San Francisco Green Festival hosts over 34,000 participants, boosts green economy, engages community

Dec. 6, 2010 - PRLog -- San Francisco - Green Festival hosted more than 34,000 socially and environmentally conscious participants on November 6-7, to celebrate what’s working in regional communities and engage in solutions to create a cleaner, greener and more socially-responsible world. Green Festival, the nation’s premier sustainability event, stimulated the green economy by giving back $24,000 to more than 300 local, regional and national sustainable businesses through the new "GF Bucks" admissions policy. Also, new this fall, Green Festival gave 10,000 free tickets, a $150,000 value, to local non profit organizations and asked community members to give back to their local communities in exchange for free admission.

Green Festival's new admissions policy, “Pay it Forward, Get it Back at Green Festival," engaged community members with 10 local non profit organizations to create year-round community involvement. These non profit allies engaged with new volunteers and donors by providing free Green Festival admission as incentive.

Highlights of the weekend included inspiring presentations from 350.org founder Bill Mckibben, Amy Goodman of Democracy Now and empowering activist Dolores Huerta. Additional highlights included eco-fashion shows, a screening of the movie “Ghetto Physics” and fun interactive art projects, creepy crawly insects and reptiles in Annie’s Green Kid’s Zone

Green Festival partnered with T-Mobile to recycle old, unused cell phones in exchange for free admission. T-Mobile representatives were thrilled to report that 560 cell phones were collected at Green Festival for recycling, as well as a large amount of phone accessories, such as wall and car chargers. Recycling cell phones is incredibly important, as it aids the recycling of energy and preserves a significant amount of precious resource metals, including gold, silver, copper and palladium.

The San Francisco Food Bank and KPIX CBS 5 partnered with Green Festival to host a food drive in which nonperishable cans were donated for free admission. Over 3,000 lbs of food was collected and distributed to families in need in preparation for the Thanksgiving holiday. According to the SF Foodbank, in San Francisco, 197,000 people struggle each day to feed themselves and their families.

“The generous donation of food collected at Green Festival will aid the SF Food Bank in delivering nutritious and delicious Thanksgiving meals for over 35,000 families throughout San Francisco and Marin,” says Events and Food Drives Manager, Jessica Brittsan. “Every donation helps in the fight to end hunger in our community.”

A project of Green America and Global Exchange, two leading non profit organiza­tions dedicated to environmental and social justice for more than twenty-six years, Green Festival serves as a foundation to explore and build sustainable solutions to benefit communities and the environment, discover new environmentally-friendly products and practices and connect with like minded individuals from all over the nation.

In a continuing commitment to green event management, Green Festival diverted over 31,000 lb. of waste over the weekend, for a 93.5% diversion rate.

Green Festival will return to San Francisco April 9th and 10th, 2011. For information and regular news updates, visit http://www.greenfestivals.org. Also, keep up with continuing news from exhibitors, partners and more on the new Green Festival press portal at http://www.greenfestivals.org/press or through Twitter @GreenFestival and Facebook.

Special thanks to: Made, Earthbound Farm, Park Merced, Nissan LEAF and KPFA.

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About Green America
Green America is a national nonprofit organization founded in 1982, providing the economic strategies, organizing power and practicing tools for businesses and individuals to address today's social and environmental problems. Its Green Business Network is the largest national network of businesses screened for their social and environmental responsibility. www.greenamericatoday.org

About Global Exchange
Global Exchange is a membership-based international human rights organization dedicated to promoting social, economic and environmental justice around the world. Since its founding in 1988, Global Exchange has successfully increased public awareness of root causes of injustice while building international partnerships and mobilizing for change. www.globalexchange.org

About Seven-Star, Inc.
Seven-Star, Inc. is the nation's premier green full-service event company focusing exclusively on green events. Since 1999, Seven-Star has provided turn-key green event services for environmentally Responsible and socially Respectful (eR/sR) festivals, trade and consumer expositions, conferences and concerts. From the greening of the 2007 International Live Earth events, to the 2008 Democratic National Convention events, to producing the nation's largest consumer Green Festivals, Seven-Star has defined itself as the company for eR/sR event production. Seven-Star is the first event company to have won the EPA's Gold Waste Wise Award for Excellence in recognition for their proprietary system of event waste diversion, which has consistently achieved greater than 85%. www.sevenstarevents.com

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At Green Festival® is the nation's premier sustainability event. Attendees enjoy informative speakers, green shopping, eco-innovations, live music, family activities, workshops, organic wine and beer and local vegetarian cuisine.