Live Nation, Coachella, Stagecoach Enact Ban on Plastic Straws

The concert promoter and influential festivals are joining forces with Lonely Whale to promote "For A Strawless Ocean."

The world's largest concert promoter and the world's most influential festival have each teamed up with ocean protection group Lonely Whale to ban plastic straws, which result in thousands of tons of seawater pollution each year.

Live Nation now is an official Global Stakeholder of Lonely Whale's "For A Strawless Ocean" campaign and has committed to removing all single-use plastic straws in favor of a marine-friendly paper alternative at the company's 45 owned and operated amphitheaters across the U.S. Meanwhile, Goldenvoice -- organizers of this weekend's Coachella festival and next weekend's Stagecoach festival -- have also phased out plastic straws from their events and will be the first festivals in North America to go 100 percent straw-free.

“Plastic pollution is a huge problem around the world, and it’s exciting to pioneer change by phasing out the use of single-use plastics from our festivals,” says Mapi Moran, director of festival marketing for Goldenvoice. “Our new straw policy is estimated to eliminate about 300,000 plastic straws from Coachella and Stagecoach. We look forward to announcing similar initiatives later that go beyond just plastic straws.”

"For a Strawless Ocean" is an open-source guide to reducing the nearly 500 million plastic straws trashed each day, amounting to approximately 12 million pounds of plastic waste year. Vendors throughout both Coachella and Stagecoach are replacing plastic straws with marine-degradable paper straws, as part of each festival’s sustainability efforts which include waste and recycling programs. 

"For A Strawless Ocean" has made available a campaigning guidebook, an artificial intelligence-powered chatbot, free customizable marketing and venue materials as well as resources for discounts on Lonely Whale-vetted alternative straws. 

Besides banning plastic straws from their amphitheaters, Live Nation and Lonely Whale are also collaborating to progress a new standard for sustainable straw use across live events and spare the use of over 3 million plastic straws at its amphitheater shows this summer.