GGB Pittsburgh’s Whedonverse Brunch
We <3 the Whedonverse!
April was a crazy month for GGB PGH. To begin with, we attended our second local con; Tekko 2017! We had so much fun at Tekko and met so many wonderful people. Not only were we able to get sign-ups for our chapter, but there were lots of people from other areas who came to participate in the con. We matched them up with their local chapters and got their registration all set up for them. We also were able to connect with local organizations, businesses, and groups. This resulted in some pretty interesting collaboration ideas that we hope to share soon. Just another example of how amazing and supportive Pittsburgh is!
We like to do a fun activity at our outreach that gets passers-by interested in our table and also allows us to collect anonymous data on people attending those events to see if we’re serving our population as best we can with our brunch themes and extra events and get-togethers. These interactive data visualizations ask participants to select their favorite fandoms and pair them with their favorite activities. As more people participate, it allows us to build charts and graphs in real time. We did this activity at Wizard World with a large foam board sectioned off into columns to represent fandoms and different colored stickers to represent favorite activities. Participants selected a sticker that most closely matched their favorite activity (like RPGs or reading, etc.) and stick it in the column representing their favorite fandom (like Harry Potter or Star Wars). We mimicked this at Tekko using fuse beads for activity and glass vases for fandom. Participants could select the color bead that best represented their favorite activity and drop it in the vase for their favorite fandom. In both cases, the participation helped to build a bar graph in real time over the weekend of the con. If you’re a data nerd, stay tuned for a post from us entirely about the data we collected!
Our brunch proper was held at Industry Public House in the very hip neighborhood of Lawrenceville. Their food is a fun twist on American pub food, and they’re locally known for their fun bacon selections. We celebrated all things Whedonverse with a great group of ladies and were able to treat them to some very cool swag that included Iron Man mittens (knitted and donated by a GGB friend), a Buffy the Vampire Slayer coloring book, Joss Whedon films and more! We talked about books (forever talking about books, this group!), fun hobbies, and how amazing Buffy is. We also geeked out over a fun podcast we were recently introduced to: ReVisiting Sunnydale! We met the ladies responsible for this Buffy rewatch fan podcast at Wizard World after a panel about strong women in science fiction. If anyone needs a new podcast to get obsessed with, we highly recommend it. It is not unusual that we find ourselves spoiled by excellent service when we go out for brunch, but Industry really deserves a shoutout. We had one incredible server who managed to juggle dozens of orders and checks quickly and without any mistakes. He deserves a major raise!
We were also lucky to have been approached by Jenny from FanMail, a bi-monthly geek subscription box for women, with an offer to sponsor us for a brunch! They sent over fun prints to give to each Brunchette and offered a unique discount code for our members to use for money off their first FanMail box! Quite a few of our Brunchettes took them up on their offer and subscribed in time for their April box: “The Gang’s All Here”. It included goodies like Orphan Black paper dolls, a Charmed scarf, Star Wars rebel hat, Guardians of the Galaxy bath bomb, nail stickers, and more fun goodies. They’re a great service for any geeky lady out there!
May  is a big brunch for us: Marvel! We have another partnership with a  local candle shop and are excited to try a new restaurant. Guardians of the Galaxy is of course on the menu. Thank you to Industry for allowing us to take over their back room and sending us that rock star server, thank you to our Brunchettes for bringing their best selves to brunch, thank you to FanMail for sponsoring our Whedonverse brunch, and thank you to Pittsburgh!