Chapter Spotlight – Theta Theta (St. Joseph’s)

This week’s chapter spotlight is Theta Theta (St. Joseph’s) whose Red Dress Chairman introduced games to take the planning, and the event itself, to the next level. Chandler Lutz shares her secrets to success with us.

Event Name: Red Dress Gala
Location: Hyatt at the Bellevue Hotel, City Center, PA

How many times have you held this event?
9

Who attended the event?
Friends and family of our sisters, the St. Joseph’s community and local supporters.

How long did it take to plan the event?
9 months

Briefly describe the event.
We hosted a beautiful night in the Grand Ballroom of the Hyatt at the Bellevue Hotel. The evening consisted of a cocktail hour with hors d’oeuvres, a basket auction with 35 baskets, 50 silent auction items, a 3-course gourmet meal and dancing.

How did your chapter publicize the event?
We publicized on campus. I created a Donation Game for our members that helped spread the word to our community and the Greater Philadelphia Area. We also used Paperless Post to send electronic invitations.

Tell us more about the Donation Game.
I created this in order to get our community involved and to raise more money. I broke up our chapter into groups and sent them to different areas around Philadelphia and the Maine Line where they could go and ask for donations from local stores and business owners. In the end we raised $2,000 in merchandise and gift cards that we divided up into our silent and basket auctions.

Did you incorporate any other games into the evening?
Yes! I also created the Purse Game after a friend of mine who is a purse designer donated more than 20 evening bags to the gala. I stuffed all of the purses with prizes and sold tickets to our guests. The guests would buy the tickets (1 for $5 or 5 for $15) and place their tickets in purses. We drew one winning ticket from each purse and announced the winners before we started off the night.

What was your favorite part of the event?
For me, having made this event my life for the past year, being able to get up on stage as our emcee and speak to everyone about the importance of our chapter and Alpha Phi Foundation made all of the long nights and planning worth it. The room was beautiful and it was truly a spectacular night.