event/incentive
programmes or their
luxury incentive product
to meet the demands of
younger generations.
So how are programmes
changing? Annee Gregg,
CEO at the Society of
Incentive Travel
Excellence (SITE), says: “The younger generation
are not necessarily looking for more bells and
