First Friday costs / questions

[Brian Munroe]

Here is some commentary from Bill in regards to the response I got
from one of the directors of FF...seems a bit more pricey then the
numbers we were throwing around on the Saturday....

Also, sorry it is all choppy and broken up, I forwarded it from my
work account...

-- brian

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Bill Tomiyasu <bi...@synshop.org>
Date: Wed, May 2, 2012 at 3:33 PM
Subject: Re: First Friday Contacts?

Interesting answers.  I guess my first question is if the $250
sponsorship he's offering is for the 10x10 tent (but we supply the
tent) per month or some other promo?  At that rate, we're better off
joining as an Artist with a $75/month fee if we can.  Or see if we can
cut a better deal on a 3 month buy-in.  Still seems pricey, but we may
be paying for the media attention and that could be worth it.  Let's
discuss the trade offs.

What does he mean by an "activation" in Get Back Alley?  If it's free
and all we need to do is build our own show, we ought to be able to do
something with that at no cost to us (except whatever it costs us to
build our booth) but we trade off visibility because it's low traffic
there.  Would we still get the media attention of being a sponsor?
This may be a good opportunity to drive traffic to that part of FF and
a way to leverage very little or no cost to us to participate.
Intriguing...

The kid's zone thing sounds interesting but I think it's more
specialized and we ought to brainstorm separately on that part of the
event if we decide to go there.

The insurance issue rears it's ugly head.  We may have problems doing
anything other than fingerpainting in the booth without getting the
insurance issue worked out.

The info below is from the FF website:

> April - June 2012  Partner / Sponsor Opportunities
>
> Promotional Table - $250
> - Includes 6’ display table, and basic area lighting - Includes logo placement and link on FF website
>
> Promotional Tent (10’ x 10’) - $750
> - Includes tent, 6’ display table, two art hanging grids, 1 chair and basic area lighting - Includes logo placement and link on FF website
>
> Promotional Tent (20’ x 20’) - $1,500
> - Includes tent, two 6’ display tables, two art hanging grids, 2 chairs and basic area lighting - Includes logo placement and link on FF website
>
> FF Community Partner (All Access) - $3,000/month
> - Includes access to entire event footprint + all FF marketing assets - Includes up to a 20’ x 20’ promotional tent OR stage branding (limited stage availability) - Includes logo and link on FF website(www.firstfridaylasvegas.com/sponsors.htm) - Includes dedicated email blast to FF database + dedicated FF facebook posting - Includes sponsor mention in applicable media interviews and PR opportunities
>
> **Presenting Partner or Customized Packages - Presenting and Custom Packages Available upon request - Presenting includes naming rights in all collateral “First Friday presented by [brand]” - Consult your First Friday contact for details and pricing
>
> **3 Month Advance Payment - Discount Offer: - Quarterly Partnerships available - pay 3 months in advance for 20% discount!
> - Example: 3 month Community Partner = $9,000 - $1,800 = $7,200

--BillT
bi...@synshop.org


On May 2, 2012, at 12:05 PM, Joey Vanas wrote:

> Hi Brian,
>
> All sounds good, couple answers below:
>
> On May 1, 2012, at 10:16 PM, Brian Munroe wrote:
>
>> Hey Joey, thanks for the quick response.
>>
>> So if you've never heard of a maker/hackerspace, we are basically a community center focused on the fusion of technology, industrial arts, collaboration and kinesthetic learning.

yeah i know basically what it's about, but don't have good working
knowledge how it actually functions

>>
>> We have been in a bit of a hibernation mode for several months now, but we would like to start doing a little marketing and public exposure and we think First Friday would be an excellent venue to showcase what we are all about.

agreed, what we are at the core is a marketing platform to get messages out

>>
>> We have registered with the site and have started to plan for a possible June showing (well aware of the May 18th deadline).  Most of the people helping with the planning have been to a recent FF, but we still want to do a little bit of research during the May 4th event and get a feel for how things operate.

sounds good

>>
>> Since SYN Shop is registered as a Nevada non-profit and we are actively pursing our 501c3 status, another goal is to do some fundraising as well.  It was unclear to us if that is allowed at First Friday and if so, what we should classify ourselves as.

what we've done with other non-profits is offered a $250 sponsorship
fee (rather than $750) if they have their own tent and tables/chairs
they can bring.  that way they get the value of more traffic in the
casino center area and have the tent infrastructure but we don't have
to pay as much infrastructure cost on our end for the tent, labor,
tables/chairs, etc.  We would still provide the power hookup.  Or if
you wanted to do an activation in Get Back Alley and have more space
and be able to customize something we could do that with no fee.  The
traffic is less there and we just want cool and interesting things
going on so it benefits us to have more programming
>>
>> Additionally, since we feel like we fit in to both education and art, we didn't know how we fit into things.  For example, part of our fundraising efforts would be to give (for a small donation) color shifting LED ping pong balls that cycled colors depending upon how you rotated them.  We'd show kids (or interested adults) how they function and give them an opportunity to learn more about the science behind them.  We'd also like to bring along our 3D printer and laser cutter and have a sort of mini-makerfaire [1].  We are still fleshing out ideas, but regardless, it would be related to science / technology and education.

if it's really education and young kid focused there might be the
opportunity to get something like this in the Kids Zone, but it would
have to be discussed and we'd need to look at what else is going on in
there.
>>

>> So with all that said, I guess my questions boil down to:
>>
>> 1) Where do we fit in?  Personally, I think we are more education then art.

I would probably just categorize you as a non-profit sponsor

>> 2) Would we be allowed to do fundraising at FF?

yes, however you think is best

>> 3) Laser cutter ok?  We just be cutting birch and is no more toxic then say a campfire

yes, just need to have your own insurance on that, which I imagine you
do anyway, and name us as additional insureds on the certificate and
have a waiver of subrogation (we can get you more details on that as
it becomes necessary)

>>
>> I'm pretty excited to become more then just an attendee at First Friday, so please let me know what you think!
>>
>> I didn't know how late was too late to call, so I decided to email instead,  if you would like to call instead, I can be reached at 702-592-1931.

no, thank you for your interest!

[Mark J. Koch]

It seems to me that we are in the reverse position of needing to be
sponsored at this time. It would be nice to be a partner/sponsor in the
future though.


Mark

>> - Includes 6� display table, and basic area lighting - Includes logo placement and link on FF website
>>
>> Promotional Tent (10� x 10�) - $750
>> - Includes tent, 6� display table, two art hanging grids, 1 chair and basic area lighting - Includes logo placement and link on FF website
>>
>> Promotional Tent (20� x 20�) - $1,500
>> - Includes tent, two 6� display tables, two art hanging grids, 2 chairs and basic area lighting - Includes logo placement and link on FF website

>>
>> FF Community Partner (All Access) - $3,000/month

>> - Includes access to entire event footprint + all FF marketing assets - Includes up to a 20� x 20� promotional tent OR stage branding (limited stage availability) - Includes logo and link on FF website(www.firstfridaylasvegas.com/sponsors.htm) - Includes dedicated email blast to FF database + dedicated FF facebook posting - Includes sponsor mention in applicable media interviews and PR opportunities
>>
>> **Presenting Partner or Customized Packages - Presenting and Custom Packages Available upon request - Presenting includes naming rights in all collateral �First Friday presented by [brand]� - Consult your First Friday contact for details and pricing

[Bill Tomiyasu]

Thanks for reposting, Brian.  Wasn't sure if I should respond back to the main group on this stuff.  

I think going to the event on Friday should answer some questions about the Get Back Alley area.  Since Joey indicated that we could go there for free and we only need to bring our own stuff (tables, chairs, tent, etc.) with us, that sounds like a great deal as long as we still get the marketing provided by being a sponsor.  If not, then we get to sit in a low-traffic area for 6 hours.

On the positive side, being in Get Back Alley will let us know exactly how many people are truly interested in SYN Shop because they will have to seek us out.  If we work on our projects and make it interesting for anyone who comes to see us, we can bring some life to that area of FF and maybe get some leverage to keep it free for us to participate in FF in the future.  Free is pretty good.  If we build it, they will come... and come back again...  :)

--BillT
bi...@synshop.org

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[Brian Munroe]

I'm tending to lean more towards "free" at this point, for the same
points you and mark have pointed out.

The Get Back Alley is on 6th and Fremont...

-- brian

[shawn looker]

If the Get Back Alley is where I'm thinking (And I'm honestly not sure if that's what they call where I'm thinking of) then its definitely very low traffic.  I don't think we want to be in the position of making people seek us out, because people don't ever look at the flyers for First Friday, they just sort of wander around and look at what ever is interesting.  Free is definitely good, but we'll definitely have a LOT less traffic than anywhere else.  Again, this is assuming its where I think it is...  Like Bill said though, if we get the marketing for being a sponsor, awesome.  If not... bleh.

Insurance required to use the laser cutter seems really odd to me, but I don't know much about business. :)

On Wed, May 2, 2012 at 7:50 PM, Bill Tomiyasu <bi...@synshop.org> wrote:

[shawn looker]

Ah cool.  That's not where I thought it was.  I didn't even realize they were doing the section near the El Cortez anymore. 

That section tends to be a lot lower traffic as well though, since its so far away from the actual "main" First Friday, you rarely get people going from the El Cortez side to the far side.  Its not bad, but definitely much lower traffic by a large order of magnitude.

[Monera Mason]

Want to give me fliers . . . Isabella has a booth in kids zone(with Garehime). If you bring me fliers tomorrow(education shift) Ill be happy to put them at our table unless I get yelled at.  

Also if you want to help build a giant unicorn out of trash tomorrow I am sure you can get more exposure. The unicorn is being sponsored by FF so it might be a good way to connect makers and artists.

And one day I will get you to make a Tesla coil for the hackerspace.  

Monera Mason Brand Storyteller Mobile: 415.336.4245

[Brian Munroe]

Thanks Monera!  Actually we don't have any fliers or anything worthwhile to hand out yet.  That is what the month of May is for - to get organized and design some promotional materials, banners, t-shirts, etc.

We should make a Telsa coil for First Friday!  :-)

-- brian

[shawn looker]

That would be super awesome. 

[Krux]

Those are rather dangerous.  I want to build one, but you need more space for something like that.

perl -e 's==UBER?=+y[:-o]}(;->\n{q-yp-y+k}?print:??;-p#)'

[shawn looker]

When and where were we meeting tonight?

shawn

[Bill Tomiyasu]

Here's from Brian's email earlier on where to meet...

So those of you who expressed an interest in checking out First Friday
on May 4th, lets plan on meeting in between the Arts Factory and
Artiface at 6:30pm.  Who knows what I'll be wearing, but you can
always reach me via at (702) 291-8514 if you can't find me.  It is
just to the north of most of the events, but I figured the crowds
might be a little less and we'll be able to find each other a little
better.

Also, if you don't mind, please email me directly (br...@synshop.org)
if you are planning to come, that way we won't leave you behind once
we reach critical mass.

I figure that we'll walk around the main part of the S. Casino Center
and then walk towards the East Fremont area and check that out.  They
do have shuttle service so getting back to your car shouldn't be a
problem.

Where to Park?
===========
http://www.firstfridaylasvegas.com/pdf/First-Friday-Parking.pdf

Any questions, please let me know.  See you Friday!

-- brian

--BillT
bi...@synshop.org

[shawn looker]

Thanks.  It got lost in my influx of mail.