In the past, with the support of PPAI, our non-affiliated group of innovators, dreamers and misfits has had the privilege of kicking off the Expo-marathon with our PromoKitchen Mixer at The House of Blues in Las Vegas. While we all knew there was a chance PPAI Expo-as-we-know-it would look different in 2021, the news that PPAI Expo would be completely virtual was a big adjustment!  Many of us look forward to PPAI Expo in January each year to reconnect with our friends and colleagues, to jump start our year with some of the industry’s best education, and of course, to check out the latest and greatest in the world of promo. While PPAI did a fantastic job creating the virtual Expo this year, we at PromoKitchen were a little devastated at the thought of not being able to host our annual in person mixer.  

The PK Mixer is always a call for us to come together as an industry. It’s a time to celebrate a new year with new goals and new ambitions, to connect with old friends and to network with new ones.  It’s a time where we, the PromoKitchen community, get to engage with all of you, and share what we’re up to in terms of bringing you new education and strengthening our mentorship program. We knew we had to find a way to continue that tradition, and more importantly, provide a gathering that would bring people together to kick off Expo week. Going virtual was the only option, however in true PromoKitchen form, we couldn’t bring ourselves to host another “Zoom event.”  Enter wonder.me.

Wonder is a platform designed to relieve the Zoom fatigue that many of us experienced in 2020, and are still experiencing, and boy did it do just that. In a new world where we crave true human interaction more than ever, their goal of “creating fluid togetherness” was spot on. We have been humbled and blown away at the positive responses we’ve been getting regarding the event.  The overwhelming consensus has been, “it was the closest thing to an in-person event any of us have experienced to date.” The dynamics allowed you to see who was in the room, and be welcomed into conversations. You could move organically around the room just as you are when you join a conversation with a group of people at the House of Blues. It brought engagement back into networking. With it’s broadcasting system, we were able to ‘take the stage’ and share some phenomenal news in terms of donations we’ve received, thank and acknowledge our amazing chefs who are stepping down this year, and thank all of our sponsors and supporters. Wonder does a fantastic job of truly making you feel like you’re raising a glass together at the end of the speech, and you could feel the good vibes that brightened each of the virtual rooms we went right back to. You can read more about the inner workings of the platform in a recent blog post we shared here.

Arguably the most exciting part of the PK Mixer in past years (other than the open bar) is the photo booth. Our hope was that by including one of the fundamental elements that really gets the people going, we would be able to add another “real-life” dynamic to the event. We

partnered with MDRN Photobooth Co. to add a virtual photo booth, complete with “props” and a custom background and border on each photo.  Party people could download their photos to share immediately, and we received a dropbox file containing all of the shenanigans. You can check them out on our Facebook page, and don’t forget to tag yourself and share! 

There’s quite a bit of work that goes into launching an event with a new platform, and our amazing chefs, sous chefs and volunteers really stepped up their game to support the decision to challenge our community by using a new virtual platform.  Our Mixer Committee had multiple calls in the months leading up to the event, and we wanted to make sure we gave you all the tools you needed to navigate wonder on the day of.  We created additional resources, such as a training video and a how-to and troubleshooting guide, that you can now take to your team, should you choose to use this platform for your own virtual events in the future.

Last but not least, many of us are familiar with Eventbrite and their ease of organizing events, both in-person and virtual. This is exactly why we chose them to funnel ticket sales and manage the registration component.  

Another HUGE helping of gratitude to our amazing sponsors over the years. We couldn’t do any of this without you. We want to highlight CJ Schmidt, Meghan Kory-Pyecha, and the entire team at Hit Promo for their extremely generous donation of $15,000 to PromoKitchen in 2021.  Another shout out goes to Maple Ridge Farms. Their continued sponsorship, along with these donations, will go towards our educational webinars, mentorship program, #promochat, podcasts, newsletters and more.  Additionally, a big thanks to those of you who have helped raise over $8,000 for the Tee Hamilton Creative Fund.  You people seriously rock.

If you missed our 2021 Mixer and are experiencing major #promofomo, don’t fret.  Follow us on social and stay tuned, as we might just have something up our sleeves to “see you all” again in a Wonder room soon.  In the meantime, please subscribe to our newsletter!