Country Fest Parade

Today we teamed up with Erickson Enterprises Great Clips to help distribute coupons in the South Jordan Country Fest parade. Being this was my first parade, I definitely learned A LOT about how to improve the next time!
1. Separate the candy from the coupons - Kids want candy, the coupons are for the parents. It would be best if we had 1-2 people throwing candy and 1-2 people handing coupons. That way we could cover all the crowd spectrums.
2. Have a vehicle placed at the end of the route as well as the start of the route! This way it's quick and easy transporting the parade participants back to their vehicles and families. This also provides an easy way to have cold water accessible at the end of the parade.
3. Bring breakfast, sunscreen, and WATER! As participants are lining up, it's a great time to socialize and hand out cards and network. I had many marketing ideas pop into my mind as we were waiting for the parade to begin.
4. Parade spectators are touchy! As I was handing out Great Clips coupons I had a lot of them comment "Nothing Personal Right?" to the haircut coupons. They didn't know they were getting $30 for 30 day coupons too! I'm interested to hear what their response is to our tag line - "Do something sweet for yourself and lose your "rolls" this summer."
5. I wore our Total Solution Tee shirt - but would have felt more comfortable wearing one of the tee shirts we got from great clips. Since this was an event to support Great Clips, I should have had one of their tees on. I would have enjoyed myself more because I would have been more comfortable about fitting in!
All-in-all I thought it went well for the first one, but I would definitely want to tweak my approach for the next one. I enjoy working with Erikson Enterprises Great Clips so much and would like to have supported them better with better representation today. Any disappointment I may feel towards this event is geared towards my participation and support of them.
I learned a lot from how Tammy of Great Clips worked and marketed the entire day. Not only did she make the parade fun for the kids, she found marketing ideas and took pictures with the Real Bear Mascot and Miss Utah - and got permission to use them in her promotional material. Miss Utah also agreed to send her information about how she has help change the stereotype of beauty pageant women. That's great stuff for Great Clips to help promote! Way to go Tammy