We care about our impact on the planet here at Brightelm. We also know a thing or two about the trendy topic of sustainability of events and the common misconceptions thereof…  Here’s the backstory on what we suspect is the only truly ‘zero-waste’ conference badge available.

Jonathan Richards, Senior Project Manager and Rob Eveleigh, MD at Brightelm are passionate about improving the impact that events have for attendees, organisations and the planet too.

Badges are the one thing common to all events so improving this seemingly small element has the potential for a large impact.

“The problem is that every single project we were involved in has a badge. There were a lot of different options available to our clients for their badges and most of these aren’t sustainable at all. We wanted to deliver a fantastic way of doing badges so that no material ever ends up in landfill.” said Jonathan.

After a period of trial, error, tweaks and determination, Brightelm now has something the industry can rely on as truly zero-waste. While badges are a very small part of the total carbon footprint of an event, as it’s common to all events and all our clients, it is one of the few bits that couldn’t be repurposed and reused until now.

What is it?

The Brightelm badge solution consists of four elements: the badge stock (paper), the printer, a QR scanner, and a computer to power the whole thing.  You can hire these from us, thereby maximising the use of this kit (rather than all our clients buying equipment that lies idle in between in-person events).

Early discoveries

We discovered that whenever you add glue to the cardboard, you can’t recycle it. The common misconception is that just by putting a piece of cardboard in a recycling bin it can be recycled. In fact all cardboard recycling needs to be separated into at least seven or eight different grades. Then, anything which has blue added or is treated with any substance, makes it incredibly difficult to recycle it into the paper & cardboard supply chain again.

This is because each time you recycle paper, the fibres get shorter and shorter, which means the quality of the paper becomes lower and lower. So ultimately, you go from Bond, nice writing pads all the way down to egg box quality.

What surprised us most, was that early conversations with clients revealed the majority mistakenly thought that the “sustainable solution” for the badge issue was to simply replace plastic holder with pocket for paper with a cardboard adhesive badge that folded over and you could put a lanyard clip through the top. This demonstrates how Brightelm have improved and extended the reach, moving the conversation forwards from solely seeking to replace the plastic holders.

That meant a lot of people would go to a conference and if you didn’t see a plastic holder the impression was that the badge was made out of card, so the issue with plastic was resolved, but that’s not the case.

Step 1:  Remove the glue

Most of our clients are membership organisations, associations or professional bodies and they want a double-sided badge so they can give event attendees details on both sides of the badge.

To create a truly recyclable product we had to take out the glue. We discovered a simple and quick win that everyone can do (in part) and easily too. We’ve since found new paper for the badge stock that doesn’t need adhesive.  The clip that the lanyard attaches to becomes the mechanism for keeping the badge together.  It worked fine in the office… Next we had to test it in the field.

At two significantly sized events in March 2023, one in Norway and the other in Birmingham, each with over 500 attendees over multiple days, we found that that lanyard clip kept the badge together and the new paper maintained its integrity and still looked good until the event ended.

Step 2: Remove the ink

When you print on card this makes the material non-recyclable. This lead us to investigate printers. We tried two different types.

One of them used a roll of ink. We quickly rejected this option.  The other type pf printer is called Direct Thermal (DT). The big benefit is that is uses just heat to create the details onto the badge paper.

The side benefit is that you don’t ever need to replace the ink because you’re not using any and there’s ancillary waste from printer ribbons or cartridges either.

Anyone who has run registration at an event knows that when it gets busy changing ink cartridges holds things up and negatively impacts the experience for an attendee. DT turns out to be better for the environment and also much more efficient too.

What we learnt

At the conferences last week, it was surprising to us that there some delegates asked for plastic wallets to put these badges in to maintain their integrity throughout the duration of the event.  These weren’t necessary.

“I did more reprints because delegates had lost or forgotten their badges on day two, and only then for three or four people out of 800 because the badge had broken. So it’s not just reusable. It’s robust too.” said Rob

Step 3: Cement and the 360 circular process

After an event we try and collect all of the badges (which is a challenge that we’ve still not solved 100%). Badges are transported back to our base in Bristol to be shredded.  After that they get sent back to our badge paper supplier who then turns all of those badges into cement.

This is how we conclude the zero waste process. But we weren’t finished…

Step 4: Presentation and the aesthetics of displaying the technology

At the beginning, Jonathan Richards wanted to make a bit of a statement about the fact that we are doing something that is sustainable.

“my idea was to go to a local recycling organization and ask them to use recycled materials to create a custom box that we could take with us on site to put the printer, scanner and laptop within so we could display everything neatly and attractively to attendees when they arrived.”

Unfortunately we found that it’s challenging to create something from recycled materials that that looks appealing to professional clients, is clean and slick  and easy to transport on site.

It’s probably fair to compare our first attempt to a used fruit box.

We were very impressed by the presentation box initially but realized it just wasn’t fit for purpose for a conference environment.

Message me and I’ll show you a pic (taylorm@brightelm.co.uk)

If we were in the business of running festivals, or something outdoors it would work well, but for the majority of our clients events it just didn’t give the impression we and our clients usually achieve.

The attempt to make a big statement using recycled wood didn’t work.  We would have to do so much to that recycled wood to make it look up to scratch for a professional conference that it quickly became a non-starter.

Practically too, wood is quite heavy which impacts transport, especially when we deliver events simultaneously in the UK and internationally.

The solution

The whole solution now sits neatly on top of a registration desk with a footprint of only 60cm x 50cm. We also have a screen which can be branded easily and we continue to play with the aesthetics of the display.

You can see the system at our recent event in the attached file, named Badge Printing video 2023.

In conclusion

The badge of a conference shouldn’t really be a talking point. It should be something which you arrive, you scan, your badge gets printed, you get your lanyard, and you move on.

Want to hire our kit? Follow this link.