Bike night at Arizona Joe's

Tonight was our weekly Bike Night at Arizona Joe's affectionately know as AJ's to the locals. We have been holding this Bike Night every Thursday night for the last 3+ years. It takes place in the covered patio of AJ's. Believe it or not, this Bike Night has been held all summer long, even through the hottest days. Granted, many people don't show up, but hey, the tradition continues.

Tonight, in order to make people laugh, Steve put on a pair of men's boxer shorts that were to be raffled off and stuck a paper towel roll in the shorts. He then walked around the patio with the ticket bucket hanging from the paper towel roll in the shorts. He had people laughing so hard they were crying. We had a lot of happy people tonight because we were being silly and trying to help people leave the reality of they day behind for an hour or two.

Our Bike Nights have been quite successful over the years, but we believe we need to change the pattern a bit. I believe shaking up things will be for the better. I noticed that we continue to get our regulars, but it would be nice to have something different to draw more people and to woo back some of the people that have grown bored with the status quo. Starting next week we are going to have our first Wet T-Shirt contest.

I have no idea who will be attending and who will be participating in the contest, but it definitely will cause a stir amongst the attendees at Bike Night. Until now, our bike nights consisted of raffles, bike shows and sing-alongs, which is not bad at all. It is time to jazz things up and make people start to laugh. This economy has been so hard on everyone, it is important to give people a little break from reality and have fun for a bit. I am not even going to discuss the average age of our attendees, I will be wrong no matter how you slice it, so it will be extremely interesting to see who will be willing to participate in the upcoming Wet T-shirt contest. I have already received requests from guys to be included, so that should be interesting. I know the first few times are going to be challenging, but hey, it will cause people to laugh...and trust me, it will be fun no matter what.

The week after the Wet T-Shirt contest will be our People's choice bike show. In this anyone can enter their motorcycle or trike, there are no classes and the attendees of bike night will get one ticket to vote for their favorite bike. The following weeks will include a Hot Buns contest, a motorcycle detailing clinic, a sing along with Greywolf, and a motorcycle trivia game. We have more ideas in the works, but this is what we are willing to disclose for now. If anyone out there has some ideas, I would love to find out what else we can do to spice up the bike nights.

If you are wondering why we hold this bike night, it is another form of marketing to your target audience. Every Thursday we always have a product table out, and are always willing to talk to people about our product offerings. What we have started doing with much success is changing what we put on our product table each week. We will not show the same product each week, so that way, each week we get to showcase different products. This keeps your table from getting boring. If the stores change their window displays frequently, we should change our table displays often.

This is a soft form of marketing, you always have product out for people to look at, you answer questions, listen a lot, and just remain available for people. You then become a trusted information source for the attendees of the bike nights and people start looking forward to seeing you and what you will bring each week. This can also generate word of mouth advertising. Once people start expecting you and your products, and using your products, they will tell their friends who will attend the next bike night, and the ball gets rolling.

Bike nights do not need to be expensive affairs, the cost of advertising doesn't have to be more than printing and placing flyers around the local community. There is a huge return on investment on that small expenditure for printed materials and raffle prizes. This type of advertising pays dividends down the road. You have fun, the attendees have fun, and you are remembered as being fun and not just another salesperson with a business you are trying to promote.

Again, please forward any additional Bike Night ideas to hawgwash1@yahoo.com. Thanks so much for continuing to read our blog.

Until tomorrow...