Starting and building a business from scratch is a huge task. Once you have your perfect business or restaurant location, you will probably start furnishing it, hiring staff, and even hiring an interior decorator to spruce it up, however there is much more to be done to ensure a high possibility of success for your new venture. The most important part is yet to come! Organising a #grandopening event is key to promoting a new brand and business. If you have the time and resources you can plan and manage the entire event yourself or hire experienced and professional event planners to take charge of everything, turning your ideas into a reality.
Grand opening ceremonies can be for any kind of business or trade, such as for restaurants, hotels and offices. Often small businesses worry that grand openings will be a costly affair, however, professional event planners through their vast experience have many #grandopeningeventplanning ideas and can offer custom grand opening event packages according to clients' budgets. #Eventplanningcompanies understand that the important goal of grand opening events is to make a stellar first impression that goes a long way when it comes to brand awareness and creating a new business and client relationship. Find out how you can make a dazzling entry into the market and into people’s hearts!
Here are some great grand opening day event planning ideas.
Pre-planning for the Grand Opening and Soft Launch
Even if you think that you are the best entrepreneur in town and have all the event planning and management knowledge required, you cannot pull off a rushed grand opening event within a few days. It has to be understood that a grand opening is not just another party but the possible creation and beginning of a fruitful relationship between potential future clients and the business You can start with,
talking to your friends and spreading the word
launch an exciting grand opening campaign in social media to give a short teaser of the products and services you provide
design catchy invites and send them via post, hand-deliver invitations accompanied by a gift if you already have a list of VIP contacts or even send out a catchy video invite YouTube link through a clickable phone message to set the mood
distribute free samples, coupons or even engage professional event promoters to distribute flyers with custom-made brand mascots
Nothing beats the support of your friends and family. If you are opening a new restaurant, invite them for a soft opening and treat them to a meal made in your brand new kitchen! Always take note of their valuable suggestions and ideas; you’ll never know when they’ll come in handy.
If you are thinking of the some great grand opening ideas for your restaurant check out this blog on the '5 things that event planners include for planning successful grand opening day events'.
An Event for Local Influencers to Promote
Forget newspapers, nowadays most people in the city get their news and updates from social media. Influencers have a large number of followers and their promotion of your grand opening can go viral online through social media with likes and shares of their followers reaching out to many more people online. If you have a higher budget you can also have a celebrity appearance at your grand opening event and be sure to promote it, not forgetting to hire photographers and videographers for the event. You can even update the press of the celebrity appearance to get more publicity for your new brand.
Reach out to the bloggers, YouTube stars, Instagram models and food critics in your area and if you are opening a restaurant treat them with your signature dishes. If you have a small business or shop, give them a free sample of your product or offer a free value-added service, just for them to get the feel of quality of your new products and services. Making a good impression on your influencers, will translate to them putting up a good review of your business which, will mean making a good impression on their followers as well!
Hosting THE Grand Opening Day Party!
Once you have laid all the groundwork for promoting your brand, it is now time to source for the ideal host for your grand opening event! Get the decorations, lights and sound system set up, and possibly even hire an event entertainer! You could arrange unique games that can be associated to your brand or business, for example, if you are in opening a restaurant it could be a food tasting contest. You can even include lucky draws that would win your guests coupons and samples of your product. Remember to hire videographers and photographers to cover your event in a very professional setting as the raw photos and videos can be used for future publicity and blogs.
Grand Opening Event Marketing Campaign
You can even come up with a marketing campaign that is suited to your business. If your online grand opening marketing campaign through your influencers includes the issuing of coupons and special offers or promotions, that are to be claimed by customers, remember to keep it within budget and manageable to avoid the possibility of a chaotic first day of business. If you are opening a restaurant, instead of giving big discounts, you could offer free desserts for the first meal to cut down cost. To keep it manageable, the claiming dates on the coupons could be for up to 500 customers per day (depending on your seating capacity and space) for the promotional first month, to ensure you wont be overwhelmed on any particular day throughout the promotion period.
From the feedback you received by hosting for your friends and family along with the possible input from the influencers that you invited, be flexible and adjust where you must to ensure you have a well-thought-out plan. Event planners know that publicity is key for a successful grand opening day event.
Bringing up a business, planning and hosting the soft launch, getting influencers on board, and hosting the final spectacle of the grand opening day event can be too much to take on for one person especially if you lack the experience! When we are talking about small businesses, even the planning stage could be a hassle especially with limited resources and staff. You can leave everything to the professional event planners who with their extensive experience in the events industry can offer you grand opening day event packages that are customised according to your needs and requirements.
Here is the latest video of some of our grand opening and product launch events!
Here is a fun video by our event company on grand opening and product launch day events.
Visit our event company YouTube page for more fun videos.
For more of our past blogs on ideas for grand opening ceremony and product launch day events visit our grand opening and product launch category page. There are also related blogs below that you may be interested in.
Have an upcoming grand opening day event? Electric Dreamz event company is a one stop solution event planner who can cater to any needs and requirements including backdrop, stage, LED wall, sound system, lighting, decoration, launch mechanism, special effects AV equipment, custom fabrication (according to theme or product, etc.), event crew hire, emcee service and etc.
Feel free to contact us through email at assif@electricdreamz.com or call us at +65 6683 9541. For more information on our event company visit us at Electric Dreamz! Alternatively, for more on our event planning services visit our event planner page.