Can Old Pasadena Handle Halloween? And Howl!

Yes, this year Old Pasadena is not just out to celebrate Halloween, but to make this year’s Halloween celebration the best ever. For kids of course, that’s a simple task indeed. It’s one of the highest of the high holy days in kid-dom: The day of candyCandyCANDYCANDY CANDY! But for parents, especially in this economy, it can be a bit of a trial. Especially this year when Halloween falls on a weekend. How do you handle keeping the kids entertained, for two days, on a budget? That’s where Old Pasadena comes in. First create an event that makes both days really special, then let everyone know about it – with an advertising budget that is tiny at best.

Old Pasadena Home Page featuring the Halloween Celebration

First, and most important, to make any event work you have to make it special.

Kershona Mayo, our Director of Event Marketing & Production, worked hard to organize a district wide, Halloween celebration filled with treats on both Saturday and Sunday. And it’s Free! The focus is on fun and safe, with the emphasis on fun, encompassing activities throughout Old Pasadena.

On Saturday, October 30, Old Pasadena takes over Central Park, 260 S. Raymond Avenue. There’ll be Free caramel apples for the first 200 people to arrive, then a pumpkin hunt (little pumpkins filled with candy) from 1:00-2:00 pm, and from 1:00-5:00– There’s a Halloween moon bounce accompanied by live “ghoulish” music. At the Armory Center for the Arts, just a few blocks north, they’re holding a Halloween crafts center from 1:00-5:00 pm complete with a scary animal-and-bug show and tell.

The Old Town Haunt joins in the fun with a little kid-friendly tour.

On Sunday, October 31, Old Pasadena partners with One Colorado for free store-to-store trick-or-treating along with a special Meet-and-Greet with favorite Halloween characters from 4:00-9:00 pm.  There will be free haunted photos of the kids and free screenings of Halloween cartoons in the Courtyard from 5:00-9:00. And to make even the littlest kids feel big, there will be a special youngster-friendly tour of the popular Old Town Haunt, with all the lights on and no scary screaming from12:00-4:00pm.
Pretty impressive, huh? But now that the event is in place, how do you promote it?

First of all, it’s newsworthy. So Kershona, even with limited print and absolutely no broadcast budget whatsoever, can generate millions of dollars in free airtime on TV and radio. She also fully exploits an array of social network sites from Twitter and Facebook to Yelp to generate buzz. Partnerships with our local Pasadena City College radio station KPCC, an NPR affiliate, further magnify the reach to parents.

Every participating merchant received a poster and matching postcards to hand out to customers.

Add to that select local newspaper advertising, posters all over town and free postcards for our merchants to hand out, and you have a powerful campaign indeed. Reinforcing that effort is the OPMD website. Janet Schwartz, OMPD’s Director of PR & Destination Marketing, has put not only the Old Pasadena website to work, she follows up with regular email blasts to merchants, visitors and friends of Old Pasadena. Last year, the Halloween celebration marketing effort resulted in an additional 2000 page views in the days leading up to the event.

So that’s the secret. A great event. Enthusiastic social marketing promotion. Partnerships with merchants and media outlets. And an audience of parents hungry for fun, free and safe entertainment, and of course, kids just hungry for candyCandyCANDYCANDY CANDY!

Happy Halloween everyone.