America 250 Festival of Trees 2025
Nonprofit Spotlight in Malls Across America!
A wonderful event that a national organization, club or nonprofit could take on would be a Festival of Trees in each state - hosted in malls. The decorated trees represent nonprofits who set up the trees themselves and give each tree a theme. Calling the event America 250 Festival of Trees matches well with inviting military and veteran nonprofits that provide resources including homelessness, meals, suicide prevention and other support. Of course nonprofits supporting other causes are welcome as well.
For groups with chapters in every state that would like to take this on, here are some steps:
1. January 2025 Approach a large mall in your area and propose an America 250 Festival of Trees in 2025. They will likely not charge any fee to do this, as this is a huge draw for a mall to have a display like this and builds goodwill with the community. You will likely need to sign a contract with the mall. Shoot for 20-25 trees. Run the event during November and December. Most malls have a Santa arrival at the beginning of November, having the Opening Night for the Festival of Trees on the same day creates a lot more excitement.
2. As soon as the mall is secured, start reaching out to local nonprofits and invite them to participate. They will provide the tree and decorations themselves or they can partner with a business to help them if needed. The tree should be artificial and be at least 7ft tall. They need to decide on a theme for the tree and a name like "The Transformation Tree" or "The Puzzle Tree", or "Dr. Suess Tree".
3. Promote the Festival of Trees on your social media early on in the year and announce each nonprofit as they come on board as a featured tree. Establish contact with local media so they will promote the Festival of Trees leading up to the event. Ask the mall if they have a PR company and get them to work with you and issue press releases. Consider having a Media Sneak Peek two hours before the Grand Opening and invite the nonprofit staff and their families plus executive director to be available to talk to press about their tree and their mission.
3. Plan for 3-4 days of setting up the trees before Opening Night. Provide a table next to the tree so people can get flyers about the nonprofit, create standing displays with the nonprofit's name, name of the tree, mission, info on how people can help/support, and a QR code so people can donate etc. Encourage nonprofits to hold drives like coat drives etc with barrels next to their tree.
5. The trees remain on display through Christmas. Create tree events like: a "Favorite Tree" competition (host on social media), Ugly Sweater Weekend for nonprofits to come back and man their trees, Specific weekend for drives, etc.
