Celebrating its ninth year, the Sustainable Living Festival has gone from strength to strength with significant audience growth each year.

The Festival aims to engage as many diverse groups as possible to accelerate the uptake of sustainable living. By engaging with the community the Festival seeks to empower visitors by providing inspiration, information and innovation in the areas of ecological and social sustainability.

The Festival showcases talks, demonstrations, live performances, films and interactive workshops. Audiences travel far and wide to listen to keynote speakers and exhibitors present at the Sustainable Living Foundation.

Snapshot
• Experiences exponential audience growth every year, attracting over 124,000 visits in 2007 to Federation Square.
• Is the largest event of its kind in Australia, held in the heart of Melbourne.
• Attracts national and international audience and recognition.
• Is a free community event.
• Provides visitors with real world solutions to achieve sustainability change.
• Winner of the 2006 Melbourne Awards

Event Format
• Presents over 300 talks, demonstrations, live performances, twilight films, artworks and interactive workshops.
• Showcases a huge range of home and lifestyle products and services via Festival exhibitors.
• Presents easy, everyday sustainability solutions
• Is one of the largest festivals in Melbourne and has the smallest environmental impact - The Sustainable Living Foundation ‘Walks the Talk’. (Winners of Sustainability Victoria Waste Wise Gold Certification)
• Celebrates innovation and future thinking

• Open-air, ungated, free three-day festival

Audience Profile
The Festival aims to provide people with leading practice innovation and information to make achievable changes in their lives. The Festival has a growing audience from Melbourne’s inner suburbs and from Regional Victoria.

The Sustainable Living Festival Audience is comprised of:
- General public - both those committed to the environmental movement and a mainstream audience who may have very little idea about how to live more sustainably, but would like to make some positive changes
- School/Youth - the first day of the event is Education Day with schools attending from across the State

- Business strategy and industry representatives

Publicity
The Communication Message will be supported by program content and promotional activities with Festival Partners and other organisations.

Marketing activities for the 2008 Festival will include event brochures, posters, direct mail, email, online, calendar listings, print and joint promotions with many organisations, as well as media releases, editorial and advertising.

Key marketing 2007
- 2007 generated media to over 5 million people (print editorial alone to 4 million)
- National radio coverage to both mainstream and grassroots audiences
- Statewide Community Service Announcment campaign on channel 7, 9 & 10
- 15,000 posters distributed prior to the Festival
- 50,000 brochures distributed throughout Melbourne and Regional Victoria (2007 introduced the ‘Mini Mag’, which not only promoted the Festival, but also provided the reader with handy Sustainability hints on ‘how they can do it’).
- 30,000 A3 Event Day Program Guides distributed
- Online interactive website with full program listing. Web visits for the two months prior to the event averaged at nearly 400 hits per day, with over 2000 hits on the first day of the Festival

The Sustainable Living Festival has a growing identity with National and International recognition due to high profile speakers and exhibitors, partnerships with national organisations, and visitors travelling from around Australia to be a part of the Festival.