OC Blogger Bash: A Swell Time Indeed!

What do you get when you mix a "Mad Men" theme, 150 of SoCal's top bloggers and the Anaheim Orange County Visitor & Convention Bureau? A kickin' party, that's what! This past Sunday, October 9, AOCVCB hosted the first ever OC Blogger Bash at the Anaheim Convention Center as our "coming out party" in the blog community. We wanted to get to know bloggers, the "new" journalists and have them get to know us and the fabulous destination we promote.

The inspiration for the theme came from our big August milestone as our organization celebrated 50 years of promoting Anaheim and Orange County as a leisure and business destination. What better way to welcome the new than to celebrate the old? There was a mock drive-in complete with two retro cars, an old movie theater "lobby" complete with popcorn and malts, a live band playing 60s hits and even the food- mini beef wellington, shrimp cocktail, baked Alaska and deviled quail eggs- was reminiscent of simpler times. The Photo Booth Pro provided some fun photography for the evening- each shot was at a different iconic OC location. One of the biggest hits of the evening was the retro fashion (in which the models came down escalators!) show featuring vintage-inspired clothing from Queen of Heartz.

Though the fashion show was amazing, there's no doubt that the main feature of the evening were the prizes we were giving out- 52 to be exact! Destination prizes like a dream flight with Sunset Flying over OC, a chef's apprentice experience at Hilton Anaheim, spa treatments and a night stay at Hyatt Regency Huntinton Beach Resort & Spa, four tickets to a 2012 Angels game & a Jered Weaver signed ball and MUCH more. Over ten of the prizes were given away on Twitter, which undoubtedly helped us achieve the over 4 million Twitter impressions from the evening!

Everyone's favorite pup, Snoopy, was there to gift EACH BLOGGER with two tickets to Knott's Berry Farm! In addition, 25 lucky guests took home two park hopper tickets to Disneyland Resort and 4 lucky guests got a Disneyland vacation with a night at the Disneyland hotel, two park hoppers and a character breakfast.

Our friends MomsLA were a huge asset to us in helping to promote the event in the blog community. They wrote some awesome posts on the OC Blogger Bash site- check 'em out for some fun early '60s trivia including historical events, music, film and more! 

The night was a huge success and we got to meet lots of new friends and share our amazing desination. We look forward to being a bigger part of the blog community here in SoCal and helping our blogger friends to get the resources they're looking for. Thanks for coming, hope you had a blast- we sure did!