October was SUCH a busy and exciting month for our clients and Laners! With over 59 events staffed and 901 shifts worked, our Laners were as busy as ever all across the country! With so many fun and exciting events, it is hard to pick a favorite! This past weekend Laners were working with Target to kick off the Halloween season with SLIME! The rockstar Laners handled everything from set up to working a Slime Lab! Here's a little bit of how the event worked and what made it so memorable! Don't worry...there will be more Slime Lab this weekend too!
Brief Description of the event:
Target is gearing up for the Halloween season by creating an incredibly family friendly pop-up experience outside of select Target stores the last two weekends in October! The event is essentially a small outdoor pop-up activation run by only 3 Brand Ambassadors! OH WAIT, did we mention its a 'Slime Lab?" Who doesn't love slime? People who decide to take part will be able to pick a jar of slime created by Elmers, and then fold into the slime fun little Halloween bits and bobs to create their own fun/slimy creation! The event is open to the public at select stores in the Minneapolis/Philadelphia/Denver area!
In addition to running the pop-up, our Brand Ambassadors are completely in charge of setting up and breaking down all the elements to the activation! You say Brand Ambassadors for Target, we say All-Star Event Producers who oversee it all!
How do you approach staffing an event that is taking place at 11 locations simultaneously?
When it comes to staffing multi-city events, especially all on the same weekend - you really have to get everything started as soon as possible and have an ample supply of patience and foresight along the way. Lets just say there are a lot of Excel sheets and Google Documents that go into it - as well as a Google Calendar that should be overflowing with interviews. It's measure for success can also be attributed to the Managers running everything onsite! These Managers for this activation are ALL-STARS. They have attended multiple training calls, been communicative and open with the client's thoughts and feedback - as well as patient with the inherent hiccups and hurdles that come with the territory.
We reached out to one of our Target Slime Lab Managers, Efrata Yitbarek, who worked in Denver and here's what she had to say:
"Families and kids were delighted to attend the pop-up Target's Hallo-EEKend festivities with the Slime Lab team. Guests were delighted to see such a fun and rewarding (with a take home gift) event and displayed the most heartwarming smiles watching staff help make their slime creations with them. The kids displayed the biggest smiles and parents were intrigued by the minimal mess which can be achieved with the Elmer's goo product while their kids could get creative enjoying the endless possibilities with their goo."
On a scale of 1-10, how cool is slime?
We thought long and hard about how to accurately answer this question, and we decided that if your answer was anything less than 10 you need to add a little joy to your life, and maybe stop by a nearby target this weekend and purchase some slime and see for yourself. A world without slime to play with would be a hard world to live in.
Were there any BA's that added to the success of the event?
Daniel Williams in Minneapolis provided some excellent dance moves and great energy to the event. There was an ipad onsite with a spotify playlist and so our Laners really got to strut their stuff and have some fun doing it.
Sean Schuette in Minneapolis is a machine! Hard working and fastidious in his completion of any and every task handed his way! He even went out of his way to help deliver Boxes to FedEx after the event was over!
Michael Pricharda in Philadelphia went above and beyond to make the client and team happy! The large crate that was housing all materials and being shipped in was destroyed by Target store employees so Michael volunteered his vehicle to transport and help get the materials onto the footprint of the Target Store for weekend #2! Hearing that kind of selfless problem solving just makes your heart glow!
Maria Tejada Caceres in Philadelphia was so lovely to work with and really helped out when the uniforms turned out to be all X-Large, and so she volunteered to drive and trade them with another location in Philly to get more appropriate sized uniforms!
Pamela Miller And Efrata Yitbarek have been such huge Laners over the years, including in different cities/markets! It was such an absolute honor and privilege for them to lend their warmth and expertise for this event in the Denver area!
Peter Christou is a new hire at ML and we are so thankful for him! Communicative, pleasant, patient and good natured to everyone he comes in contact with. We love Peter!