
Event Sponsorship
Issue 003
Every Wednesday at noon, the team at MerchLab gets together for lunch in their conference room. They discuss a challenge that one of the distributors is having. As a group, they come together to help solve the challenge.

Harold, are you okay? You are limping.

I am fine. I ran in Grandma’s Marathon, and I am still recovering.

We are very proud of you, Harold. That is a fantastic accomplishment.

Just thinking about all of the running is making me hungry. Let’s nosh.

What are we discussing today?

I need help. I spoke with my friends at Backline yesterday. They want me to help with their title sponsor for their upcoming concert at First Avenue.

Who is Backline?

They offer mental health services to the music industry. My friend Zack helped start the organization, and they do fantastic work.

That industry needs all the mental health they can get. Way too many musicians die young.

They are looking for a title sponsor, and they want to offer them something unique besides the usual put their name on emails, signs, and t-shirts.

UGC is the most important thing right now. I would try and get the people attending the event some gifts with the sponsor’s name and reward them for creating content.

I can reach out to my contact at KIND. Their foundation has been looking at mental health initiatives.

Is that KIND bars? I love their fruit bars.

I have an idea. What about offering all of the people who buy a ticket a free gift with KIND on the merchandise. Give the people six options of gifts to choose from. They can choose if they want a t-shirt, hat, bottle, backpack..etc. You can’t just slap KIND on a t-shirt because more people won’t want it or wear it to the show. You have to give people options.

KIND could follow up with people who received their gift and ask them to take a picture wearing or holding their gift and then do a post on social media.

I like that. Take a picture of your gift. Name the band you are most excited to see. Tag Backline and KIND in the post.

KIND would get a ton of UGC. They can reward each person who posts a photo with a box of KIND bars for participating.

Once KIND gets a customer a free box of products, the LTV of that client is huge. People love their products.

Hundreds of social media posts showing that KIND is helping the music industry with mental health is excellent for their brand.

Mary, do think you can talk to your contact at KIND about this?

My client at General Mills might like this concept as well.

Max, you speak to your contact at General Mills, and I will talk to my contact at KIND. We will find a title sponsor for this event.

Thank you so much for your help.