boatBurner builds hop field in downtown Minneapolis

Global craft beer industry experts, brewers and suppliers flocked to downtown Minneapolis for the 2022 Craft Brewers Conference (CBC) at the Minneapolis Convention Center. The hotels were packed, the convention center was jammed full of exhibitors and people from all sides of the business connected over everything and anything craft beer related during this three-day grand event. With over 1,200 trade show booths on the showroom floor, boatBurner created an unexpected experience to make Roy Farms stand out in an extremely crowded vendor showcase. We opted out of the main convention floor altogether and built an artificial hop field outside the main doors on the convention plaza.

With our uncanny ability to make things happen, boatBurner was able to source a truckload of artificial vines and hop cones — and, most importantly, we paid off Mother Nature to behave during this early spring event in Minnesota. This winning mindset allowed the sun to shine brightly on the 20' x 40' replica of a hop field as it took center stage as the CBC wow factor. Every day attendees had to walk through the hop field to cross the street to enter the CBC. Intentional placement? Yes. Did the hop field look real? People were smelling the artificial hops (true story). And since we couldn’t drink beer on the plaza, we handed out thousands of Roy Farms sample hop bags and distributed free pint tokens to drive traffic to some of the best local breweries in the Twin Cities. Roy Farms was thrilled with their activation and the team is already planning for next year’s CBC in Nashville.