Attendees Have “A Night To Remember” Via Titanic Theme

Latching on to an already popular trend may be considered jumping on the band-wagon. But piggybacking – if it’s done right – can also pay off big, especially if it involves promotional products.

Example: At least once a year, the senior class of the Los Angeles Culinary Institute (LACI) hosts a special dinner open to the public. To help defray costs, it solicits corporate sponsors and sometimes offers gifts as incentives to attend. The dinners usually have a theme, and for 1998 LACI chose Titanic, then at the height of its considerable hype. Inspired by the top-grossing film of the same name, the meal was an exact re-creation of the dinner served in the Titanic’s Ritz dining room on the night it struck an iceberg and became the stuff of legend. To line up attendees for the $150-a-plate event, LACI received help from one of its sponsors, ANPC, a division of a firm whose products include phone cards. “The concept was to offer people something they could immediately use, and which would be available in very limited quantities. But it had to tie into the event,” explains Richard Nelson, ANPC president.

As each of the 150 guests arrived, they were handed a “boarding pass,” an 8-inch die-cut phonecard shaped and colored like the Titanic. The 12-minute card, which was limited to 2,500 copies, was attached to a larger card resembling the White Star Line posters of the era that listed interesting facts about the ship. It also bore a set of numbers. During dinner, other Titanic phone cards were given as prizes to those whose numbers were drawn at random. One was a larger 20-minute card featuring another limited-edition Titanic poster. A second set of prizes – 10-minute phone coins picturing the ship and produced in a limited edition of 1,912, the year the ship sank – were rechargeable. These could be carried as long as people preferred. There were 10 coins in nickel silver, five in pure silver and one in .999 fine gold.

“Not only was the LACI extremely pleased with the turnout and everyone’s reaction to the gifts, but the items turned out to be some of the most popular phone cards ever issued anywhere,” Nelson reports.