With their bi-annual peer group meeting shifting to virtual, Solomon Coyle needed a way to fill the void of their usual meeting offerings for their attending associations
Industry: Office Furniture Consulting
Takeaways
1. Solomon Coyle needed to provide their attendees with at-home hospitality for their virtual events
2. SnackMagic’s simple interface, attentive customer service, and user-friendly Treats Dashboard portal hits all the marks for a hospitality element at their virtual event
3. Each box was customized with Solomon Coyle branding that further personalized the experienced and Thank You notes came pouring in from recipients who enjoyed the selection process
How it Began
The Solomon Coyle team of industry professionals and association experts provide industry research, consulting, financial and compensation benchmarking, professional development and peer group management services developed specifically for contract furniture dealers. “We are a consulting firm in the office furniture industry, and we manage small trade associations of office furniture dealers,” explained Solomon Coyle consultant, Sheri Winter. “We have eight of these small associations who typically meet twice a year in person for peer group meetings.” The event ran throughout the month of October, but instead of having attendees glued to their computer for two days, there were three or four sessions a week throughout the month of October, with a total of 575 attendees. The longevity and scale of the event required centralized management and attentive service, both qualities that SnackMagic provides.
In a year filled with uncertainty, organizations across the country have been tasked with trying to connect with their employees in a meaningful way to fill the void of in-office hospitality. “This year because of the pandemic, we needed to move to a virtual meeting format, and when I was researching kind of what we could do for our event to kind of add some sort of hospitality food and beverage element, I came across SnackMagic,” said Sheri. With limited options and time, Solomon Coyle needed a way to treat their event attendees with a physical touchpoint that was personalized and easy to send out. “From there, we reached out to contact your team about how we could possibly make that work and what you all offered, and I had a great conversation with Shaunak and he walked through the program for me. We were sold.”
The Outcome of the Partnership
The event was a huge success with the help of SnackMagic’s simple interface, attentive customer service, and user-friendly Treats Dashboard. On the planner’s side, having the flexibility to include almost any branded item in the box makes the gifting process even more personal. “The thing I liked best was that we had the ability to customize each box so we could include our branding and make it seem like our attendees were really was a part of the event. I also liked that people could choose their own items,” said Sheri. SnackMagic provides a platform for personalized snacking, but more importantly for the corporate space, it provides a customizable swag component where companies can include their own branded items in each box sent out to recipients. “I had worked with the SnackMagic team upfront so that we actually had them segregated into different groups. They each got a slightly different box that had the agenda for their specific conference activities in it, a Thank You sheet with the sponsor logos who sponsored their specific event, and a book from one of our keynote speakers. Plus, we had a cool custom sticker on each box, so it was really nice that we were able to have that flexibility to customize the box for each group.”
Leaving the choice of treats up to the gift recipient is the most important selling point to event planners who are seeking little involvement in the process. To have to go through the trouble of collecting addresses of attendees that are scattered around the country and handling the nitty-gritty of making sure everyone is satisfied is not a simple task for even the most experienced event planner. “With so many other things going on, it’s would have been difficult for me to be like, ‘Okay, so everybody’s gonna get pretzels or everybody’s gonna get this,’ but with SnackMagic, everyone was able to pick out those items that they personally like and we’re excited about. I think people probably had the most fun just picking out the items in their box.” The SnackMagic experience starts from the moment the recipient receives their redemption email. With many aha moments throughout the process, gift recipients can browse a colorful menu of a huge array of snacks from all over the world! Moreover, they can even write Thank You notes back, so event planners like Sheri can receive tangible feedback to share with sponsors.
SnackMagic unique’s approach to custom orders is based on our constant strive to collaborate with customers in a one-on-one manner. As a small start-up, attention to details that are often overlooked by larger companies is a characteristic that we pride ourselves on. “The best part of this experience was working with the SnackMagic team. I know that our event was a little unusual since there were actually eight events happening at the same time and we had some specific requests, but everyone I interacted with was very customer service oriented; very helpful and professional. I really can’t say enough about how great the team was to work with,” said Sheri. “Pretty much every day I was giving them a list of people who registered because we had people registering even after our events started. Every day I kept sending them more people, but your team was great in terms of getting everything updated. Everyone received their boxes in a very timely manner, so it was smooth and easy from a planner’s perspective.”
SnackMagic is designed to be passed along because hits all the marks that virtual event planners seek out. “It’s really overwhelming how many people were blown away by the concept. They didn’t know anything like SnackMagic existed and I had many people who told me that they were going to use you guys for their own virtual events or for a client appreciation gift or things like that,” said Sheri. As a physical touchpoint that is exciting to receive, SnackMagic is the ideal solution for event planners seeking an at-home hospitality solution at the center of control and customization. “I would absolutely use you guys again. I think that SnackMagic was a real highlight for our attendees. I really appreciate the fact that using you guys enabled us to have something tangible when everything else was virtual, so that was something that was important to us to be able to have some kind of physical connection with the attendees and this was one way that we were able to do that.”
