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Planning Scrapbook Special Events

(Retreats, Open Houses or Get-Togethers)
by
Linda Schaefer, Families Are Forever ‘Camp Crop Alot’ Retreats

Special events are a great way to advertise new products, inspire your customers and express customer appreciation. They give your customers a chance for uninterrupted scrapbooking and networking. Time to get away from husbands, children and housework for a few days to ‘crop ‘til they drop’! They complete a lot of pages, socialize and exchange tons of ideas! Revitalized and motivated, they return home and look forward to the next retreat. Successful events don’t just happen, they are planned!

Goals

The key to having a successful event is a lot of advertising and good promotion! List your goals under two topics, 1. What do you want to accomplish at your event? 2. Why will your customers want to come? Consider having ‘free’ demos, workshops and breakouts. Have door prizes, raffles, drawings and a small ‘free’ gift for all attendees.

• Allow yourself enough planning time (3-6 months). Don’t rush.
• Make announcements in your newsletter every month. If you don’t have a newsletter, start one!
• Make sure you talk about all of the benefits and specials you’ll be having.
• Place an ad (usually free) in your local newspaper, What’s Happening section.
• Hand out flyers in customers’ bags.
• Announce on your answering machine.
• Put up signs.
• Use your web site.

Themes

Themes help set the mood and create a fun, warm atmosphere! Photo ops can be set up in different areas (beach scene, western, etc.). Play background music. Use Table covers and centerpieces.

• January – Resolution Solution, ‘Souper’ Bowl, ‘Snow’ Kidding page retreat.
• February – Cupid Crop, Presidents Day
• March – Lucky Lock-In, Clover Crop, Hippity Hop-Crop ‘Til You Drop
• April – April Flowers, Spring Into Action
• May – Mother’s Day Off, Midnight Madness
• June – Beach Party, School’s Out
• July – Christmas in July, south of the Border Bash, Havin’ a Heat-Wave
• August – Beat the Heat Retreat, Watermelon Crawl
• September – School Daze Craze, ABC Crop, Fall Kick-Off, Back-to-School Bash
• October – ‘Crop’tober Fest, Happy Haunting, A Hunting We Will Go
• November – Photo Feast, Count Your Blessings
• December – Deck the Walls, Ho-Ho-Holiday Page Retreat
• Miscellaneous – Pajama Party Crop, Album Express, Red Eye Retreat

Sign-In Table

Greet everyone who comes. Have nametags so everyone can get to know each other. Have information sheets to explain details of the weekend.

Food

Have snacks and treats readily available and tie into your theme if possible. For example, my traditional Halloween food is stew served in a pumpkin, root beer in a cauldron with dry ice and orange punch with ice hands. (Fill a rubber glove with punch, tie the end and freeze. Run under cold water to remove the glove and put the frozen punch-hand into the punch to float. It’s awesome!)

Also, put plastic spiders in your guests ice cubes. They love it! For my watermelon crawl, I serve a watermelon ice cream. (Soften lime sherbet and press around the bottom and sides of a large bowl. Freeze. Soften raspberry sherbet and mix mini-chocolate chips into it. Fill the bowl of lime sherbet with the raspberry mixture and freeze. When hard, invert onto a plate and slice like you would a watermelon.) It is pretty and your guests will love it!

Special Tips, Activities and Classes

Take photos of everything so it is easy to repeat again. Have albums on parade so guests can share their books. Have interesting breakouts, demos or how-tos:

• How to use classroom tools, Xyron machine, circle cutters, die cut machine, etc.
• Lettering Classes
• How to do pop-ups, pocket pages, peek-a-boo pages, etc.
• Journaling Tips (Journal jars as gifts to relatives.)
• Layout Contest
• accommodation in RothenburgPage Exchange (Everyone designs a page to exchange.)
• Contests for the most pages done, most creative use of die cuts, etc.

Location

Pay attention to details! Make sure you know exactly how many scrappers you can accommodate. Don’t crowd them in. Make sure everyone has his or her own space! Scrappers really appreciate being able to stay set up all weekend.

Sign-up Sheets

Make sure everyone knows what is included and what’s not and what to bring. Make sure people know what classes, etc. are available, what is free or what is the cost.

Sales

Have plenty of supplies and lots and lots of inventory on hand. We have a ‘store’ area set up. Each customer has a sales sheet on file at the store. They shop all weekend and we just keep tally on their sheet. They check out on Sunday, total up their sales sheet and pay just once. Our customers like this convenient way to shop.

Have an early bird special sign up fee. This helps you to plan by encouraging early registration. Have all employees easily identifiable and available to help everyone. Give fantastic customer service! Treat your customers as guests. Pamper them, let them know how much you appreciate them and they will keep coming back!

Have fun and remember smiles are contagious. Start an epidemic!