The Oklahoma Garden Festival is one of the premier annual Oklahoma City events. The downtown Oklahoma City event not only included the landscaping show which consisted of custom landscaping and floral exhibits by the city's premiere landscape design firms, but also included three days of hands-on workshops, and horticultural lectures by national landscaping experts.

However, the Oklahoma Garden Festival is not without its problems. The event is sandwiched between the Oklahoma City Home Show and the Oklahoma City Home & Garden Show, both of which also feature spring landscaping as a focus. Both of the other home shows are held at the Oklahoma City fairgrounds and utilize several large exhibit buildings to house the shows which include free parking. While the Oklahoma Garden Festival is a true downtown event occupying the Cox Convention Center facility. The show is differentiated from the other home shows by its vertical focus on high-end landscaping, its lectures,workshops, and premium downtown location which requires parking fees.

When Beals Cunningham was brought in the show was struggling. It had a small budget and was getting lost among the shows. After reviewing what had been done in previous years, Beals Cunningham worked to restructure the sponsorship agreements with television and radio stations. The agency then designed a new website, and planned and implemented an advance public relations program to build advance interest in the show.

Posters, brochures, and other point-of-sale materials were also produced and placed throughout the city to promote the show. For advertising, the majority of media space consisted of the restructured media sponsorships with a few select spot buys, and the agency produced new television spots instead of relying on a sponsoring television station to provide a spot. Live on-air newscast, promotions, and remotes were arranged to drive interest and urgency once the show started.

The first year Beals Cunningham was involved with the Oklahoma Garden Festival the show had three times its previous attendance, even though the city had a severe ice storm just before the show started.

©2008 Beals Cunningham Strategic Services

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