Knowledge transfer

  • Workshops and seminars are valuable for team members, allowing them to deepen their knowledge and get motivated to produce more sustainably. It is helpful if the whole team takes part and the training courses take place on a regular basis.

  • Sharing knowledge within the team promotes joint learning. This ultimately makes implementing sustainability measures easier.

  • Communicating sustainability goals and measures to the public, sponsors and cooperation partners helps make the commitment visible. The venue thus creates awareness of sustainability issues and serves as a role model.

  • Dealing with sustainability issues in artistic work brings fresh insights and can stimulate social discourse.

  • Discussion events, lectures or information formats raise the public’s awareness of sustainability and encourage reflection.

  • Information on climate-friendly travel options, for example on tickets or flyers, as well as a “green travel plan” support audiences and artists in choosing sustainable transport options.

  • Less merchandise, no (promotional) gifts: this way, fewer resources are consumed. Some event organisers want to do merchandising and improve their environmental balance sheet. It is helpful for them to pay attention to sustainability standards. These include fair production, recycled materials, durability and environmentally friendly packaging.

Good to know

Accessibility must be ensured in communication and through a new ticket system.

Further reading

NRW Landesbüro Freie Darstellende Künste: Kostenfreie Workshops u.a. zum Thema Nachhaltigkeit

PAP – Performing Arts Programm Berlin: Kostenfreie Workshops u.a zum Thema Nachhaltigkeit

egocentric Systems: Nachhaltiges Event-Ticketing: Wie umweltfreundliche Lösungen die Branche verändern

Theater und Nachhaltigkeit: Expert*innen für die nachhaltige Transformation im Kulturbereich

Sommerauer Sustainable Events: Weiterbildungs-Akademie für nachhaltiges Eventmanagement

TÜV SÜD Akademie: Nachhaltiges Eventmanagement nach DIN ISO 20121:2024 – Basisseminar

IHK-Zentrum für Weiterbildung: Nachhaltigkeits- und Klimaschutzmanagement

Good practice examples

The PATHOS Theatre offers a climate-related costs ticket with which visitors voluntarily pay a portion of the CO₂ impact costs caused by their theatre visit. The proceeds go into the Munich Climate Protection and Transformation Fund and support local projects such as solar panels or green roofs.

Pathos Theatre: Sustainability at Pathos – Climate-related costs ticket

The Armada Theatre takes a humorous and poetic look at climate change. The consequences of human activity – forest fires, droughts, heavy rainfall – are shown to impressive effect in a live disaster film performance in miniature format. And the question always remains: where to put the homeless polar bears?

Armada Theatre: One World Is Not Enough

The “Mülheimer Müllviecher” project shows how plastic waste can be turned into participatory art and community-based environmental protection. Theatre employees and city residents work together to make imaginative creatures out of waste, raising awareness of sustainability in a playful way while nurturing a creative urban community and conserving resources.

Theater an der Ruhr: Mülheim’s rubbish creatures are on the loose