The Zone

Mister Mike

The Connected Circus

Blues and Roots Music Festival

R & J DJ and Entertainment

Bendigo Party Hire

Bendigo Hire

Animals Arts & Activities Entertainment

Sweets & Treats Ice Cream Co

Taco Man

Each Spring and Summer, the Bendigo Homemaker Center host a free, fun community day featuring plenty of hands-on activities for all ages.  

The most recent was held on Saturday October 8, featuring a special showcase of up and coming young Blues and Roots musicians.

The details

With almost 20 individual contractors, 15 retail stores and a massive car park to negotiate traffic management, this event requires next level logistics to coordinate a vibrant, attractive and most importantly safe event.

Goals of the event are to grow awareness of the centre via a fun, family day out, support sales and brand growth for the retailers and attract new shoppers.

Strategic considerations applied to the event include:

• Maximise road side appeal to attract passing traffic, without dispersing activities too far away within the large space
• Car park management to ensure the safest, closest parking configurations that ensure customers have easy access to stores
• Traffic flow placement for safety
• A strict bump in and out plan to ensure safe and timely contractor preparations that doesn’t prevent shopping.
• Hands on, interactive experiences for all ages
• Ensure an attractive and accessible food offering that supports existing stores, rather than impede it with temporary providers.

Working to the client’s specific budget and brief, and with the freedom to develop the event inclusions as we felt most appropriate,  we delivered a mix of chilled music vibes for adults, high energy slides, rock-climbing and water challenges for the bigger kids, face-painting, an animal zoo, craft and magic activities for the little ones.

A taco van and specialty ice-cream provider added to the local Cafe’s food offering, with plenty of seating, shade and giant games to enjoy.

Unpredictable weather in the lead up added some nerves, but thankfully ended with a sunny day.

Availability of contractors in a post-covid event world is challenging as many are pre-booked for dates that were originally postponed. Particularly challenging when working with a ‘local-first’ focus, thankfully we were able to secure most of our favourites.