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The Grand Tasting is an evening of wine tasting held as a benefit for the Milwaukee Art Museum on a September Saturday. It is the finale of a four-day celebration called The Grape Lakes Food and Wine Festival. Beth Hoffman of the Milwaukee Art Museum explained that extra caution is needed in dealing with waste in an art museum setting, not only to protect the museum's collections, but also because the Museum is a visually oriented place. Event organizers want guests to remember works of art, good company, and fine wine; not the garbage. The organizers examined opportunities to minimize trash at The Grand Tasting.

• The event has used a popular strategy for eliminating disposable cup waste for over ten years; each guest is given a wine glass printed with the Grape Lakes logo to use at the event and keep as a souvenir. People look forward to adding each year's Grape Lakes glass to their collection. This year, 700 - 800 guests used souvenir glasses at the event and kept them for home reuse.
  
• One of the event planners also coordinates Milwaukee's RiverSplash festival, where a successful waste reduction and recycling program was implemented. His used his experience and connections with the Wisconsin Be SMART Coalition to arrange for recycling at the event.
  
• Glass wine bottles were anticipated as a large component of the waste stream, so plans for recycling glass were put in place. The City of Milwaukee Sanitation Division provided recycling carts, and collected 285 gallons of mixed color glass, weighing 600 pounds. The material was picked up for recycling on the Monday following the event. The City Recycling Manager reported that the recycling operations required minimal effort on the part of the City.
  
• Beth Hoffman of the Milwaukee Art Museum reported that participating wineries rely on event organizers for the removal of empty bottles. She commented that the recycling carts were a wonderful help.
  
• The Grand Tasting has always looked for creative approaches to waste reduction. In a previous year, empty bottles from the event were given to a new winery that put its own label on the cleaned bottles.

To learn more about event waste reduction and recycling, call the Be Smart Information Hot Line at
1-866-91-SMART or call Beth Hoffman at the Milwaukee Art Museum, 414-224-3200.