Dementia in Old Age

[RJ]

There has been a report on the radio about a Swedish study on dementia in old age. They report that exercising for 30 minutes twice a week significantly reduces your chances of dementia in later life.

What an opportunity!

Any ideas on where and how to publicise orienteering as the means to this end? Anyone got a specific idea where a club might spend some promotion money on advertising?

[Guest]

local GP's surgery

[Mrs H.]

"get someone in" as Robin Field would say - to write an article in Saga Magazine which seems to be issued to you automatically when you turn 50.

[RJ]

Good idea Mrs H. I'll pass that on to Caroline Povey and see if BOF have the contacts to pursue it.

Guest... another good idea. This is one that we can do ourselves! Any ideas for the text that might be used for an A5 sized poster. How about a few sample ideas from the Nope melting pot!!

[Mrs H.]

Good idea Mrs H. I'll pass that on to Caroline Povey!

Yes RJ it was a good idea the first time I suggested it to BOF central too (and there were a lot more where that came from). But then - why get a journalist who orienteers (and is over 50) to do it for free when you can pay out hard earned memberships fees to get someone else to do it? I wait to see the callibre of the result with interest.

PS I also used doctors Surgeries for MADO posters targetted at getting parents to get their children off their fat backsides. the local primary health care trust were helpful in doing this.

[seabird]

"get someone in" as Robin Field would say - to write an article in Saga Magazine which seems to be issued to you automatically when you turn 50.

They seem to have overlooked me. Or have I just forgotten.

[gross2006]

I have good contacts with Saga in Folkestone. I can at least get an article onto the correct desk:)

[Ian W]

Hmm, I too get my unsolicited free copies of Saga magazine but try to convince myself that I'm too young to find anything of interest in them.

Are we really sure this is consistent with the image that Orienteering is currently trying to project?

Ian

[gross2006]

I wouldn't dismiss Saga as a target group.... most of Saga's customer base seems to be the wealthy older people.... they have families and grand children...

Wouldn't put all my marketing efforts in that direction but wouldn't dismiss it. Mind you I might be biased because more Saga age people in orienteering makes more people going to WMOC etc etc....

[Mrs H.]

Havn't you heard of niche marketing? You can target all sorts of groups without other groups necessarily being aware of it. I see BOK are courting running groups, OD are after school children and I'm after families - our young friends here are doing a very good job of making the sport more attractive to young adults.
It would be a very bad idea to put all our eggs in one basket. Anyway I suspect it's the over 50s who do most of the volunteer donkey work and as such are an invaluable resource for the sport. From my funding efforts I see that intergenerational sport is a big plus point and I don't know of another sport that does it as well as orienteering.

Just read Gross - we must stop agreeing like this

As an after thought, I also offered to pitch for
the NT magazine (especially as a follow up to the item on permanent courses last issue)
The Caravan Club magazine (There is a course at Park Coppice and quite a number of orienteers who must attract attention when they stay on sites for multi-days - if only in the laundry)
The YHA mag (now who do we know who works for them)
Practical Parenting (availsble at the supermarket as I recall)
Scouting Association (I imagine Peter Bylett has already taken care of that)
And of course many many more - with the exception of the NT article I have yet to see anything - I guess Robin didn't think it worth "getting someone in".

Oh i put a feature with photo in the Hereford and Worcester Edition of Primary Times in the summer - but that was to publicise MADO. It got a big response - but not as big as the half page feature in the Malvern Gazette. small fry maybe but it gives you the opportunity to make a very specific pitch. the more directly you can appeal to people's interests - the more they will respond.

[tokoloshe]

It is not just physical exercise that helps but mental exercise as well - O must score well on both

[RJ]

Any ideas on where and how to publicise orienteering as the means to this end? Anyone got a specific idea where a club might spend some promotion money on advertising?

local GP's surgery

There are two posters available, which you can download and print off yourselves. The files are in pdf format, and are in high resolution, so will print well on any colour printer.

The plan.... Print a few copies and display them in doctors' surgeries. They will only have a shelf life of a couple of months, so the message is simple. The posters are A5 size, but will print out onto an A4 sheet; then trim them down to the tick marks. It gives an A5 with full bleed and will look very professional! It is an opportunity to put 'orienteering' into the public domain. Let's see how it works.

The posters show orienteers running.... doing what we do! Both people have said they will allow their images to be used, so I am grateful to them for that.

In the long term we need to be doing this in as many different places as possible with loads of different posters.

[Ed]

nice work. only comment is that a box for a local club contact might be helpful rather than just directing to the BOF website (maybe not a good advert to send them to get lost there!)...

[NeilC]

So not only is Jeff a coach of the year he's also a pin-up model.

Mind you an early onset of dementia might have the side effect of convincing oneself that 1)one should enter M21E not M40S and 2)Afro haircuts are still cool.

Great posters though.

[RJ]

nice work. only comment is that a box for a local club contact might be helpful rather than just directing to the BOF website (maybe not a good advert to send them to get lost there!)...

Leave the sheet as an A4, and put through the printer a second time printing underneath the message that you want. Then trim to A5+ so that you include your message.

However, the main function of the posters is to increase awareness and to show an image of orienteering which is appropriate. People running with a map!