At a meeting a few weeks ago, the fact that Edinburgh was due to host the first annual Scottish Tattoo Convention at the end of March was brought up, and given that the members of the Edinburgh Greenpeace group have more than a few tattoos between us, we thought we should get in touch with the organisers on the off-chance that they might be willing to have a Greenpeace stall there. On getting home, I typed up a short email asking if we could go along and have a stall there for the weekend.
To a small amount of surprise, they emailed back the very next day saying they would love to have us there and could provide us with a table for both days. Not only did they do that, but the organisers also gave us a special mention in the convention programme without us even asking!
It was a fantastic weekend. We got over fifty Go Beyond Oil cards signed, had nineteen people ask to be kept up to date with the campaign, raised over £45 for Greenpeace and even managed to get two potential new members for the group, whilst having a lot of fun being there ourselves.
Our main aim in going along to this event, however, was first and foremost to speak to people who we probably otherwise wouldn’t meet at a Greenpeace stall, by going to an event which would attract an audience that was outside of the tradition ‘green’ audience we would meet at environment fairs or green festivals.
Whilst these more traditional Greenpeace events are of course useful and a good thing to go along to and support, there is always a concern that we may end up just talking to ourselves in that the people who we meet there will generally be already in tune with green ideas, and are probably already doing a lot of things we may be asking of people, such as writing to their MP about environmental concerns. If we don’t leave our comfort zones every now and again, there is a chance we will end up just speaking to the same people time and again.
These reasons are part of the reason why it is important to get out and about and make sure we engage with members of the public outside of our comfort zone. At a time when global issues such as climate change, nuclear issues and overfishing are at the front line of our campaigning, we need to get everyone we can on board to make a difference.
People meet in all kinds of places for all kinds of events, from music events to beer festivals. Within each Greenpeace group, there is bound to be a whole range of interests among the members which can be used as a starting point for finding places to hold a stall outside of the normal comfort zone. More importantly, going out to these events can be a lot of fun.
At the Scottish Tattoo Convention, we found ourselves really enjoying the weekend as we did face painting for small children and big burly men alike, encouraged people to take time to colour in the rainbows on the Go Beyond Oil cards and engaged in all kinds of conversations with people who were there, many of whom had never seen a Greenpeace stall before.
Overall, it was a fantastic weekend to come out of just a quick email to the organisers of an event which we weren’t sure would even want us there, but who turned out to be really excited about the whole thing. If we can, we’ll definitely be back again next year, hopefully getting in plenty of other unusual events along the way as we go.
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