Marketing Work

After viewing the film, the team immediately came up with various ways to promote it throughout the greater Orlando area. We decided to pass out flyers at the various culinary institutes, such as The Orlando Culinary Institute and Valencia Community College West Campus, since the film involves culinary art competitions as well as culinary art education. The team also thought it would be key to promote the film at various upscale and middle-class restaurants throughout the Winter Park Area. These restaurants included P.F. Chang’s, Brio, Beluga, Crispers, Johnny Rockets and so on. We felt that reaching out towards the patrons of several restaurants who are interested in gourmet foods would share an interest in culinary competitions as well as culinary arts in general.

As our promotional plans progressed, we came up with the idea of dressing up as chefs and attending the Opening Night Ceremony/Screening at the Florida Film Festival, where there would be press as well as many potential filmgoers, as well as passing out flyers dressed up as chefs around the Winter Park Village area. Since press was attending the event, as well as many headliners, such as the several filmmakers and celebrity chefs, it would be perfect to get media attention and help create a buzz, spreading the positive word of the film to a greater audience.

Each team member had a specific task in order to properly promote the film.

Juan Sanchez: Contact various culinary institutions and restaurants; look up prices for chef outfits.

Jared Smith: Liaison with filmmaker, communicate with Enzian about arrival of promotional materials, contact Valencia Community College East Campus.

Michael Lighston: Designed flyers, look up various prices for flyers.

The entire team shared many responsibilities, which include: creating a Gmail account for our feature, printing and passing out flyers at various locations, purchasing the chef uniforms, design a marketing plan, writing a pitch and press release, attend the Opening Night and Kat Cora event to pass out flyers.

Each team member accomplished their specific tasks. The teamwork was also a success. Everyone chipped in and did their part, never leaving other team members with an additional workload.

As with every endeavor, there was some success as well as many failures.

Success: The Opening Night Ceremony and Kat Cora event, in which the group dressed up as chefs and passed out flyers, was an incredible success. The group received many positive responses, even acquiring contact info from filmmakers as well as catering businesses that confused us for actual chefs. Passing out flyers around the Winter Park area, dressed as chefs, also proved to be a success. We reached most of the restaurants we wanted to contact and they were quite friendly and willing to assist promoting the feature.

Failures: Contacting Bryan Stamp, the filmmaker representing our feature, did not flow as smooth as it could have. Emails went unanswered for a week and a package which included our promotional materials did not arrive until the opening day at the Festival, with limited supplies for us (only about ten flyers). Communication and promotion at the Valencia Community College campuses did not work as planed either. At the Valencia West Campus they did not allow us to pass out flyers, due to the fact that the flyers did not state an affiliation with Valencia Community College. Luckily, after franticly pacing the campus for an answer, Juan talked to a culinary professor and he agreed to pass out flyers for his specific class. Also, due to the fact that our promotional materials arrived late, we were unable to promote the film in timelier manner.

While not necessarily a failure, the fact that we were not able to get a hold of Kat Cora or other celebrity chefs at the Opening night event for photo-op was most disappointing. Local media was also in attendance and we were unable to create a situation in which we could get some on air time.

If given the opportunity again, we would have been more aggressive towards attracting the media. An opportunity to get a photo-op with Kat Cora could have garnered some substantial local media attention, which of course would have not only helped promote our particular film, but the Florida Film Festival in general. We would have also attempted to reach out to the high school student demographic, considering the film is about high school students struggling to achieve greatness in their future.