We know we are only just in September but I’m sure many of you (like us) are already deep in Christmas planning.
What Hello Dorking is doing : –
Christmas Guide
We will be producing a printed Christmas Guide that will get distributed door-to-door, positioned in local businesses and venues, and handed out at our Christmas events. This will include a gift guide, details of events taking place in town over the Christmas period and other useful info. Please let rosie@hellodorking.com know what you have going on or if you’re unsure what you might be able to include we’re happy to help advise.
Christmas Festival – Sunday 30th November 11am – 5pm
This event will have a Circus theme and will contain our usual festive mix of live music, street performers, fun fair, market stalls, Santa’s Grotto etc and will have the same road closure as last year from Lyons Court up to Pump Corner, West Street and part closure of South Street.
A few ideas to help you get the most from it : –
This year we are planning to host more activities within businesses to help drive footfall to you. We already have businesses hosting a face painter and Santa’s Grotto but we are looking for more businesses to host additional face painters and some Circus themed games. Contact rosie@hellodorking com if you would be interested in this.
The businesses that get the best results from big town centre events typically do one or a combination of the following : –
1) They treat it as a marketing and engagement opportunity and have flyers, offers or information to hand out that encourages people to return to their business.
2) They come outside their business to join in and engage with the public. Some businesses have run competitions, offered tasters/samples, dressed up etc and this has all led to business beyond the event. If being outside your business is not possible feel free to give us some flyers etc to put in our goodie bags.
3) They have signage enticing people in, e.g. posters in the window or specific info on their a-frame.
3) They tell us what they are doing well in advance so we can help publicise it.
If you’d like to discuss ways you can get involved and how to maximise your involvement please just let us know.
Saturday 6th December – Small Business Saturday
To encourage people to return to the town after the Festival and continue their Christmas Shopping we will be having some entertainment and community carol singing in town, and we hope to spread this around the town to include areas that we can’t at the festival.
Please let us know if you would be happy for a cheeky elf to pop into your shop and we can include you in our plans.
Christmas Trail
In conjunction with Dorking Men’s Shed we will be running a town wide Christmas trail. We are looking for 40 businesses to either have a mini sleigh or gingerbread man in their window. You must be able to commit to having them in your window from late November until the new year. If you are interested in taking part email rosie@hellodorking.com.
If you have any other ideas or questions about Christmas in Dorking please do let us know. We want to make this a fabulous Christmas for the whole town and by working together we can really make Dorking shine!
