Case Study · Special Needs Trunk-or-Treat · 2024–2026

Community Halloween Event

A trunk-or-treat for kids with disabilities, and a way to get people into our Kenosha clinic.

Client / Brand

Tender Touch Therapy / Medical Support Services

Role

Digital Marketing Specialist

Year

2024–2026 at Bradford High School (4th year overall)

Pieces

Sponsor Letter, Flyer, RSVP Poster, Facebook Event, Email, Host Flyer, Maps

01

Problem

We Outgrew the Clinic.

Each of our clinics has its own standing event, something the community can count on every year. Kenosha, our original clinic, didn’t have one yet. When we moved into a new building there, a trunk-or-treat felt like the right fit: families get a Halloween that actually works for their kids, and Kenosha gets a tradition of its own.

It worked better than we planned. Each year more families came out and the lineup of trunks got longer, until the clinic lot couldn’t hold it anymore. In 2024 we moved the whole thing to the Bradford High School parking lots, and it’s been Kenosha’s big event ever since.

Main goal: give Kenosha a standing community event, one that brings families and local organizations to us every year and turns into new patient leads and referral partners.

Along the way, we wanted to:

→Give back to the families we already work with
→Make trick-or-treating work for kids who use wheelchairs, walkers and scooters
→Get all of our brands in front of people: Medical Support Services, Tender Touch Therapy, We Rock the Spectrum and Tri My Best
→Meet future clinicians through student volunteers
→Cover the cost with sponsorships

02

Insight

We Could Host the Resource Fair Instead of Paying to Be at One.

We go to a lot of resource fairs, and at most of them we’re one table out of many. A lot of the families we work with go to those same fairs. So we figured we could host one ourselves and pair it with something families actually want to do.

They get a Halloween their kids can do, with no porch steps, no crowds and nothing to explain, plus the resources they’d normally go to a separate fair for. It’s two events in one trip.

03

Idea

Every Trunk Is a Booth.

Local businesses and disability organizations decorate a trunk, hand out candy and talk about what they offer. We host the whole thing. It’s free for families to attend and free to host a trunk.

04

Execution

How It Came Together.

Building the list: we kept every contact from the resource fairs and networking events we went to. That list of businesses and organizations is where everything started.

Recruiting trunks: we wrote a sponsor letter with four tiers, from a free trunk spot up to a $500 co-host. We worked the list with mailed flyers and letters, a few rounds of emails, and phone calls when we needed them. We also asked our own staff to host, set up a registration page and listed the event on local calendars.

Reaching families: a flyer, RSVP poster, Facebook event and email, all leading with the basics: it’s free, when it is and where. One QR code handled both RSVPs and trunk sign-ups. At the entrance, families got a flyer that thanked our sponsors and offered a free developmental screening.

Event day: maps with reserved accessible parking, plus student volunteers from local high schools and Marquette University, food trucks and costumed princesses for the kids.

After: we got photos and video for social media and to show sponsors the next year.