Open House and Bridal Show
Open House - Bridal Show
We hosted our first Open house/Bridal Show last week! Was it perfect? No. Was it successful? Yes.
First of all, we were encouraged to host an open house by our new friend Tonya, of Asher Lane. We met her at another open house and she is coincidentally family to my long time best friend. It was great to meet her and we highly respect her advice.
After attending our first venue open house back in September we have been preparing to organize our own for the past few months. Google: When do you host an open house? Who do you invite to an open house? What do you do at an open house? What is an open house? We had so many questions. Will anyone even show up??
Not to rush things, but to also get something going sooner than later, I chose Sunday July 9 from 2-5PM. Sunday. The day of rest, surely the prime day of the week to do some wedding shopping. Two o’clock to five o’clock, the perfect post-church and lunch activity. July, hot. But we have fantastic HVAC, no problem. Summer vacations and being out of town was my only concern.
Do I invite people? Do I put it out there and see who wants to? I decided to invite a few folks I have already made connections with. People who have reached out to me since we opened. But I don’t want more than 3 of any category of and event. I.e. no more than three photographers. I wanted a wide variety of vendors. But how many?? Tonya said if you can get 20 you’re doing good. So I booked 24. My theory is, make a list, call that list, determine vendors commitment level. Once I had contacted 24 or so vendors I was confident we had enough to proceed. I then called all vendors back to tell them the open house is a go! Put it on your schedule, share the posts and tell your friends.
I created an event on Facebook. There are a few ways to organize and track attendance and vendors. I wanted to keep the first one simple and manageable. I’ve seen other venues use Eventbrite and so forth. I understand these are great ways of capturing all of your vendors and attendees information. That info is then distributed to the vendors who attend your open house. So we did forego the info capture part, but not to be ignored!
In the days approaching the open house we would tag and share the vendor of the day and showcase their product or service. In addition to daily FB posts, we would also share the same promo to the event page. Each vendor got a shout out on the main FB page as well as the event page. In the background, we had a FB boosted post tagging all committed vendors and all necessary details of the day.
Sunday July 9, 2023. Showtime. The building has been freshly swept and mopped. The toilets been scrubbed, curtains pulled to the perfect place, floors have been marked off, bring on the people. Vendors were first to arrive. Chelsie, of Afterglow by Chelsie, was the first in the door. A local spray tan artist, she had her booth up in no time and set up for success. In the next couple hours the rest of the vendors trickled in and got their booth space decorated and ready to sell.
2:00. Let’s go. Balloons by Jalin had decorated our arbor as well as the Murphy door leading to the bridal suite. The smell of espresso and BBQ filled the air thanks to Magnify Coffee and 3D BBQ. Competing sounds came from opposite ends of the venue, DJB at the South end and DFW DJ Lady on the North end. Bring on the people. A steady trickle of folks came through over the next 3 hours. Sampling Sweet B’s treats, planning a vacation with Charlotte’s Dream Vacations and talking hair with Lindsey Clem. In the bridal suite Lindsay Blair of Live.Beautifully.MUA set the vibe with her awesome display. Bluebonnet Bakery was near our booth and her cupcakes were delicious. The Punchy Petal brought a ton of flowers, Exquisite Brides had their exclusive gown on display and Stress Free Wedding was planning away. Next door the Stress Free Weddings was Jamie Huffman Photography displaying some amazing prints and canvases.
There were plenty of client opportunities as well as B2B networking opportunities. We are grateful for a successful event and excited to work with our new clients and vendors. The plan is to do this annually, ideally in January/February. So be on the look out for our next Open house, we would love to have you!
-Matthew & Kevyn Harvey
www.BenedictionOnTheSquare.com
@benedictionOTS