If you’re planning to use Patchwork to organise a party, check out our top tips before you get started:
Keep it simple
The secret to getting people to help with a party is to be clear about the plan, set out a range of specific ways they can help and then allow them to decide what they’d like to do.
Whilst people don’t respond well to vague pleas for help, they also don’t like to be assigned tasks that may not suit their skills, available time or interest. So clarity and choice is key.
Start out by clearly setting out the plan for the party, who it’s for and why. It helps if you can summarise all of this in your patchwork title e.g. ‘Ben’s surprise 30th party’, ‘Kate’s hen do in Copenhagen’, ‘Elise’s baby shower’. Then use the patchwork description to explain exactly what it is you want people to do i.e:
‘To celebrate [insert name] [insert occasion] we want to organise the best party ever. And we’re hoping you can all help. Please click around the patchwork below and show your love for [insert name] by choosing something to fund, make or do. Love and thanks, [your name].’
Make it personal
Don’t be afraid to make your patchwork personal. Use your images and words to share more about what is it you want and who it’s for. If you’re organising a party for a friend, remind everyone how much they love him with pictures of him and an anecdote or two.
This doesn’t have to mean creating a patchwork from scratch. You can customise one of our readymade party patchworks, then simply tweak a few words to personalise it and add or delete patches to suit your needs.
You can also add a banner image and a profile photo. So there are lots of opportunities for your friends to see the giftee’s happy face, remember how much they love them, and then give generously!
Give options to fund, make or do
While some people will be cash rich and time poor, others will be the opposite. One friend might have a couple of hours to bake a cake but not much money to buy a gift. Another might want to flex their creative skills to show their love. And someone else might just prefer to pay towards a barrel of beer. There are times in our lives when we are more interested and able to contribute cash, time or skills to help make a party happen – so make sure all the options are available.
Whether you want to customise one of our readymade party patchworks or create your own from scratch you’ll see that you have the ability to assign an action to each patch. Automatically set to ‘Fund’, you can set a patch to ask people to ‘Make’ or ‘Do’.
Asking people upfront to fund a wedding party or baby shower might feel a bit uncomfortable. So including make and do options in a patchwork removes any awkwardness around the money side of things. While most people will opt for the ease of giving money, they will be grateful for having been given the choice.
Be specific about quantities
If you need 10 cakes made for the dessert table, add an image of a cake to a patch, set it to ‘Make’ and then set your quantity to 10. Then one person can choose to bake ten or 10 people can choose to bake one. Either way, once you’ve got 10 cakes being made this patch will say ‘Sold out’ for future contributors.
In your account you’ll then be able to see the person(s) who has pledged to bake your cakes so you can send individual or group messages to all bakers to discuss the details.
This same principle applies to the 2 people you need to help with decorations, the 5 hours of DJ-ing required, the 15 dishes you need making, the 5 embarrassing hen do games that need organising or the 1 new-baby playlist that needs putting together.
Use your patchwork as an invite
You can add an event date in your patchwork and include venue address, contact email and any other event details. This means your page can act as an invite/event page as well as a DIY party planning tool. Handy, not just to keep all the party info in one place, but because people visiting your page to find out the plan will be inspired to help while they are there.
Gift your party patchwork
If you’re organising a party for a friend, you can ‘Gift’ them their patchwork once the party’s over so that they can read everyone’s messages and send thanks when they’re ready.
All you need to do is ‘Gift’ the patchwork from your account by adding their email address and a message, then they’ll be sent a unique login and instructions to see their gift page. A gifted Patchwork page will show your title, description and all the patch images and descriptions – which you can edit if you like. But it wont show prices or give the option to fund anymore, as this page is presented to the person receiving the gift. This person will be able to see all the messages from friends at the bottom of the patchwork (along with their happy faces if they choose to upload photos too). And then they can click to ‘Send thanks’ when they are ready.
Ready to start your patchwork? Browse our customisable party templates here.