I lead the event coordination and marketing of UC Berkeley’s Laser Safety Vendor Fair from 2016-2018.
This vendor fair invites between 13-14 vendors to market their services and products to researchers utilizing lasers and optics.
Feedback from the vendors in 2015 suggested there felt to be a lack of engagement between fair attendees and them, so in 2016 I designed and implemented a passport game to encourage engagement as a way for participants to learn about each vendor and fill the passport to enter a raffle for gift cards. Filling the entire card resulted in winning the researcher and their lab a pizza party, which previous focus groups showed to be a big incentive for this audience.
Process Improvement
Another area that needed attention was processing payments by the vendors to participate in the fair. When I took over event coordination, I set up a credit card registration portal using campus resources for the vendors to optimize payment. The fair is completely funded by the vendors, and it helped with paying for event supplies earlier with the credit card registration over checks.
