AIGA Chicago: 2026 Paper Show Campaign
Challenge:While our volunteer design team built an amazing brand system, my responsibility was to sign off on creative decisions, build the marketing funnel, author the messaging, lead our media crew during the event, and publish the content. The goal was to generate meaningful event revenue by increasing attendance without raising baseline admission prices.
Solution:
I led a 3-phase campaign focused on limited-time offerings and directly integrated corporate sponsor tie-ins and promotion. We also focused on the panelists with a countdown to the event. Then, a final campaign rolled out photos and videos of the event to highlight the panelists and sponsors.
The concept of the campaign was to bring print to the design community, specifically in Chicago, and to use the city's landscapes as a character to center AIGA within the city. The rest of the campaign focused on the Chicago-specific creative leaders and paper mills.
Ticket Revenue: 35% increase in gross ticket revenue
Premium Conversions: 55.3% of revenue driven via VIP upgrades
The launch post achieved a 12.50% engagement rate on LinkedIn, while the presale campaign window alone captured 79.5% of the previous year's total event attendance.
Brief: The 2026 Paper Show, held at the Chicago Cultural Center, is the third annual exhibition celebrating print and physical design media within the Midwest creative community. This event is the chapter's main revenue generator. Its success determines the quality and the output for the chapter for the rest of the 2026/2027 fiscal year.
Target Audience: Creative leadership, graphic designers, print enthusiasts, agency creatives, production managers, and students across the Chicago area.
“The concept of the campaign was to bring print to the design community, specifically in Chicago, and to use the city's landscapes as a character to center AIGA within the city. “
3-Phase Campaign Funnel & Marketing Analytics
Phase 1: Presale Launch
Jan 19 – Apr 3 • 151 Tickets Sold Early• 12.50% Peak LinkedIn ER
• Limited Time Window Messaging
Phase 2: Sponsors & Panelists
Apr 3 – May 13 • 6,600+ Partner Impressions• 3,837 Max Instagram Reach
• B2B Sponsor ROI Tracking
Phase 3: Media Production
Post-Event Rollout • 5 Creative Crew Members Managed• 40+ Wrap-Up Assets Deployed
• Long-Term Chapter Financial Impact
Phase 1: Presale Launch
January 19 – April 3To establish a financial baseline before we got close to the event, the copywriting and content strategy focused strictly on limited-time pricing and early access. This campaign strategy locked in 79.5% of the previous year's total overall campaign attendance (190).
*Art Direction & Brand System Design: Katrina Trinh
LinkedIn Engagement: Our initial LinkedIn reveal hit a 12.50% engagement rate, beating the 2% industry average. Across all core presale posts, we maintained a 10.15% average engagement rate, capturing 1,152 initial impressions on the kick-off alone.
Instagram Engagement: Achieved a 5.26% engagement rate on the launch announcement, generating over 12,800+ total impressions across our top presale posts during this early campaign phase.
Direct Email Traffic: The April 3rd "Presale Deadline" email reached a peak click-through rate of 1.5%, improving our direct-traffic conversion and closing out the phase with 151 total tickets sold (96 General Admission, 55 VIP). This single launch window effectively captured 79.5% of the previous year's total overall campaign attendance (190).
Being at the cultural center was a big deal for the chapter, and within the campaign, we tied together using the city's landscapes as a character to center AIGA within the city. This repetition allowed the communications to tie together seamlessly when the work spanned different channels.
Phase 2: Sponsors & Panelists
April 3 – May 13Once general ticket sales opened, the narrative shifted from locking in presale to focus on our sponsors and highlighting the panelists.
*Art Direction & Brand System Design: Katrina Trinh
Delivering B2B Sponsor ROI: To provide value to our corporate partners, I wrote a specialized "Partner Spotlight" social series. The concept of sponsors being represented by printers was meant to focus on what they brought to the event: their expertise and print samples. This strategy captured the attention of their former, current, and potential business partners, accumulating 6,600+ impressions on our Partner Spotlights on LinkedIn—averaging over 2,200 impressions per post.
"Even during this heavy final-week push (May 6–12), we held stable open rates up to 9.1% right up to the eve of the event."
High-Converting Email Funnel: To convert last-minute fence-sitters, I directed a three-wave email sprint in the final six days before the show. Across the entire campaign lifecycle, we achieved 31,000+ total inbox deliveries. Even during this heavy final-week push (May 6–12), we held stable open rates up to 9.1% right up to the eve of the event.
Phase 3: Media Production & Post-Event Rollout
To ensure the event's physical scale translated perfectly into the content, I served as the Executive Producer for all on-site media coverage. This required establishing clear creative leadership to manage the teams and contracted creative crew members.
Crew Coordination: Sourced, briefed, and managed a live production crew of 4 photographers and 1 videographer. I built comprehensive shot lists and runtime schedules across speaker panels, interactive vendor booths, and audience engagement to guarantee the event was recorded. The goal of the shot list was to help with post-event sponsorship promotion, highlight the success of the event with crowd and panel shots, and document it for promoting next year's event.
Asset Distribution: Oversaw the creative review, editorial alignment, and multi-platform deployment of over 40+ digital assets, ranging from real-time Instagram Reels and LinkedIn recaps to post-event sponsor appreciation assets.
*On-Site Media Production Crew: Samuel Saavedra, Alexa Agrelo, Ronald Uruchima, Katrina Trinh, Abner Benjamin
Post Event Social Media Engagement
Retrospective & Long-Term Chapter Impact
The 2026 Paper Show packed the Chicago Cultural Center and captured a diverse set of the creative community. Beyond attendance metrics, the campaign met AIGA Chicago’s financial goals. Compared to last year, we had a 35% increase in total gross ticket revenue.
This result secured the funding required to keep half of our annual programming community events completely free and accessible to local students and emerging creators throughout the year.
"This result secured the funding required to keep half of our annual programming community events completely free and accessible to local students, and emerging creators..."
Campaign Strategy, Copywriting & Media Production Lead: Derek Desormeaux
Sponsorship Lead & Event Coordinator: Hannah Goldberg
Event Program, Event Collateral, and Print Design: Hannah Goldberg
Art Direction & Brand System Design: Katrina Trinh
On-Site Media Production Crew: Samuel Saavedra, Alexa Agrelo, Ronald Uruchima, Katrina Trinh, Abner Benjamin