When an Incredible Edible group begins its journey it is important to get your message out there and the beginning of your story told so you can link up with and get support from new people and organisations.
Often in the first weeks and months people in your local community will ask your group to tell your story at events and group meetings. Once that initial buzz has died down how do you, as a group, engage with a wider reaching audience whilst keeping those important first supporters up to date, and spread your message whether it’s in your village, a town or a city?
It’s worth taking some time as a group to look at who you want to tell your story to. Initially you may find that you aim yourselves towards local gardening groups, allotment societies and third sector environmental groups, but it’s important to step outside your comfort zone too. Whilst it’s amazing to tell the tales to people who are natural supporters, it’s also important to inspire others who might not even have heard of Incredible Edible or it’s aims. How do you decide who you’d like to engage with as a group and what then?
Writing a list of groups or sectors is a good start, based on the interests of those in your group. If you have a particular interest in health for example, who do you want to speak to? On a local level your GP surgery is a great start and on a citywide level it might be that you engage with the local NHS. In England, NHS Trusts have a Sustainability Team who often are looking for people to set up lunchtime talks at larger hospitals, for example to encourage staff to get involved in volunteering activities.
Schools are always a good choice as they are often looking for people to speak in assemblies. It’s worth calling rather than emailing, as schools receive so many emails each day you are likely to get lost in the inbox, particularly if you send it to an info @ address. A call to the head and a conversation about the Incredible Edible Learning Plate is always worth some time and could lead to an assembly where you inspire the children to get their parents out to volunteer with you.
Local campaigning groups often hold open meetings where you can go along and talk, fairly informally usually, about what you are working on with your group and how people can get involved. Whilst often these groups are a part of the movement for change that we are a part of, it’s also the case that often they might not be clear what the difference between an Incredible Edible group and a community growing group is, so it’s definitely worth engaging.
There are places where you can add yourself to a list as a potential speaker. Some of these charge to be added to the list, however this might give you opportunities to talk at events where you can charge, so it might be worth the investment. Others, such as the Women’s Institute, ask you to an event where you do a demo talk and they then add you to their list if they feel it’s appropriate.
The best way to generate invitations is by word of mouth. If you inspire people in your talks to get involved or to learn more, they inevitably will tell friends and colleagues in other circles of society. So it’s really important that when you do speak, people have the opportunity to get all of your details so they can contact you for further talks. Take cards, flyers and anything else you might think will help with spreading your contact details and get you more invites to spread the Incredible Edible story.
Finally it is always worth creating your own opportunities by holding talk events yourselves. It could be with a film showing, with another speaker that you invite along, or as a part of another event going on locally that you are asked to be a part of.
