We love the Blues, but caring about our planet has got us going green. We’re lucky enough to call Byron home, a beachside paradise of turquoise waters and lush rainforest, where we welcome over 100,000 music lovers every year.
With five days and five stages of incredible music, delicious food and good times, we all need to do our bit to leave no footprint. We’ve launched the #BYOBBottle campaign, recycle everything from cardboard to compost, send organic waste to Cromwell Farms, and donate food for the homeless through Liberation Larder. But there’s always more we can do.
Here at Tyagarah Tea Tree Farm, we want to do everything we can to look after the festival site so we can make the music scene greener. And you can help!
Celebrate #PlasticFreeJuly Bluesfesters and help make 2020 bigger, better and more sustainable than ever.
5 Simple Tips for an Eco-Friendly Festival
1. Litter
We’ve heard time and again from Bluesfesters about people littering in the tents and leaving behind a mess. Our advice? Don’t be a tosser! And if you see anyone littering then call them out on it. None of us want to dance around trash which is why there’s plenty of bins across the site.
We’ve got dedicated people cleaning up after the litterbugs, but wouldn’t it be incredible if we all just put it in the bin?
2. Camp
We’ve all seen the shocking images of festival sites strewn with leftover tents, rubbish and sleeping bags once the music has stopped.
Bluesfesters tend to be impressively eco-conscious campers and in 2019 we had less than 5 tents left on site. Keep up the amazing work because with over 6,000 campsites that’s a lot of debris that could be left behind (and the koalas don’t want that).
3. Water
All that dancing means you need to drink plenty of water to keep your energy up, your feet moving and your booty shaking.
We were excited in 2019 to have water refill stations across the site. This helped to remove over 25,000 plastic bottles backstage. We also launched the #BYOBBottle campaign to help eliminate single-use plastics around the world. Eco-warrior Jack Johnson promoted the cause onstage with Lukas Nelson and took part in a Byron beach clean-up over the festival weekend.
4. Fashion
Getting dressed up in festival fashion, from outrageous hats to rainbow-coloured pants and cowboy boots, is all part of the experience. Make sure your Bluesfest wardrobe rocks socks but with fashion being the second biggest polluting industry in the world, avoid fast fashion at all costs.
Choose eco-friendly fabrics, buy a pre-loved outfit or swap clothes with your friends, and if you want to sparkle, make it eco glitter. The local Byron area has some great op shops where you can dig for festival outfit treasure.
5. Travel
Carpooling or taking the bus is easy to do and makes all the difference in reducing greenhouse gases. Take the easy ride to Bluesfest. Jump on one of the festival buses that run regularly up and down the coast, from Ballina to the Gold Coast.
If you want to drive, grab a group of your festival buddies or pack in with your music-loving family. Travel to the festival together. Carpooling makes the parking fees cheaper and with the tunes turned up, it’s sure to be a fun ride.
If you’ve got more ideas about making Bluesfest greener, we’d love to hear them!