2005 Bulletin No. 3

With just over a month to go the World Vegan Day committee have been working tirelessly to ensure that as much preparation as possible has been completed before we hit the busy few weeks peaking with the much anticipated World Vegan Day. Thus explains the considerable gap between the last bulletin and this current one. Nevertheless there have been a lot of developments to fill you in on in this bumper edition. So without further ado.......

Sponsorship

We are pleased to announce that we have finalised all our sponsors. For the third year running Soulmama have agreed to be our major sponsor and this year they are also joined by Avant Card and Tofutti. For the first time we have 10 affiliate sponsors who are Earth Choice, Freedom Foods, Organic Formulations, Vegetarian Orgasm, Scarlette, Melrose, Enlightened Cuisine, Garden Organics, Pronto Bronto's and Vegetarian Nirvana Café.

The feedback we got from last year's surveys at WVD was that people wanted more stalls; well we have satisfied this demand by providing over 40 stalls. These include food products, clothing and footwear, cosmetics, cleaning, personal care and health products as well as information stalls which include food co-ops, not for profit organisations including animal welfare/rights and vegetarian/vegan groups. There will also be some vegetarian eateries that will be selling some of their fine food as well as offering some delectable free samples. You can also have a stubby or glass of wine while chilling out with some new friends or listening to the entertainment from two of our stalls that are providing alcohol. What a great chance to stock up your wine rack, without having to roam around liquor stalls all over Melbourne. We'd like to get some regional businesses involved so if you are from outside of metropolitan Melbourne and know some who may be interested please let us know.

Publicity

One of our major sponsors Avant Card has generously printed 3,000 posters and 10,000 postcards to promote World Vegan Day. Half of these have already been distributed all across metropolitan Melbourne and some parts of Victoria. Avant Card has distributed these at student unions, cafes, restaurants, theatres, libraries, cinemas etc. We will distribute the rest of the postcards and all the posters to vegetarian restaurants and businesses in Victoria. Keep an eye out for these and let us know where you have seen them.

This year we have placed greater emphasis on spreading the word about WVD through the media including newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations. We have made special efforts to reach out to the regional areas and are aiming for as much exposure as we can get throughout all of Victoria as well as interstate (including veg societies around Australia). All media releases to these areas have been completed. Melbourne Vegan is also giving good coverage leading up to the day.

On the advertising front we have placed ad's in publications such as Living Now, Vegan Voice, Heartwise, Options and Cheap Thrills. We also have small listings in some of the popular newspapers and magazines. Further to these our Event Manager Mark Doneddu has just completed an interview offering great scope of the event with Cheap Thrills which appears in their current edition. This satisfies another request we had from last year's surveys which was to advertise more. As you can see this shows the survey responses prove valuable to us in improving the event, and we do act on as many suggestions as we can.

Despite this great work we are doing promoting the event word of mouth is still a very effective way of getting the message out there, so don't forget to tell everyone you know about World Vegan Day. If you would like one of our posters to put up on your work or uni/school notice board please get in touch with us ASAP.

World Vegan Day T-Shirts

The great news is that we have recently printed 200 WVD T-Shirts which look great. They are a striking black with a large WVD logo on the front and our slogan and website address on the back. All of our volunteers will be sporting them and the good news is that for the first time we are also selling them to the public either through our website or on the day itself at our information stall, plus we will also be stocking them at our stall at the Cruelty Free Expo. The T-Shirts are also a good walking advertisement for the event. Our T-Shirts have been printed by Unbranded/No Sweat who is the only company who provide non sweat shop labour sneakers and now they have expanded into T-Shirts as well. You can check out their other stuff at their stall on the day.

On The Day

As the big day approaches closer we are getting a clearer picture of how it will all look and run as details are being finalised. Since it is such a popular event and many people make a whole day out of it we have extended the hours yet again and final times are now 10.00am to 5.00pm. We are looking at ways to accurately judge crowd numbers as there will be multiple entry points, if anyone has suggestions of the best way to do this please let us know.

Children's Activities Area

We are very lucky to have one of our vibrant volunteers, Tara, head up the Children's Activities Area; she will also be ably assisted by her sister Meghan and their friend Ben. Apart from her very friendly, enthusiastic and fantastic personality which will go down well with the kids, she is also a school teacher by trade so has the experience and expertise to deal with the little munchkins. She has many wonderful activities and games planned which will be up on the website shortly, so there will be loads to keep the kids amused. We would like to have a World Vegan Day 2005 mural displaying the creative drawing talents of the non-adult attendees. The popular sack race from last year will be repeated and a new innovation this year will be a children's yoga class. There will also be a face painter on hand (using vegan, not tested on animals face paint) and a couple of roaming people in animal suits. I must stress though that even though we are offering a dedicated children's area this year for the first time parents are still responsible for the supervision of their children, it is not to be used as a crèche. We are looking to enclose this area in some way for added safety and to give the kids a space of their own.

BBQ Area

This year we will be armed with both loads of yummy food items and drinks, much more personnel behind the counter plus two instead of one entry point to efficiently handle the hungry hordes making a beeline for the ever popular World Vegan Day BBQ. This year we have set prices which still offer very good value for money and there is a huge array of choice regarding the products including Frys burgers and sausages, Zoglos burgers, schnitzels and pastries, Papa Nutal burgers, Blue Lotus burgers and Potts will be supplying the bread and rolls. Organic fruit and vegetables will be supplied to us courtesy of Joe's Organics, Hampton St Organic Produce and Dynamic Vegies Organic Food Co-op. Money made from this area goes back into funding next year's event. We are looking at the possibility of having a chill out area close by, we'll let you know of developments on that front.

Raffle

A big bonus of WVD is the multiple raffle draws throughout the day, there are over 40 different prizes (including some organic produce) to win so your chances of taking one of them home is greatly increased compared to the usual raffle with only 3 prizes. Of course the more tickets you buy the more chances you have of winning. Check out the website to see exactly what prizes are on offer. There will be draws hourly on the day and everyone who buys 3 raffle tickets will get a free showbag filled with some goodies and vouchers as well as Peter's in demand additives card. We now have a very professional looking raffle barrel which we must thank the ever versatile Dermot for making especially for the event.

Website & Surveys

The website is constantly being updated as latest developments occur. Drop down menus have now been created. The website really is the best way to find out the most current information regarding the event so keep it on your favourites list www.worldveganday.org.au. As already mentioned you can check out the T-Shirt design and prices in the T-shirt section. You can also get a preview of all the wonderful raffle prizes in the raffle section. Since the last bulletin all the information and feedback we got from last years surveys are now up on the website and provide some interesting reading. Don't forget to fill out a survey this year so you can help us improve the event, your feedback really does work as we have taken on board many of the requests from last years surveys to better satisfy the event goers and increase their enjoyment and experience of WVD. Some of the suggestions we are fulfilling this year include more stalls in general, more clothing and footwear stalls, more food and more people, more publicity & advertising, more music & entertainment and incorporating children's activities. There will be several survey boxes placed around the venue, if you have trouble locating one see the information desk as there will definitely be one there.

Volunteers

We are glad to say that all our volunteer positions have been filled and we have succeeded in recruiting hard working, dedicated people as most of them have been happy to work more than the minimum 4 hour shift. So a big thank you to all of you especially those who are offering their services for the whole day. Your help is invaluable as is your commitment and enthusiasm to the day. It really means a lot to us. Some of the volunteers were sourced from last years WVD and many of the others were recruited from Vegans Unite and Vegetarian Network Victoria events. There will be a Volunteers Workshop one week before WVD, at Scarlette on Saturday 22nd October at 1pm. All volunteers will be advised of final details in the coming weeks.

Activities & Entertainment

With all the wonderful things we have organised for your amusement for the day there will be no such thing as anyone complaining of boredom. Ok you should already know about the free yoga class that will be happening before lunchtime, now to add to your enjoyment we also have a laughing club to get your 'feel good' hormones gushing through your body. There will be a cooking demonstration or maybe two, and now added to our music line-up are the musicians from the Australian School of Meditation who are back for their second year running and will open the day's events with their soothing melodies. Glen Stewart who not only will be performing on the day and providing sound assistance has also completed the song he has written especially for WVD titled "Nature's Playground", so don't miss hearing it live for the first time anywhere in the world on October 30th. A full schedule of the day's events should hopefully be available in either the next bulletin or on the website.

Not long to go now!

Belinda (with assistance from Mark) on behalf of the WVD 2005 Committee.