Making stalls interactive (use the kids to get to the parents...) - Glasgow WDM

One of the hardest things with a stall is how to get people to engage with you long enough. Most WDM campaigns are not easy to communicate in 2 seconds, so it helps if you can hold on to people for a minute to explain what the campaign is about and then try to persuade them to sign an action card. And it also helps if you can have something on the stall which will attract people's attention in the first place. We've tried a few methods of making stalls more interactive and entertaining, but our most successful so far was the free lucky dip that we ran at a festival in Glasgow. By offering something that attracted children, we also drew their parents to the stall and could have a conversation with them whilst their kids were happily engaged. And there were a surprising number of adults who were also very keen to try out a lucky dip!

We made the lucky dip climate-related by using model polar bears (made of polystyrene and card - just 2 dimensional, so not too complicated) as the objects to be found - we used 'Rescue the Polar Bears' as part of the branding for the stall. Once a participant had found a polar bear, they received a sweet as a prize and we returned the bear to the lucky dip. We used shredded paper in the lucky dip and wrote simple 'climate facts' on the polar bears to add an extra layer of interest. By having one person running the lucky dip and attracting people's attention (shouting 'free lucky dip' works very well!), whilst another talks to them about the campaign and asks them to sign a campaign card, we were able to run the stall very effectively with just two people (though it helped when we had more than two). The festival we were at always works well for stalls, but even so we thought 161 signed cards was not a bad return for a few hours work.

Contact Glasgow WDM for more information about how they put together their lucky dip stall, including the model polar bears and posters: wdmglasgow@gmail.com