Overview

Robot Dragon Studios blog covering my first trunk or treat experience at Jam Hops in Ramsey, MN for their second ever trunk or treat event. This was an event for local community intended for advertising only.

Applications, Payments & Planning

I came across a post in my local Facebook group for Andover, MN Community. It was posted on October 10, 2026. I didn't see the post until the next day and emailed at that time asking about it since I was unsure if it was a place we could sell at or not. It mentioned promotional items and free and of course I love free events. 

She responded rather quickly and I went ahead and decided I'd just give it a shot since I had made some coloring pages on a whim out of a sticker & pin design already. I figured I would just print out a ton of coloring pages to advertise myself along with the candy. Kids really love my plush and stickers anyway, so it seemed like it would be worth doing, so I decided to sign up.

The form to fill out was really simple. It didn't ask for a ton of information either.

Once submitted, I guess i was in and that was that. On October 16, 2026, Mary sent everyone an email confirming the event information. There was also a page attached that showed our locations. The first year was last year and they said there were about 950 people who attended and to plan for more. I can't afford to plan for 950 people, so I planned for whatever I could budget for. If I ran out, I ran out and that is how it would have to be.

My spot was number 14. There were 15 total vendors despite the confusing way spaces are numbered on the map. 5, 6 & 7 were all taken by the same group.

Before the Event & Setup

So I can't say I had too much planned for this as it's just a trunk or treat. I had never done one previously so I came in with sort of bare bones decorations. The only thing I planned for was the candy and coloring pages. 

I went to UPS in Coon Rapids where they quickly printed out 300 coloring pages for me. It was so much more expensive than I expected though - at 20 cents each it came out to $60 + the $4.88 tax. I guess I will be printing from home next time.

Candy I forget the exact cost of at this point since we planned to use any leftover candy to hand out at our house, but I will say it was about $80-$90 worth of candy. So about ~$150 invested into an event that was free to be at with the intent to advertise. We had 4 bags from Costco going into the event.

I decided last minute to grab the blow up dragon, per my husband's recommendation. I had only intended on bringing some Frankencorgis, coloring pages, candy and stickers that I don't sell to get rid of (just incorrectly sized ones). I tossed everything into the vehicle and headed over around 12:30 or so. We are basically right next to Ramsey/Anoka area so it was very close.

Once we arrived the lady with the clip board, who I assume is probably Mary, checked us in. My spot was basically right where I drove up to and she had to move out of the way so I could park. It was nice that we each got space between vehicles so if I'd had a bigger setup or display, I could have spread out a bit. Since it was windy and teasing rain, I am glad I also did NOT have any sort of wild display.

Setup was pretty quick. We used the portable battery we bought for events to keep the dragon inflated. It was at 75% and I think ended at 40% or so over the two hours so I am more shocked I guess that it didn't use as much power as I expected. We initially had the dragon next to the vehicle but decided to put it inside the back to stick out like someone had done with their dragon blow up. It worked much better that way.

The Event Itself

It started before 1pm by like 10 minutes since everyone was ready already. There were so many kids! I brought 300 coloring pages, 4 bags of mixed candies and like 80 stickers. I ran out of stickers within 30 minutes and coloring sheets by 2pm. 



It started to slow down quite a bit around 2:20pm or so. I was told at this point there were about 500 people who had come by, and I knew we'd passed out 300 coloring pages by 2pm, so the extra 200 people would be parents and that makes sense. I don't plan to email and ask for a final count since I don't think it really matters that much. Most of the photos I got before it started or after it was dead, so don't take my images as it was a dead event. It was super busy in the first like hour and 30 minutes since we did start early. I didn't have any time to grab my phone for photos or anything in that time.

My husband was folding coloring pages and I was taking them and putting them with candy since the coordinator told us at the start not to give away handfuls because we may run out. Had the attendance been what it had the first year, we absolutely would have run out. I barely snapped a photo before tossing my phone aside, but you can see what I was doing haha. We ended up using the candy bucket to hold the folded pages. I also ended up with more paper cuts than expected on one of my knuckles.



It started to sprinkle about 30 minutes before it was over. We ended up leaving with about 6 or so minutes to go before 3pm since everyone else had started to pack up way before we did. Since it was starting to rain at that point, I had decided to just call it good. We were down to 1 and a half bags of candy as well as out of all promotional materials anyways. 

What Worked & What Did Not

Considering it was just an event with the focus on making kids happy and promoting our businesses, it was really fun. I had no expectations and it exceeded that easily.

I underestimated how many coloring pages I would actually need so if I go back in 2027, I will prepare myself much better.

Conclusion

I actually really enjoyed this way more than I expected to and would love to do it again for 2027. I do think that I would like to have a blow up of one of my characters though instead of some random dragon. I consider this a huge success and now have even more ideas than before.

The Details (TLDR)