SUSTAINABILITY
WE KNOW THAT SOMETIMES BIGGER ISN'T ALWAYS BETTER, WHICH IS WHY GOCF IS STEPPING UP ON SUSTAINABILITY.

Gathering together to share a laugh is important, but we also acknowledge the impacts this has on our planet. That’s why we’re committed to paving a path to a more sustainable festival in future years. From reducing our carbon footprint to thoughtful planning around waste, manufacturing and operations, we’re curating a comedy experience that also keeps the earth smiling. We pledge to continually evolve our robust green event practices year over year, ensuring that we tread lightly and leave nothing but laughter in our wake. We hope you’ll come along for the ride.

SUSTAINABILITY FIELD GUIDE
Green Event Practices include:

Working with Ostrom Climate Solutions, Canada’s leading carbon management solutions provider, to understand our greenhouse gas emissions and earn a Climate Friendly Event Designation for all 8 of our festival sites!

Through our Festival’s Climate Friendly Event Designations GOCF is supporting Ostrom Climate’s Great Bear Forest Carbon Project. By supporting this project, GOCF has contributed to an Improved Forest Management initiative, which generates emission reductions by protecting forest areas that were previously designated, sanctioned, or approved for commercial logging.

Working with accommodation partners at all of our festival cities that are leaders in sustainability or Green Key Eco certified.

Promotion of active and eco-friendly transportation for attendees to take advantage of getting to and from the festival venues.

Only certified compostable containers + cutlery distributed on site from food trucks, where possible.

Working with our crew caterers on menus that are as local and sustainable as possible at all our festival venues to cut down on emissions and water consumption.

Water Refill Stations provided at key back-of-house locations for Staff, Volunteers & Artists encouraging the use of reusable water bottles and reducing single use plastic waste. 

Working with our festival venues to build out and execute robust waste management plans in order to increase our waste diversion rate.

Fabrication of large signage pieces which can be reused at multiple festival locations vs reprinting and disposing each time.

Through our Great Outdoors Community Fund we will be granting upwards of $80,000 to Sustainability focused organizations who are supporting environmental education, research and advocacy to provide climate solutions and/or charities that protect, grow and nurture the health, diversity and sustainability of our environment. From animal welfare to marine protection to climate change, we will ensure the environmental charities will put the Great Outdoors Community Fund donations to good use to pursue a more sustainable future and advance environmental solutions.

Developing robust internal and external communications + marketing plans around sustainability in order to educate and encourage our sponsors, attendees and production suppliers to join us on this journey!

GOCF is proud to be partnering with BrandLIVE’s Green Effect Consultancy on enhancing sustainability at our festivals. With the support of BrandLIVE’s team we are able to assess our current green event practices and work towards improving them year over year.