It's more than a love story with plants and green events!
Caring for the Living Green Wall
I’ve always dreamt of a better world – I think we all have.
At a young age I learnt about the inequalities in the world and my naivety evaporated as questions such as these arose: why don’t these kids eat three times a day? Why don’t they go to school? Why do I have all this? Why don’t they have anything? There were so many questions I had no answers to -and to this day still struggle to answer.
I’m grateful I’ve always had food on the table, always gone to bed in a warm house, always had someone drop me off and pick me up after school. I was one of the lucky ones. But I found it difficult to accept the injustice in the world. How can the family and country you were born into determine your life? As the years passed by, and as the health of our planet became an undeniable topic of conversation, I also realised once again the ones who were most affected by the climate crisis were those in financially poor areas.
I always knew I wanted to have a positive impact on our world. I never really knew how. But I always wondered what can I do on such a small scale? What positive impact can I have? How can small me have an impact on a planet filled with 7.8 billion humans?
The more I read about the environment, the more I felt defeated, powerless and deeply saddened. How could such an intelligent ‘species’ be so destructive to our own home? It made no sense.
I eventually took this short online course on Climate Change Leadership which helped me a lot. The one lesson I will always remember from it is: you can’t carry the weight of the world on your shoulders. Only together can we make a change. I started to regain faith in humanity and I now believe each and every one of us, united, we can tackle anything.
So as we started our plant hire and event styling company, HapPea Events, Rocky and I both knew we wanted our business to be more than a financial organisation. We wanted our organisation to have a positive impact on our planet and people. We decided that our decisions would be ethical first, before financial. We decided on offering plant hire and styling as a waste free styling alternative at events (weddings, corporate, conferences, etc.). We made sure our planter pots were either natural or recycled – and committed to donating a proportion of our profits to charities. Our future goal is to run our deliveries by electric van.
We also wanted to join a network of like-minded peeps and as we searched the web, we found the Sustainable Business Network, which we joined in January 2020. It was definitely one of the best decisions we made.
The Sustainable Business Network is New Zealand’s largest sustainable business organisation.
Their purpose: Empowering business so people and nature prosper. Their mission: Always connect. Always inspire. Build unstoppable momentum to restore Aotearoa.
Young button fern planted in a natural ponga pot
We had found our match! A bunch of people who love and care for our planet as much as we do. Since joining, we’ve received regular newsletters keeping us up to date with the green news, we networked with brilliant people at the Tauranga Green Drinks (and ate yummy vegan food!), had our first webinar via Zoom with CEO Rachel Brown and Bay of Plenty Regional Manager, Glen Crowther and other inspiring SBN
members from Tauranga and Whakatane. We shared how we were coping through COVID-19 lockdown. It’s such a great feeling to feel connected. We felt so welcome from day one, and everyone genuinely wants to help achieve the same goal of sustainability and better the planet. There’s heaps of resources and advice available on sustainable practices and you will not be short of inspiration – whatever the size of your organisation, we would totally recommend joining.
I still struggle some days to accept the world as it is. But I do believe that every time we make the right choice, whatever it may be, it’s one step closer to a better world. I’m writing this during Covid-19 lockdown, on World Health Day on April 7th 2020.
My hopes for the future are bright and green. What are yours?
Green love,
Claire, one half of HapPea Events
Plant hire + Event Styling
C O N N EC T I N G Y O U W I T H N A T U R E
Whakatane . Rotorua . Tauranga . and beyond