In a market where retail sales are down, where people are not using their cars as much or driving as far Cabela’s knew it needed a major draw to insure that everyone in the New England States would know about and come to its May 15 – 18, 2008 grand opening in Scarborough , Maine . They wanted to draw crowds from a 100 mile radius, especially from the Boston area and its suberbs. They contacted Lerner Sports Marketing, one of the Nations leaders in arranging athlete appearances for grand openings and corporate events. We, at Lerner Sports Marketing knew that there were only 2 or 3 athletes in the New England area, whose appearance at the grand opening could accomplish that feat. We chose the greatest living former Boston Red Sox player, Carl Yastryzemski. Convincing Carl to appear at this event was no easy task. Carl only does one or two appearances a year. We were successful in convincing Carl to make Cabela’s that appearance for 2008.

Lerner Sports Marketing will help you select a highly recognizable sports celebrity for your grand opening. We can supply you with photos and balls for your sports guest to sign at your grand opening. Your customers can also have their photographs taken with the sports celebrity. We can even have a sports trivia contest or hold a free raffle. Prizes can include tickets to local sporting events, autographed balls and other sports memorabilia. Lerner Sports Marketing can help your company plan this promotion to make it memorable for your customers. THAT CAN MEAN REPEAT BUSINESS. Don’t delay, Call us today.

A grand opening is when a business, public office or private association wishes to announce their official opening of their store or business location. On this, the first day of doing busines at this location the grand opening is more of a celebration event, not just the first day having the doors open for clients. Often there will be a promotion to the community telling them that there will be a grand opening of this business. The purpose of this grand opening is to let the community know that there is an intent to serve them and a special event promotion to draw them to this location to see what is going to be available for them. This is often achieved with a party type atmosphere such as: food, music, prizes, balloons, give always, and festive signs. To make this grand opening something spectacular many companies will have a famous sports celebrity attend this grand opening. People look up to athletes and are very excited about the possibility of meeting one. Thus the appearance of one at a grand opening can bring large crowds of people to that grand opening.

Often an organization will not have a Grand Opening promotion the very first day they open their doors. Rather they will open their doors a few weeks in advance to have a chance to get the kinks out of their operation before the grand opening. This is sometimes called a "soft opening". This means to open the doors with out a lot of attention. This allows the store to become more organized the first few weeks or months they are open. In this way the management and staff have a chance to become familiar with the daily operations of their business and customer service requirements. Once the organization gets the kinks worked out and is ready to receive larger amounts of clients, they will then sponsor a Grand Opening event. Some will use hanging banners, colorful posters, bright signs, post card mailings, newspaper articles or radio and television ads to attract as much attention as possible to this celebration. Still others go a bit further and have a ribbon cutting ceremony, where an over sized pair of scissors is used to cut an over sized ribbon to "officially" open their doors. No matter how the organization chooses to announce their Grand Opening, it should be viewed as a promotional way to state that they are completely ready to serve their clients needs in a proficient and professional manor.