Sustainability

The Real Farmville

Nestled just outside the Grand Ballroom, The Real Farmville is the Huntington Convention Center of Cleveland’s 19,000-square-foot urban farm—a standout feature of our sustainability efforts. This LEED Gold-certified green space is home to chickens, ducks, goats, pigs, and bees, along with gardens that yield herbs, vegetables, seasonal flowers, eggs, and honey. Managed by Levy Restaurants, the farm provides fresh, hyper-local ingredients for our culinary team, delivering a true farm-to-table experience for over 200,000 guests each year.

The farm also plays a key role in waste reduction: food scraps are repurposed to feed the animals, and excess waste is converted into renewable energy and fertilizer through our onsite Grind2Energy system. Beyond sustainability, The Real Farmville offers a unique, calming retreat for visitors and staff alike.

Sustainability

As a LEED Gold® Certified facility, sustainability is central to everything we do. Our venue is built beneath a 4-acre green rooftop, known as Mall B and Mall C, providing a lush outdoor space above our meeting rooms and exhibit halls.

In addition to The Real Farmville, we partner with local, organic, and sustainable farms like The Chef’s Garden and vendors from the West Side Market to source high-quality, hormone- and antibiotic-free ingredients. Throughout the year, our team cultivates a wide range of seasonal produce and flowers used in our event menus.

Our sustainability features extend beyond food. The Grind2Energy system helps us divert over 25,000 pounds of food waste annually from landfills. Eleven refillable water stations throughout the building replace approximately 57,000 plastic bottles each year. A smart lighting control system uses daylight harvesting to reduce energy use across the facility.

We also prioritize social responsibility. After events, we work with clients to donate leftover materials, contributing more than 10,000 pounds to nonprofits like Habitat for Humanity in 2023. Through our partnership with Change Please Coffee, we support job training and housing for people experiencing homelessness. As of 2024, we are proud to be a designated GOLD status Breastfeeding Friendly Workplace.

Green Initiatives

Water Refill Stations

Creating Better Environments

The The Huntington Convention Center's management company, ASM Global, is committed to sustainability, diversity and community through ASM Global Acts in an effort to keep creating better workplaces, a diverse workforce and beautiful local communities.

The broad goals and commitments for ASM Global Acts are:

Protecting the Environment – Reducing waste from the guest experience across our venues, enhancing facility efficiency through capital investments, and protecting and preserving resources in and around our communities.

Investing in People – Creating an environment of inclusion and gender equity across our organization, growing the diversity of our business partners around the world, and enabling opportunities for our current and future workforce.

Strengthening Our Communities – Engaging in improving the vitality of our communities; increasing philanthropic support through meaningful efforts; and enhancing the health and well-being of our coworkers, clients and guests.

ASM Global Acts will establish annual targets that measure impact and progress to achieving these commitments.

The ASM Global Acts Foundation will support philanthropic and community-based endeavors guided by its sustainability and diversity pillars. In addition, the ASM Global Acts Scholarship will focus on serving diverse and under-resourced communities with educational and career-development opportunities.

“Whether you are a performer on our stages, a technician, hospitality team member or visitor to our venue, we all have the ability to work together and harness our collective action to make the world a better place. Our ASM Global Acts initiative is inspired by this idea of action and brings to life our dedication to making a meaningful difference in our communities and beyond.”