Attend our virtual cash mob, music bingo events to connect & support local businesses
May 12, 2020
Small biz owners: Apply to participate by FRIDAY, MAY 15
Looking for an easy way to #ShopLocal & #SupportLocal? Attend the Launch Dayton community’s virtual Thirsty Thursday Cash Mob on Thursday, May 28!
Launch Dayton is a community of regional entrepreneurial support organizations that exists to support all Daytonians building businesses. The Thirsty Thursday Cash Mob event will feature more than a dozen small, local businesses with products or services available online.
Continuing the local biz support, the Thirsty Thursday Cash Mob will be immediately followed by a virtual Music Bingo event in collaboration with Liftoff Entertainment, Sportcial and several area young professional orgs — all the prizes will be purchased from area small businesses.
“Our goal is to directly connect our small businesses to paying customers,” said John Owen, Wright State Applied Research Corporation program manager.
In a traditional cash mob, a group of people visit a designated store on a specified date & time, committing to spend a minimum dollar amount in the store. For the virtual Thirsty Thursday Cash Mob, business owners will give short pitches about their companies via Zoom between 4 & 5p on Thursday, May 28; virtual attendees are asked to commit to purchase at least one item from one of the featured businesses’ e-commerce websites during the event.
Applications are open for small businesses who want to participate in the Thirsty Thursday Cash Mob event. Participating businesses are required to:
• be physically located in the greater Dayton region;
• be 3 years old or less;
• have at least one product/service/gift card that costs $25 or less.
The application is open until FRIDAY, MAY 15 at https://bit.ly/DaytonCashMobApp. Participating businesses will be announced the following week.
“It’s been a challenging few months for many of downtown’s small businesses,” Downtown Dayton Partnership Economic Development Project Manager AJ Ferguson said. “This is a fun way for them, especially the new businesses, to share their stories and find a few new customers.”
To apply, founders must provide a company logo, founder headshot and a slide that includes social media handles and e-commerce websites. Launch Dayton partners will use these materials to promote all qualifying businesses across the Launch Dayton social media platforms, even if there isn’t time for all applying businesses to pitch on May 28. If the event is a success, partners will look at repeating the event in the future to support additional businesses.
The Launch Dayton partners collaborating to produce this virtual cash mob event include Wright State Applied Research Corporation, Downtown Dayton Partnership, The Entrepreneurs Center, the Miami Valley Small Business Development Center & The Entrepreneurs Marketplace.
Immediately following the virtual Thirsty Thursday Cash Mob, Launch Dayton partners are joining forces with area young professional organizations including Generation Dayton, the South Dayton Young Professionals, the Springboro Young Professionals, the Dayton Young Black Professionals & Sportcial to host a virtual Music Bingo event produced by Liftoff Entertainment. Attendees will have a chance to network with young professionals across the region & win prizes purchased from local, small businesses.
There are two tickets available for the Music Bingo event:
• Attendees can snag a free ticket (the Launch Dayton partnership believes everyone, regardless of their background, should have the opportunity to determine their own economic prosperity, and one way the partners act out this mission is to keep programming free whenever possible) or
• Attendees can snag a $10 ticket if they want to contribute $10 to the pool of prize money that will be spent with area businesses.
The Thirsty Thursday Cash Mob will run from 4-5p on Thursday, May 28. Music Bingo will kick off immediately after at 5p.
