Planning Special Events
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Who wouldn’t buy a tire from Mario Andretti?
Capitalizing on the racing legend’s star power has become part of doing
business for some Firestone dealers, who hold special events at which
consumers can eat and chat with the tire brand’s greatest ambassador.
Bigfoot often is there to “crush the competition” and racing show cars
are sometimes displayed. The events draw between 300 and 500 potential
customers, and dealers report significant increases in business in the
following weeks.
Throwing such star-spangled bashes is surprisingly doable with the
proper plan – and with good corporate participation. But it doesn’t
take an appearance by a superstar to create a successful special event.
Whether hosting a car-care clinic or hoisting a bouncy house for a
Kids’ Day, tire dealers can boost business through a wide range of
events for an equally wide range of investments. They only need to know
how.
Anyone watching the gathering of customers at one of Jim Enger’s
special events – with tire treads shaved into their heads, chomping on
brats and bopping to the music of a local band – might think Enger owns
a chain of nightclubs, not 20 auto service and tire shops. But Enger,
president of Enger Auto Service & Tire in Cleveland – the 2009 Tire
Review Top Shop Award winner – is a special events aficionado. He
requires each of his locations to host one major special event and
three smaller quarterly events each year.
That’s a lot of permits, promotion and popcorn.
Enger says the bigger events – consumer ride-and-drives, custom or
tuner car shows and Bigfoot car crushes – take about six months to plan
and cost between $10,000 and $20,000, with expenses shared between
several stores. “We’ll sell tires, tools, parts and accessories to
offset the expense,” he says. “Major vendors also support us with
staff, advertising money, apparel and promotional give-aways.
Relationships must be formed and details worked out well in advance.”
Those relationships ideally are both corporate and local, with everyone
from Enger’s Dunlop tire-tread template supplier at Goodyear to the
local hairstylist who shaves the pattern into consumers’ heads.
Even his smaller events – women’s car-care clinics, customer
appreciation days and special sales – require about two months of
planning and can cost as much as $5,000, Enger says. But they can drive
sales for three days.
“Keep it simple, fun and friendly,” he says. “I would suggest an EZ-Up
tent, tables, chairs, gas grill, coolers, radio and lots of tires,
banners and advertising. Have a little contest and give stuff away.
Build tire stacks or pyramids all around the parking lot. People love
free food, music and cook-outs.”
Free local resources are abundant, from schools that send cheerleaders
and bands, to area clubs and groups that can be found on Google, Enger
says. But John Baratta, president of consumer replacement tire sales at
Bridgestone Americas – one of the men who helps bring Andretti to local
dealers – is quick to also tout the benefits of corporate involvement.
“We encourage our dealers to work with our marketing and PR teams, and
to engage their own staff, to put together a successful event,” he
says, identifying local sales managers as the best liaisons between
dealers and corporations. “You can’t do it alone. By leveraging our
assets, a dealer can do a very good event without spending a lot of
money.”
Baratta says Bridgestone dealers’ events typically cost between a few
hundred and a few thousand dollars, with the tiremaker often supplying
interactive sports displays, show cars, racing simulators, give-away
items and the Bigfoot monster truck.
“The dealers’ biggest expense tends to be advertising,” he says. “But
they also have to figure-in food and beverage, decorations and other
incidental costs.”
Bill Bainbridge, director of brand communications for Hankook Tire
America Corp., reminds dealers to consider manufacturers’ earned co-op
dollars for such expenses. “Earned co-op dollars are an accrual
percentage set aside for marketing purposes based on dealer dollar
purchases from a manufacturer,” he says. “Each manufacturer has
different accrual percentages and rules for a dealer to be able to be
reimbursed for advertising and promotional expenses.”
Hitting a Homerun
And then there are resources that are less measurable but highly
valuable. Bridgestone’s status as the official tire of the NFL, NHL and
PGA, and Firestone’s as that of Major League Baseball and the IndyCar
Series, allows the company to carry-over popular sports themes into
dealer events. It’s a natural marriage that results in the previously
mentioned corporate sports displays and ticket give-aways at on-site
events, but perhaps more importantly in independent, off-site
profile-raising sponsorships.
Griffin Brothers Tires, Wheels and Auto Repair in Charlotte, N.C., has
established itself as the official auto and tire dealer of the
Charlotte 49ers minor league baseball team, and partners with the
city’s ECHL professional hockey team, the Checkers. Larry Griffin Jr.,
the company’s vice president, says it not only sponsors the teams’
games – creating high visibility in the community – but also holds a
tire give-away at the Checkers’ final game of each season.
“Our investments range from as much as $15,000 a year, depending on
frequency, for the Charlotte 49ers or Checkers games, to nothing for
child-seat check points,” he says. “But unless you do coupons that you
can track, many times it’s hard to gauge the immediate success of an
event. That’s why we try to do event-specific coupons, so we know.”
Creating and fostering such large-scale partnerships – let alone
tracking and measuring their results – can require outside help.
Griffin hires a marketing firm on a monthly retainer to handle the
seven-store dealership’s advertising and some special event planning,
even for smaller events like the child-seat checks (“There’s a
Chick-Fil-A close by and we have them send their cow mascot to give
away coupons,” he says), customer appreciation days (complete with show
cars and bouncy houses), and women’s car-care clinics.
Howard Fleischmann, senior partner of Community Tire and Auto Service
Specialists in Phoenix, also has linked with a marketing firm, “to help
us keep our focus on where we spend our dollars and to assist in
evaluating the results. Over the past few years,” he says, “it has
become very evident that our dollars get much more results with
targeted, hands-on events rather than print advertising or other forms
of media.”
Many of Fleischmann’s hands-on events, in keeping with the name of his
five-store dealership, are closely tied to the community. “In all
cases, we look for a cause that we believe in to participate and
benefit,” he says. “Our thought process is that if we partner with a
cause and the event is designed to create support for the cause, we
have a larger team to spread the word. Even if the event is not a great
success for Community Tire, it allows the participating cause to
benefit and, in this way, we’re giving back to the community where we
make our living.”
Among the groups with which Fleischmann has partnered are the 100 Club,
an organization that supports families of fallen law enforcement
officers and firefighters, and a local driving school, for which
Community Tire provides car-care and driving safety clinics. “The most
effective of our adventures has involved marketing through local groups
like chambers of commerce and providing an event focused only on that
group,” he adds. “We serve a nice lunch or dinner, bringing in speakers
from the community, and create a joint mission.”
What goes around comes around, even in business. And while
Fleischmann’s outlook is charitable, he benefits from the
band-wagoning that surrounds his approach.
“For the lunch and dinner events, a local catering company will do a
majority of the event in exchange for the exposure to our customer
base,” he explains. “We also turn to local parts vendors and offer them
exposure in exchange for support. This works very well since some don’t
want the exposure or extra work, so they throw money at it. Others like
to be involved, which creates a stronger bond with your people.”
Fleischmann also is among the dealers who continue to ride a trend
toward female-friendly dealerships. One of his quarterly educational
events is tailored to women; Community Tire was the first U.S. tire
dealer to receive training and certification in the AskPatty.com for
Tire Dealers program. And he remodeled his stores to create an
environment that welcomes them – which offered perfect opportunities
for ribbon-cutting events. “They were sponsored by the Greater Phoenix
Chamber of Commerce and the attendance was over the top,” he says.
Enger and Griffin hold women’s care-care clinics as well, and are
pleased with the results. “We do them once a year,” Griffin says. “We
get vendors to donate gifts or local restaurants to supply appetizers.
Even if you have to purchase a few items, we have found these clinics
very worthwhile. We always see some ladies back within a week.”
Before the Popcorn
The idea is a good one; finances have been arranged; food and
entertainment are lined up; and the program is planned. But, on the day
of the event, even the hottest bash could fall flat if attention hasn’t
been paid to what should be preliminary considerations.
One is obtaining the proper permits. After all, dealers surely would
prefer seeing only those police officers assigned to providing traffic
assistance and security that day. Another is getting adequate pre-event
promotion, which could be costly, free, or something in between.
As for obtaining permits, each municipality has its own regulations
about when they’re needed and how they can be obtained. The Rubber City
– Akron, Ohio – for example, requires permits for events that include
games of chance, rides, petting zoo animals and, of course, alcohol,
according to Glen Stalcup of the City of Akron’s License Division. He
also recommends that dealers check with local departments of health and
zoning, as well as a city’s service director, before planning an event
to determine if there are other considerations.
Fleischmann and Griffin, however, both say that the events they’ve held
haven’t required permits – though Enger’s have. He suggests applying
for them 90 days in advance.
“We haven’t had to deal with permit issues,” Fleischmann says. “But
we’re very focused on creating a safe event, so we assign several
people to security. And, in some cases, such as with Bigfoot, we have
contacted the local police and arranged to hire off-hour officers for
support. We also are very careful to notify our insurance company of
all events, on-site or off.”
“Typically, we work with the local community to plan traffic flow and
manage the parking situation,” Baratta adds. “When we use inflatables,
Bigfoot or other large branded show cars or signage, we work with the
community to make sure we’re in compliance with local sign ordinances
and other things.”
In the end, however, many of the community officials who become
involved in dealers’ events tend to be guests, invited in what Griffin
calls “good will.”
“For events like customer appreciation days, we invite police and fire to stop by and have lunch,” he says.
Baratta sees things similarly. “We typically invite the mayor, police
chief and other high-ranking officials to attend and participate in
ribbon-cuttings and other things,” he says. “It’s very important for us
to be good corporate citizens who give back to the community. This is a
value we share with our dealers and we’re very proud of the way we work
together to involve the community.”
Setting the Stage
When Fleischmann held his remodeling ribbon-cuttings, he again depended
on his local chambers of commerce, this time for promotional
assistance. “With the chambers’ help, we had great local news coverage,
talking about female-friendly auto service,” he says.
“To prepare for the event, we asked for some professional help to do
news releases for the media. We were able to get this help through the
chambers and it was very effective.”
Marketing companies like those employed by Fleischmann and Griffin also
can help line up promotions, at a cost. But Griffin and Enger cite
other resources that may be easier on a dealer’s budget: fliers, social
networking, customer newsletters, in-store promotions and advertising
or articles in local newspapers.
When Enger held a mid-summer event away from any of his stores – he
rented space at a local harness track – he used the company’s Facebook
Fan Page to build interest. The result was three days of solid
attendance and heaps of good vibes. Cost? $0.
Regardless of the method, getting the word out about the special event is a critical element in its success.
After the Confetti
So, what constitutes a successful special event? Words of wisdom from experienced special event aficionados are wide ranging.
“For any event to be successful, you have to have specific goals and a
very good plan to execute,” Baratta says. “It really takes a team to
stage a strong event.”
“The first step is to figure out your mission,” Fleischmann adds. “What
do we expect to happen from the event? What is our ultimate goal? If
you don’t have those answers before you start, how will you know if it
was successful? And last, but sometimes most important, have a meeting
following the event with all involved, review everything – good and bad
– and make notes on both for the next time.”
“Do it and learn from your mistakes,” Griffin states. “An event that
works in one area may not work in another. But don’t be afraid. You
don’t know until you try.”
“Flops are going to happen, so let the show go on,” Enger concludes.
“Do not get stressed over things that aren’t perfect. Remember, it’s
all about the experience and the love your customers feel after
leaving. Was it a waste of time? Was it a value? Was it fun? Did your
team have fun and build camaraderie?
“And leave the salties inside and away from the customers,” he adds of
team members who’d rather not join in the festivities. “This event is
bringing lots of new faces to your business. Smile and they will come
back.”