Successful Meetings - November 2008 - (Page 8) Editor’s Note > By Vincent Alonzo vince.alonzo@nielsen.com When I was Green Back in high school, picking up some litter once helped me pick up a girl. Her name was Kathy Flanagan and I’d admired her from afar in the geometry class we shared. (Actually not that far, she sat two rows away.) I don’t know what befuddled me more, the math equations or the search for the right formula for striking up a conversation with her. I never cracked the geometric code. As for Kathy, it turns out I didn’t have to do a thing—she approached me. (I had a lot more hair back then.) I was hanging around with my buddies one day and Kathy walked up and asked me if I wanted to join a group she was part of that was cleaning up all the litter around the school. Long story short, we ended up dating for the rest of the school year and most of the summer. So I guess you could say that I learned the value of preserving the environment pretty early on. All these years later the rest of the world has caught up with Kathy. Environmental sustainability has evolved from a being a fringe concern into one of the defining issues of our time. Every company is looking for ways to reduce the pollutants they emit during the course of doing business. Planning green meetings has become a major part of that initiative. That’s why this edition of Successful Meetings is dedicated entirely to exploring green issues. Every department and feature in this magazine provides ideas, tools, and best practices to make events more sustainable. And that’s not all. Next year, Successful Meetings, and our sister publications MeetingNews and Business Travel News, will join with Unicomm LLC, the creators of the largest series of travel events in the United States, and American Express as sponsors of the Green Travel Summit which will take place at the Fairmont Hotel in Newport Beach, CA, March 23-24, 2009. The event is the first fully dedicated forum focused on exploring green travel strategies and their impact on business travel and corporate meetings. Attendees will hear best practices, successful case studies, and leading experts on green business travel will provide actionable, responsible travel information that will have a positive impact on the bottom line for organizations. To register visit, www.greentravelsummit.com. I wonder what Kathy Flanagan’s doing now. Maybe I should try and look her up. I’ll bet all this would really impress her. PUBLISHER: NELLA VELDRAN vice president and group publisher, travel group, (646) 654-7325, nella.veldran@nielsen.com VINCENT ALONZO editor-in-chief, vince.alonzo@nielsen.com KINLEY LEVACK managing editor, kinley.levack@nielsen.com CORRIE DOSH destinations editor, corrie.dosh@nielsen.com ANDREA DOYLE senior editor, andrea.doyle@nielsen.com NANCY LAZARUS research director, nancy.lazarus@nielsen.com CONTRIBUTING EDITORS: RAYNA KATZ, WILLIAM NG, MICHAEL GOLDSTEIN, TOM MCDONALD NEELAM MATHEWS (ASIA); ED SCHMIDT JR. (FLORIDA); HEIDI WALDROP BAY (WESTERN U.S.) ART (646) 654-7348 DON SALKALN art director, don.salkaln@nielsen.com PRODUCTION (646) 654-7293 GRACE CASEY production manager CUSTOM PUBLISHING (646) 654-7360 MARILYN MOORE editorial director; ALISON GOLUB executive editor; KAREN GINES executive editor (performance); SARAH VEIT associate editor; DENNISTON BROWN creative director; MICHELLE TROPIANO art director; JONATHAN CHANG associate art director; TESSA SESTINA associate art director INFORMATION MARKETING (646) 654-5879 TRACEY associate director, audience marketing, tracey.dwyer@nielsen.com SUBSCRIPTIONS (847) 763-9050 MARKETING (646) 654-7263 JENNIFER PEPPER STAM senior marketing manager, travel group, jennifer.pepperstam@nielsen.com ADVERTISING (646) 654-7327 FOR THE NEW YORK OFFICE REPRINTS The YGS Group, Jenny Kintner, (800) 324-2930, successfulmeetings@theYGSgroup.com. For one-time use of our content: Barbara Grieninger, (646) 654-4675, barbara.grieninger@nielsen.com LIST RENTAL (646) 654-7220 MICHELLE WIESNER EDITORIAL OFFICES: 770 Broadway, New York, NY 10003, (646) 6547361; fax (646) 654-7365; www.successfulmeetings.com DWYER 8 successfulmeetings.com NOVEMBER 2008 SUCCESSFUL MEETINGS http://www.successfulmeetings.com http://www.greentravelsummit.com http://www.successfulmeetings.com
For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.