One of the things our Pack does to gain new recruits each year is have a table at our local elementary school’s Open House night. In talking online, I discovered that this is a real luxury as other Scout leaders around the country have said they aren’t allowed in their local schools. Here’s what we did for our Open House, and I apologize that I lack photos as we were so busy the entire night I forgot to get any of our table fully set up.

Visual Displays

Science fair boards are relatively easy and cost effective and provide excellent visuals for grabbing attention. My theme this year with our recruiting materials was “More than Just Badges,” so I selected photos from various activities we did throughout the year. I printed the photos through Snapfish.com and picked them up at a CVS near me, spending less than $3 for all of them (I ended up not using everything that I printed). Saved me on printer paper and ink. The photos selected were representative of the previous Scouting year activities, including a trip to Patriot’s Point in SC and a dolphin tour on Tybee Island as well as traditional Scouting activities of campouts, hikes. Since we are a family-friendly Pack that allows siblings to participate with their Cub brothers, I made sure to include photos of girls and younger siblings. (I even made a specific call out for “Family Camping” on the left side panel.)

On the left panel, I have the information on our STEM program (NOVA awards) as well as our special Eclipse STEM day we were offering at our Pack’s camp. On the right panel, I posted flyers about the first two campouts of the year: a Pack weekend on Jekyll and St. Simon’s Island, and a council program at the local camp.

In addition to the display, our Cubmaster brought a large shadow box filled with his son’s awards and patches (he crossed over this past spring) as well as some pinewood derby cars. We also used two chairs to rig our pack banner for a larger visual representation. (We’re working on plans to make a stand for it for next year’s open house.)

Handouts

We took our recruiting flyers to hand out as well. The boys were encouraged to give them to their classmates and friends as they passed by us.

Uniforms

As a PR professional, branding is huge for me. So for our booth, leaders and boys wore their official uniforms. I also had my son wear his red achievement vest so we could show some of the various awards and activities we did last year. It was a great conversation starter.

Engagement

If you want to engage people, you need to have engaging people at your booth. Although I had traumatic experiences as a child with public speaking, it became a necessity of my life when I started a non-profit 16 years ago. I am not afraid to invite people over to my table. I also recognize that I have to appear approachable, and one of the best ways to do that is to always be smiling. As I looked around of those with me at my table, leaders and boys included, I realized that is something we’ll need to work on between now and next year. Regardless, we had people at our booth all throughout the night (three hours) and gave out a lot of recruitment flyers. (As a side note: we reward our boys who attend Open House in uniform and stay at the booth with the Recruiter strip for their efforts.)