Zoom Burnout - distant celebration edition
June 1, 2020 2:53 PM   Subscribe

I am launching a big project soon, and would like to make it feel like An Event for the rather large team of people who have worked for two years to get this project done. I'm planning to have a project-related poster printed up and delivered to peoples' homes before the launch, but would love ideas for how to make this event feel special when everyone is completely done with Zoom.

Are there other little things I can send? I'd love to make it feel as much like a tv show premiere/wrap party as possible, while maintaining social distance and safety. I do not want to ask people to gather anywhere.

Help me think outside of the box!
posted by lizifer to Society & Culture (7 answers total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
My office recently sent everyone cocktail ingredients from a place called Cocktail Courier. Cupcakes might also be nice.
posted by pinochiette at 3:34 PM on June 1, 2020 [1 favorite]


My company "catered" an event by sending everyone a $50 credit for DoorDash.

I enjoy watch parties as a way to socialize without having to be on camera, or even necessarily engage with people.

The most inclusive way to do this would be a twitch stream. Have a video message, then host a DJ for a couple hours. Depending on how much time and dedication you have to put into it, you could also make it possible for people to "call in" to the twitch stream, as voice or video, and give toasts/shout outs. (I have not done any of these things myself, but I've seen them happen)
posted by itesser at 4:48 PM on June 1, 2020 [1 favorite]


I "went" to a Zoom event recently which sucked and I was thinking how it would have been so easy to make it feel festive by sending SOMETHING to folks' homes. Even if it would have been a little box of chocolates. If you have the budget, cocktail ingredients or an elegant food gift would go a long way to making it feel like more than just "great, another chance to stare at the screen."
posted by fingersandtoes at 5:21 PM on June 1, 2020


I participated in a fundraiser recently where the organizers sent an elaborate party box with gifts and food and then had an Instagram Live event where we all opened our boxes and a team of folks put on a fun presentation on IG Live. If you wanted to comment on the feed, you could, and if you just wanted to watch and open your box along with the hosts and everyone else and not really participate beyond that, you could do that, too. It was very low pressure and it was fun to open the boxes "together". Zoom is already mostly tedious, but large group Zooms with lots of participants are often really awful and just feel like more work. Does your company have a robust poster culture? I'm not sure I'd love a work poster. I'd much rather get something that is delicious or feels like a little bit of luxury.
posted by quince at 5:55 PM on June 1, 2020 [3 favorites]


Give them the day off and don't worry about it feeling like a wrap party which is a normal event for normal times.
posted by Aleyn at 9:20 PM on June 1, 2020 [2 favorites]


Can you ask them what they'd like?
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:42 PM on June 1, 2020


Two days ago I hosted (on Zoom) the welcome reception for a month-long summer school. After a few minutes of intro from the organizers I shunted everyone into randomly-assigned breakout rooms to chat and start to get to know each other. I set the number of breakout rooms so that there would be 5 or 6 people per room and then we reshuffled after 15 minutes. It was actually pretty fun, but this was among people who were meeting each other for the first time.

TL;DR: breakout rooms.
posted by heatherlogan at 2:42 PM on June 2, 2020


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