Holidays are a time that reinforces connections within families and communities. It’s a form of a ritual and, from a sociological point of view, rituals are the bonds that hold societies together. This presents a great opportunity for organizations to connect with their members in a meaningful way. There are many different holidays you can celebrate. We will break down different ideas you can use for creating more engagement during the holiday season.
Sociologist Diana Kendall found that, during the holidays, the media highlights charitable actions more than any other time of the year. Capitalize on everyone’s heightened sense of giving, by holding your own charity drives of different sorts.
There are a great number of food and toy drives around Christmas time but why not hold other ones on different holidays? For example, holding a Halloween costume donation drive in the month leading up to Halloween (or even the week after Halloween) is a great idea for many underprivileged kids; helping them get costumes, so that they can participate too.
Hosting an amazing event is an awesome way for your members to connect with your organization. Not only does it bring your community together for a day of fun, it also gives your organization members face time with the people you serve. Parks and recreation organizations are all about benefiting the well-being of the community around you but, without getting to know some of them on a personal level, it will be difficult to know how to do that exactly.
Have different types of events that cater to different age groups as well. For example, for Halloween, you can have a pumpkin-carving event meant for families, a costume ball for teens, costume contests for adults and a Halloween social for seniors. At Christmas time, many organizations find great success with tree lighting ceremonies. A few other events of note include craft workshops and caroling or choir, depending on your demographic. This ensures you can connect with all age groups in your community.
READ: How to Get Your Fitness Business Ready For the Holidays
Contests are a great way to incentivize your members to participate. Not only that, with social media’s prevalence these days, it’s an easy way for you to get some marketing boosts, while getting your community on board. Each holiday has a myriad of themes — best-designed egg for Easter, pumpkin carving contests for Halloween, best gingerbread house during Christmas time. These are some of the more popular ones but we challenge your team to come up with some more clever ideas! Don’t forget to combine these with your events, as well, to create even more excitement.
Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners are the most popular nights of the year for family dinner gatherings with a theme. Creating a cooking class can be a great way to teach younger cooks (or older novice cooks) how to create one of these dinners for their family. Sure, most of these are taught from generation to generation, but not all families are structured traditionally and not all families always have the time to do it at home. Food brings people together, so cooking classes can be thought of as a lesson in creating that community.
Looking to better connect with your members and community? See how Xplor Recreation can help you attract, connect and keep members.