5 Killer Content Tips from Upicnic

"Picnics are no longer just a summer thing," says Marta Antonelli, co-founder of Upicnic. Her company provides on-demand picnics to the great citizens of NYC. She has a lot to say about the world of picnicking, especially the kinds of content it allows them to produce.

Marta told us that picnic culture is still “under construction”. Most New Yorkers’ idea of a picnic is grabbing bodega sandwiches and eating at the park. But it is about so much more than that. Picnics are about the experience. They should include lawn games, food, and blankets - and they should be shared with people that you love. It can be as small as just friends and family, or as big as  a company picnic. She shared some awesome insider tips with us on how she curates content for the community.

1. There is no shortage of content

Marta manages their blog around the topic of picnics. You may be wondering how much is there to say about the topic. Well, the answer is that there are a lot of different picnic aspects to touch upon. The trick is to have a lot of fun with it. She can draw inspiration from all sorts of events around town, holidays, and news that goes on in New York. Any excuse there is to have a picnic. For example, Bryant Park hosts movie night, which is a perfect picnic opportunity. Even parks themselves offer unlimited content. Think of parks in all five boroughs and the different islands. There's so much stuff going on in the city on an otherwise lazy Sunday afternoon.

2. Keep it relevant and interesting

Marta had some other advice for brand content-makers. She said to keep it relevant to whatever your industry is. At the same time, nobody wants to read boring lists. Keep it light and fresh while making sense to your audience. Try and make content as consistent as possible. Use a schedule, so that your audience knows what to expect. For example, every Tuesday, they pick a new picnic spot that they're going to feature. Also, she says not to just upload random articles, like 10 one week and none the next week.

3. Try out seemingly crazy ideas

Thanks to friends, one idea they stumbled upon is a romantic rendezvous. It started one Valentine's Day as an indoor picnic. It was as a cute, thoughtful way of surprising your date or wife. It involved a gorgeous picnic spread in front of the TV or fireplace. The team tried it out on some customers and people loved it! They then created an ad hoc package from there. Picnic packages that carry through the entire spring, when people want to stay indoors. It's official, picnics are no longer just for summer.

4. Content can be physical

The team also organizes fun days out in the park. They shut down the company for a whole day and host a picnic. They put it on Facebook and their newsletters. For example, they'll say this Sunday we're going to go to a certain location in Central Park. They bring games for everybody and let people pick what they want to buy for a meal. They have done giant picnics with this method, with hundreds of attendees. Whenever the team is updating the picnic food menu, they'll also host tasting parties. Attendees will get a tasting card, and can go around tasting all the contenders and rating them. At the end of the event, the Upicnic team tallies up all the ratings. The best rated ones make it to the final menu.

Will you be joining them next? Get on their newsletter or shoot them a tweet @UpicnicNYC to hear about their next outing. You can catch the team coworking all over New York City with Croissant!