St Patrick’s came early to this Toronto office! I was hired to provide on-site Engraving during their office social hour event as the staff of a liquor distributing company celebrated St Patrick’s Day one month early. It’s never too early when it comes to festivities honouring the foremost patron saint of Ireland.
The office was situated in downtown Toronto with the most amazing views of the city. They had a full bar along with a bartender right at the entrance! Which I guess should be of no surprise, seeing that liquor is their expertise. The lounge was decorated with green sparkles and shamrocks and two 6ft inflatable Guinness glasses; Irish traditional music was playing in the background. But the event was all about ‘Splitting the G’, at least that was the most requested phrase to be engraved on Guinness Pint glasses that guests got to take home.
The social hour event was such a hit, it was 2 hours of non-stop engraving.
At first, I was a little unsure whether I would have the capacity to engrave everything in time. Unlike retail events where engraving is a service only offered to those who make a purchase, corporate events are a lot more fast paced and require more organization to ensure that everything is completed within the time given; so that guests are able to collect their keepsake by the end of the event.
With the estimation of engraving 40 glasses (the client predicted that 30-40 guests would show up for the event), I initially calculated that I would have 3 minutes to engrave each glass. As a seasoned event engraver, I am able to engrave very quickly, therefore 3 minutes is more than enough if it is for the engraving alone. However, on top of that, engraving on pint glasses where there is already a logo (Guinness), requires composition skills to ensure the engraving is aligned and centered as much as possible. With training, that too can be done efficiently in minimal time.
What would take the most time however and would be the most variable, is the time it would take to interact with guests. Time would need to be allocated to explain to each guest the service that was being offered and answer any questions they might have and then provide them with pen and paper to put down their request for engraving. From my experience, engaging with clients is what is the most time consuming and if it were to be included in the 3 minutes, time would be really tight (particularly if you have a guest that wants to chat!). At this point we had to consider whether we might need to hire another artist, however the estimated quantity (40 glasses in 2 hours) also was not so much to warrant hiring another artist. In the end, I requested that I would need someone to help me interact with the guests when it got busy and to take down names and requests, so that I could focus more on the engraving.
While it was expected that I would only need to engrave 30-40 glasses in the 2 hours, I ended up engraving 58 glasses! That’s an average of 2 minutes per glass, ranging from single names to long phrases. Having someone help with the logistics and take down the requests from guests was very necessary. Guests loved this keepsake so much that they made sure that their colleagues who didn’t make into the office that day didn’t miss out. Hence the reason why I ended up engraving so many more glasses!
This was an extremely successful event and the client was very pleased. However, it’s important to note that a lot needs to be considered when planning an event to ensure that everything goes smoothly. Make sure you ask the right questions and understand the scope before every event so that everything can be executed according to plan.
As I finished for the day, there was a final request to engrave a glass for the bartender who was also working non-stop. His request was my favourite one of the day ‘Irish Margarita’.
If you are looking to hire an event artist for your next activation in Toronto and the GTA, feel free to reach out to me at hello@mulberrytreeletters.com Feel free to also check out the type of services I offer on my website.
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