Creative Marketing for Rochester Soup Swap

Taking an icon and making it so much better, the folks in Rochester, New York obviously rule. I love this snowy land.

This is what Ellen has to say,

On a freezing Rochester, New York night on Saturday, January 26, I hosted my first soup swap.

My friend designed the invites to look like a Campbell’s Soup can (thanks, Pete!). (To see a larger image of this, click here.)

Eight guests arrived, bearing, if not tidings of great joy, at least soups of great flavor. After a few hours of wine, hors d’oeuvres, and nice company, we gathered in the dining room for the Telling of the Soup.

We discovered one common element among all the soup makers: people did a lot of research before making their soups! Websites were searched for what soups freeze well; online customer reviews of particular recipes were pored over; sites that help you double/triple recipes were consulted.

The soups were Curried Pumpkin; Beef, Mushroom and Barley; Chicken Tortilla; Ultimate Baked Potato; Cream of Watercress; and Hoppin’ John.

I like the idea of soup spoon prizes. We’ll do that next January, at our second annual Soup Swap! Thanks for the idea… loads of fun.

Maybe you folks can make invites for everyone! Wow! It is so excellent! Thanks for sharing your good times with us and we hope to see you and all the towns that participated outside of Rochester again next year (or later this winter again...I think there is a lot of winter left up there)!

Fairport, NY Joining on the 23rd!

"I'll be hosting what I believe is a first for our little village on the Erie Canal. I saw your web site when searching for ideas for a cookie swap and decided that this was a way better idea!!", says JoAnne of Fairport, NY.

She continues that she is starting small with eight guest, and that she'll "be providing to attendees along with party favors of silicone hot pads and a wooden spoon."

We look forward to seeing the pictures from this Erie Canal town. She has a great invite (.pdf) with a good tip sheet on how to cook and freeze soup, if you are looking for invite ideas. You can drop her a note, here.

Right now I'm excited about finishing preparations.

Ha! Ha! Invite for Centennial, Colorado

Here's one of the cleverest invites we've seen for Soup Swap. It comes from Jan in Centennial, Colorado, just south of Denver.

I'm guessing it's the rarefied air at a mile high that lends itself to hilarious invites. Make sure to click on it, to get the larger reading copy.

One thing I like about these folks, is they decided not only not to swap on Wednesday night because it wasn't convenient for them, but to only make four quarts instead of our recommended six, because it seemed more sane to them! Good on them for doing what works for their own group. Some groups taste each other's soups, some make smaller batches, some swap in the morning, some drink coffee, some have wine. You just need to do what's right for your group and HAVE FUN!

They'll be joining Pougkeepsie and Jersey City by hosting their Soup Swap on Sunday, January 27th.

For information this Denver-area swap, drop Jan a note, here.

Save the Date! Roslindale, MA

Taking a page from our pals at Gracious Bowl, Kristi and Mark up in Boston are designing fab invites to cheer their friends in the bleakness that is New England winter. (Ok, to have 3 bracingly clear days would be swell about now out in Seattle...). Mark sent this on a few days ago, and we post it to encourage all the groups to the greatness that lies within you! What a swell invite.

It is making me think it is time to send out invites. We'll be posting ours soon and sending out emails with tips on hosting a Soup Swap. Look for them this week!

If you are in Boston out past that orange line and like swapping soup on the weekends, you can drop Mark a note, here.

If you'd rather stay on the Cambridge side of things and want to swap on National Soup Swap day, check in here.

If you'd just like to be included on our mailing list and start receiving tips on hosting Soup Swap, drop me a note, here.

DC Soup Swap Invitations are a Go!

We've written our official post and sent out invitations!

It's starts out a little something like this:

You've got 2 weekends to make 6 quarts of soup for swapping. World-famous? Old-family recipe? New soup you've been wanting to try? It's up to you. Just make it good...

T minus 2 weeks and counting! Inspired by Pam's post about Food = Love, we've even designed a little Soup Swap animation over at The Gracious Bowl! If you guys are interested and I can find some time, I'll do a smaller version to fit into blog sidebars.

Now if only we could decide on which soups we're making! They're just so many possibilities! Are you guys armed and ready with your prized recipe? Is your freezer already packed and ready to take the title?

Seattle Soup Swap Invites Are Underway

And they look sort of like this (edited slightly)
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Greetings, soup loving friends!

With soup swaps in Portland, Boston, Washington DC, New York, and other places as yet unknown, Soup Swap has gone national! Soup Swap now has a blog, SoupSwap.com , where you can check in for the latest on Soup Swap news. You can download the soup swap guidelines, get the press release, and you can even get a Soup Swap sticker for your own site!

Seattle's National Soup Swap Day Event (Soup Swap Founders Day, we Seattleites might call it) will again be hosted at Carrie and Dave's place. Show up at 630. The Telling of the Soup will begin at 7pm.

You know what to do. And if you don't, you can read the Soup Swap Guidelines here.

Also, please note: National Soup Swap comes with a good deed this year. Bring one or two cans of soup which we'll donate to the shelter or food bank of the group's choosing, courtesy of Seattle Soup Swap.

Here's a quick reminder of lessons learned from the last Soup Swap:

• Wily types will try to impress with accessories. Don't be fooled. Or, bring better accessories.
• Just because a soup is under told, doesn't mean it's no good. Take a risk.
• Some folks try to pass off chili as soup. We have this to say: Right on!

See you on National Soup Swap Day, January 23rd.

Soup=Love. Both four letter words. A coincidence? I don't THINK so.

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Show us your invites, soup swappers!