At Power-up Online Promotions (POP), we have a running gag when we tell people what we do. While we often lead with, “we tell your story,” once we get into specifics after rattling off a list of services like blogging, SEO, social media, and so on, I typically end with, “and the ever-growing category of etcetera.” It’s a funny way of saying that we like to meet clients where they need us, using our creativity wherever they need it. 

Well, at the end of last month, we stepped into the etcetera category in a big way with the grand opening of the Power-Up Lounge at Berglund Center! 

What is the Power-Up Lounge?

The Power-Up Lounge is POP’s maiden voyage into the physical world of advertising in one of Roanoke’s iconic event spaces – Berglund Center. There, during intermission at a Rail Yard Dawgs’ game or one of the many concerts BC hosts, center goers can sit down with a snack, beer, or soda and immerse themselves in a section of the concourse that’s distinctly set apart from all the rest,” or something along these lines. 

While our digital footprint spans the internet, particularly locally, the Power-up Lounge at The Burglund Center is a place where you can see POP’s art and interact with some of our favorite clients’ work!

• Frame to Finish Construction has built a model kitchen where people can sit at a kitchen island with their beverage of choice. 
• More outdoorsy? Check out an indoor “outdoor” living space built by our very own SML Landscape Designs!
• The floor that ties it all together is premium LVP expertly installed by Floor Coverings International. 

 

All these clients are effectively – and immersively – demonstrating current trends reflective of what you’d experience working with them.

And in the middle of it all are your POP Star Heroes!

*We’re joking, of course. If you’re our client and you’re reading this, YOU’RE our favorite client. Yes, just you. Don’t tell anyone!

 

New Nonprofit Featured Every Quarter

Here’s the best part! As part of our commitment to building community here in Southwest Virginia, we will rotate out a new area nonprofit every quarter. 

The very first nonprofit we’re featuring is (enter dramatic drumroll):

The Southwest Virginia Wildlife Center!

 

The Southwest Virginia Wildlife Center already has a special place in our hearts. At POP, just like Superman, we’re animal lovers, as you can tell from our inclusion of the pups in our legion of heroes. 

SWVA Wildlife Center, one of the largest wildlife rehabilitation centers in Virginia, treats 2,700+ patients annually. I wrote an article about them in the holiday issue of the Roanoker. They’re a great cause, so if you have money to spare, please support them!

We already have our second nonprofit picked out, but if you have suggestions for anything after that, let us know. We plan to be there for a while!

 

Room for Friends? 

 

We’ve only just launched the Power-Up Lounge, so there is room for additional clients. If you’re a POP client or interested in exploring working with a friendly neighborhood marketer and would like a physical slot in this iconic space, let us know. 

If you’re not a POP client yet…

 

Exclusive Opportunity

 

POP is not planning to allow non-clients to advertise within the lounge. It’s not just because that’s how we know you’re cool…though, of course, yes…It’s also because we know that many people will get their first exposure to POP through the lounge at a game or concert. 

They’ll see our cartoon hero icons, plus the other businesses that make up the lounge. Most people will associate POP with the other businesses and probably assume that we market for them. 

The last thing we want is to have someone with a less-than-stellar online presence looking like they’re a POP client!

 

Berglund Center has 500,000 guests walk through its doors annually. All those people see the ads on the walls and on the ice. 

But the only place in the Berglund Center where they can have an interactive experience with the advertisers is the Power-Up Lounge. 

If you want to get your brand in front of half a million people from the Roanoke Region and beyond, you may be a great fit. 

Our Big Event

It was a long journey to complete the lounge, so we were super excited to finally have had our grand opening. 

When I spoke, I said something very similar to the following:

“As your Friendly Neighborhood Marketer, it made perfect sense for us to partner with the Berglund Center to put this lounge in place since the Berglund Center is such an iconic part of the Roanoke neighborhood.”

Anyone who’s known me more than 10 minutes and asked me what I do for a living knows I like to say, “I say words good,” so hopefully I don’t disappoint today. 

The truth is, that’s not as accurate a description of what I do anymore, since now my role is primarily to steer the ship and let the talented group of POP Stars who work for me in writing, web development, and other capacities tell my clients’ stories. We couldn’t be here without all of them doing their part. 

April Hribek and Khenan Terry are our web development team. Jenn Read keeps everything organized and runs the show when I can’t. Her daughters, Alyx and Caity, create content along with Maddy McCollum and Zoe Smith.

 

 

For direct work on the lounge, we have to thank my lovely wife Felicia, who played a major role in the aesthetic, and Aaron Baldwin, our client acquisitions lead in Virginia, who, in addition to design, prepared for the opening and presented the initial concept to me. 

Finally, I need to thank our clients whose creativity you can see on display behind me: Mike Lane at Frame to Finish, Kenny Spence of Floor Coverings International, and Sean Beckner of SML Landscape Designs.

And thank you to MJ and Captain Jack Sparrowhawk for being here today to represent our very first featured nonprofit, the Southwest Virginia Wildlife Center. You can see them in the frame behind me and use the QR code in it to donate to them and all the future featured nonprofits.

Thank you for coming. Now let’s cut this ribbon!”

 

Berglund provided a nice spread, and we had an excellent time taking it all in with our clients, friends, and local visitors. 

Thanks again to our community for supporting us every day.