Delaware Valley Orienteering Association

Steve Ohrwaschel, Bailey Reed and myself worked the booth from 11 to 3PM+.  I wasn't keeping track, but it seems like we spend significant time with about 15 people/families.  There were a few more that just came by to pick up handouts and free pens.  The people that significant time with us generally seemed very interested in orienteering for one reason or another, so its likely that we'll see a good fraction of them out at an event in the future.  Several were associated with scout or other groups (e.g., a homeschool group), so hopefully they'll bring lots of people with them.

Some lessons (potentially) learned:

• In my haste to get all the materials together, I neglected to print out a schedule of upcoming events, so the best we could do was give people the materials with our website address and tell them to look there.  That may not be such a bad thing, in that some upcoming events still don't have directors/course-setters and could get cancelled and we wouldn't want people showing up based on a printed schedule (an often-discussed issue).  But, it still would have been nice to give them an idea of where we go, as the range and location of our events is a frequently-asked question.
• Being right next to the Kettle Korn booth giving away free samples suggested that we should also have had something to draw people in.  Steve suggested maybe something like powerbar samples with a DVOA sticker attached.  And there would have to be a "Free Power Bars!" sign to go with it.
• The nature of the Sheep and Wool days, with all the cute animals and hayrides, is that most attendees are families with young children.  It was nice to talk to those families about coming out and doing orienteering as a family, but it would also be nice to try a similar booth at an event with an older crowd (e.g., teens).

Fred