One of the organizations I am involved in on campus is an on campus sorority - Delta Delta Delta. I serve as their Philanthropy Chairman for Tri Delta's national philanthropy St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. To give some background, here is some information on Tri Delta and St. Jude Children's Research Hospital partnership:
"As part of Tri Delta’s commitment to supporting children’s cancer initiatives, Tri Delta officially adopted St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital as its national philanthropic partner in 1999. Since that time, and with steadfast support from Tri Delta family and friends, Tri Delta members have raised over $55 million to support St. Jude patients and their families. Tri Delta collegiate and alumnae members are continually committed to raising funds and awareness for St. Jude as they strive to fulfill their $60 million commitment and assist in finding cures for childhood cancer."
In order to reach our fundraising goals, each Tri Delta chapter must plan and execute a number of philanthropy events to raise awareness and funds. Coming into my term of Philanthropy Chairman, I set large goals for myself to leave my legacy, as I do with every organization I am in. One of my larger goals was to create a new philanthropy event that has never been done before in the fall semester (fall 2018) of my term. This event would turn into one of the largest and most involved events I have ever planned. Grab your popcorn because this is a long one.
After attending Tri Delta's leadership conference in the Spring and hearing ideas from various philanthropy chairs from all over the nation, I got the idea to create a block party. After getting this idea, I knew I had to sit and strategically think how to create a block party vibe at a small liberal arts college with 1500 students. First and foremost, after securing the date and time, and checking schedules, was the name of the event. I am sure most of you laughed when you read about the importance of naming an event; however, I would argue the naming of the event is one of the biggest determents to the effectiveness and success of an event for two reasons:
1. Marketing to campus and community of what the events is: To even attract people to try and learn more about your event, the title and name of the event must entice them enough to hold their interest for a couple more seconds to read what the event is about.
2. Keeping a vision for what the event is supposed to be: Throughout the planning process many new ideas will pop up; however, there is always a limit to how much you can accomplish at an event. The best way to pick decorations and vendors is to refer back to your vision and ask yourself if they reflect what theme you are trying to portray, if not then you have to move on. This was extremely important with my sorority as I was portraying information of the event to almost fifty chapter members who gave me lots of suggestions and ideas.
While thinking of the name, I simultaneously began thinking of my vision for the event of what I wanted to accomplish: a new fresh event that has never been done before, raise awareness and funds for St. Jude, and a high attended and fun event. I wrote this on a piece of paper in my planning notes to refer back to many times throughout the planning process. When thinking of a block party I knew that it had to be outside, have food vendors that were fun and unique relative to our cafeteria food on campus, and have activities to keep people at the event. After brainstorming, my first idea, also my first obstacle was getting food trucks on campus, and getting a space large enough reserved for the event. I also knew the food had to be popular among the campus. After a survey with my sorority, I decided upon a pizza, BBQ, and taco food trucks.
I immediately set up a meeting with the head of our office of Student Activities with a list of my ideas. After discussing with him, I had a feeling of self defeat knowing the work that was ahead of me. He brought up legal issues with food trucks and having to reserve an outdoor space with the University police. He also told me that I would not be able to pay the food trucks for their service, or guarantee the a certain number of customers. My thoughts as he said those words were this: "My event is never going to happen". I had no idea how to attract food trucks without those two factors. While talking to him an idea popped into my head. "What if I did an on campus profit share of sorts where I don't charge admission and then when people buy their food, 15% of their individual purchase will go to St. Jude?" Good news is that I got that approved, bad news is that I had no idea if food trucks would be down for that. As soon as I left that meeting I went straight to the University Police and asked to reserve the road that is in front of the campus center and between the fraternities on campus - my thinking was that if I had an event right between the fraternities and campus center people would naturally be gathering in those spaces and would be more likely to attend my event. With the University Police checking on the ability for me to reserve the road, I rushed back to my room and researched food trucks in the Georgetown area as they needed the certifications for the City of Georgetown. I made thirty calls that afternoon with all similar responses: there's not enough people coming to your event for me to make profit, I will let you know (aka we will not call you back), or simply a long voicemail I left on the other line. However, I was not going to let this stop me.
Discouraged, I wrote down some of the names of food trucks and went to visit them in person. I got one common response: There are not enough people at your event to have more than one food truck. While I understood the vendor's point of view completely, I knew to have a true block party feel would require more than one food truck. I also knew if I had only one, the lines would be outrageous for food and people would leave. I took about a week off working on my approach. I knew that this event would not be a huge money maker for the food trucks, but they would be doing something larger than themselves, having corporate social responsibility by giving back to their community by raising money for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. I gave myself about a week break and then tried another round of food trucks that I had researched. With a new elevator pitch of philanthropic work, I had two food trucks accept my offer that day and say they would be at my event (AH!). It amazed me how quickly I was able to get food trucks to sign up by simply changing the way I marketed the event. After a few more weeks of calls, I finally got my last food truck - BBQ to agree. I had not heard back from the University Police (this is mid summer) so I made sure to call them once a month to check and and send emails. I also spent the summer designing the look of my event by drawing out diagrams with every detail accounted for. Each decoration bringing one's attention back to the reason we were having the event: St. Jude. I knew that simply having a profit share with food trucks would not generate enough revenue, I needed another source of profit. I had the idea of a dunk tank where the members could compete to get dunked (only the top five fundraising members would get dunked).
Oh yes. Did I mention my biggest obstacle? I had no budget to pull off this event. After being told the dunk tank would not be able to donated for a philanthropic event, I knew I needed to use outside resources. I wrote up a donation letter to our alumni base starting with a description of the event and what I needed the funds for. Crossing my fingers with low expectations, I sent the email to as many alumni emails I could get a hold of. Within two days I got enough double the amount of funds I had requested. Absolutely thrilled, I was able to dive back into my plans and reserve the dunk tank.
Long story short, I did not get the street I wanted approved, so I went to my back up option of the chapel parking lot that is in a shape of a square. The outdoor location in itself was a nightmare ensuring I would have a water source for the dunk tank, electrical units for lights as it was an evening event, and space for tables and food trucks. I then researched examples of contracts with food trucks and wrote up my own to send the food trucks with a due date. Once they sent those to me, I sent them to the Student Activities head at my University who then sent them another email making sure they had all the legal documents. Although I put that process into two sentences, this process took over two months and involved many emails and phone calls to make sure they were turned in on time. I then started working on my public relations for the event making a social media graphic for my members to post, planning other marketing techniques such as tabling in our student center, making posters to hang in our student center and designing a snapchat filter for the event. I also designed a t-shirt so that all of my members could wear them at the event and be in unison at the event to look more professional and more as a team. It took two weeks to get the final design with the company and get the required number of shirts ordered in time for the event. They ended up being extremely cute, and again reminded us of the vision.
Two weeks out to the event I was feeling good about where I was. My members had a firm understanding of what the event was, I had a committee helping me make all the posters and other public relation incentives and a committee helping with decorations. Early in September I coordinated my chapter to attended a 5k walk/run for St. Jude the week before in Round Rock, put on by St. Jude. At the 5k was an extremely talented face painter whom one of my members got her card and told me to get her for my event. I emailed her immediately after and with my extra money that was donated to me, I was able to reserve her for the two hour event. All was going too well it seemed, and I was right. When calling my one food truck vendor to check on the status of their contract, I was told they had new management and had no idea to what event I was referring to and told m to find someone else. Receiving this text in one of my classes, I had no emotion. I waisted no time and began researching again food trucks in the area. After sitting through what seemed to be the longest class of my life, I called the only food truck I could find. To my amazement, they agreed and I sent them the contract to be signed. I got extremely lucky on that one.
With the end in sight, I began organizing all the decorations and supplies in our chapter room for the event so that my set up team could easily grab everything without asking me questions day of. After sending a final schedule email to the University's facilities and Power Plant staff, University Police, food trucks, and face painter regarding arrival times, when to block off the parking lot, and final needs I was ready for the event to happen. Day of I was surprised at how relaxed I was. That is how it should be. Events are like midterms. It is all about the preparation in advance. If you try and study the day of, you won't remember any of it and will most likely not do well on your exam. I had done all the prep work possible and now I had the easy part of coordinating the event and making sure it was successful. Sparing you from all the details, it was not only the largest event I have ever planned, but also the most successful. We raised around $1300 for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital and I was told nothing but positive feedback. I hope that I paved the way for the next philanthropy chairman to plan this event next year. Although this event required so much work, it was all worth it because of why I was doing the event: to give the patients at St. Jude hope. I cannot wait to see how else I grow in my skill of event planning, communication, and marketing.
P.S. I did write hand written thank you notes to all vendors. You should even if you are paying them for their time. It makes such a difference and increases the likelihood of them helping you in the future greater. So many people skip this relatively quick and easy step to events.
I am attaching photos of the event below.