The public research started at our first location, outside of Prospect Park.
The props we had arranged were:
- Mood Board
- Sign Board
- Survey/handouts
- Painting
- Buttons
First Location –
The first person we interacted with asked us a lot of questions regarding the project and then refused to participate. We used a mood board to attract attention. About 5 people interacted with the Mood board. We were able to interact with 3 more people who completed the anonymous surveys. Edward drew on the paper that made people interested and 2 people painted on the paper. We stayed at the location for 30 minutes. Most of the people ignored us or rejected us to listen or interact. It was quite hard to stop the people have they were walking or running by. They definitely did not want to be distributed.
Second Location –
After 30 minutes, we move to our second location, inside Prospect Park. As we were walking to our destination, we noticed people staring, so we decided to approach people inside the park as we were on the move. 3 people interacted with us right away. 2 of which first did the survey and then interacted with mood boards. That’s when we decided to stop right on the curve next to a small bridge and interact with people as they were coming in or leaving. The strategy also changed to Edward holding all the buttons, Ravindra holding the mood board, Brannon holding the banner, and Zoya and Czarina interacting with people. The method worked. People were curious as they were passing by, of course, many ignored us. A lot of people were interested to talk to us, don’t matter if they participated or not. Many encouraged their children to write something on the mood board.
Button Strategy –
The idea of button distribution at first was to attract the audience. However, as we did not set up the table or on spot button making. Edward was holding the buttons. As soon as people finished the surveys or notes, Zoya and Czarina offered them buttons as thank you or reward. People loved it. On spot, our strategy changed again and instead of giving buttons first, we gave them out at the end. Safe to say, by the end of the day we had no blue tree design button left.
Inconvenience –
- Not enough clipboards to use for surveys
- Useless pens
- Table
- The Mood board was not standing straight
- Had to make a lot of on spot changes to steady the Mood board
- Strong wind
- Sticky notes flying away
- Children