TOOL KIT
GLOBAL
PRIMARY
This “Tool Kit” is a collection of materials and ideas for your chapter or country
committee to make your Voter Registration, VFA Promotion & Get Out The Vote events
more interesting, and more successful.
You may print some of these materials on your printer at home (ez print, ink-friendly),
print larger quantities locally at a professional printer or copy shop, or request a
shipment of SOME of these materials from the EMEA COOP by contacting
EMEACOOP@DemocratsAbroad.org
Some could even be “customized” for your chapter or CC, with your local “identity”. The
COOP will try to help you out with the graphics work.
If you have anything to add to this document or ideas on how to improve it, please
contact the Quaide Williams of DA-Germany (me@quaide.com) or any member on the
Communications Team.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of things you should have at your GP event
Documents
Decoration
Other materials / equipment / hardware
Press - PR Materials
Ideas for games, contests and programs that will make your GP event more interesting
Themes & evening entertainment ideas
Ballot Box Design Contest
Facebook : Photos of voters putting their ballots in the ballot box
Member Survey of “My most important issues”
Panel discussion on issues / constituencies
U.S. map with States for voters to mark where they’ll vote in November
Patriotic political quiz / Pin the tail on the donkey
Button design contest
Customized buttons
Graphics & Other important documents
Posters
Poster DA :
Poster GP :
Signs for tables
Sign CHECK IN HERE
Sign VOTE HERE
Sign JOIN DA HERE
Sign VFA
Postcard mailing
Postcard front:
Postcard back:
Important documents
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List of things you should have at your GP event
This list is not a complete list, but should be seen as a guide to help your voting center
coordinators get started. Depending on the size of your event, some of the materials are not
really necessary - just ideas.
Documents
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Ballots
List of GP “Voting center rules”
“DSP for Dummies”, a condensed version of the DSP + DOs and DONTs
Paper forms for joining DA if using the “join” button on DA.org is not an option, or if
Internet access is down
Paper forms for registering to vote if using VFA.org is not an option, or if Internet access
is down (get them from consulate, or order from the FVAP in U.S.)
Decoration
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GP Signs for Voting Center Tables
American flags, tablecloths
Large DA Posters or telescopic banners as backdrop for behind the ballot box
DA Info-Posters
Global Presidential Primary Info-Posters
Other materials / equipment / hardware
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Ballot box (with a special design?)
I VOTED stickers (see COOP catalog)
Computers with internet access; smart phones (to register or re-register your GP voters;
to verify addresses, phone numbers and email addresses of existing members)
Printer (to print out registrations / ballot requests when people use VFA on site)
Envelopes & stamps to make sending the VFA PDF that you print out easier for your GP
voters (you can ask for a donation to help pay for these)
Press - PR Materials
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Talking points
Press releases
Description of DA (international brochures?) in English and local language
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Ideas for games, contests and programs that will
make your GP event more interesting
Themes & evening entertainment ideas
Here are a couple of ideas on themes for the party, as well as entertainment you could arrange
for evening events:
● “Party for the Party” - Nice way to describe what we are doing during the GPP
● “Red, White and Blues” - Jazz music as entertainment during your event (evening
entertainment)
● One idea for a “low-maintenance” entertainment program would be to have a TV at your
GP event and show (on repeat, in a “loop”) the new 17-minute Obama video and/or
some of the other videos on the new link to MYBO:
http://my.barackobama.com/One-Year-Ago
Ballot Box Design Contest
You might want to get your country committee’s chapters to compete against each other for the
most interesting, beautiful, patriotic ballot box designs. (Berlin’s winning ballot box from 2008 is
pictured above)
Facebook : Photos of voters putting their ballots in the ballot box
As your voters are putting their ballots in the ballot box, you might consider having someone
take pictures of each voter (if they want their picture taken, of course). You could send them the
photo by email and/or you could post the picture to your local DA Facebook page with a caption
like “Mary voting in the XY Chapter Global Presidential Primary”. The upside of getting them to
post it to your facebook page (and share it with theirs) is that you can make sure that they have
already “liked” your fb page. This would generate buzz with with the DA sphere, but also outside
(with the friends of the members whose pictures are taken = multiplier effect).
Member Survey of “My most important issues”
There will be a survey of issues important to our members. (Details to follow. Link will be made
available as soon as the member survey has been vetted and approved.)
Panel discussion on issues / constituencies
Based on the ideas in the “membership survey” mentioned above, it would be good to have, as
part of the entertainment, a panel discussion of a couple of these issues. These are the kinds of
issues that really get people fired up (and ready to go!)...
U.S. map with States for voters to mark where they’ll vote in November
You can hang up a map of the United States on the wall and ask each voter to mark (with a
sticker?) where they are from, i.e. where they vote. For larger events, this will show the diversity
of our voters and of our members.
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Patriotic political quiz / Pin the tail on the donkey
Games and a quiz based on politics and the upcoming elections / candidates will soon be made
available to all CCs worldwide. (Details to follow. Link will be made available as soon as the
game/quiz has been vetted and approved.)
Button design contest
You can get your members’ creative juices flowing by having a button-design contest. Buttons
can be produced, by most companies that make them, for around 40 cents each (if you can’t
find a place, contact the EMEA COOP for help: EMEACOOP@DemocratsAbroad.org). So you
could have a contest in your country and produce the winning design(s) for distribution, giving
the winning designer 5 or so free buttons. You could even do several different “themes” like
“constituency buttons” and “issues buttons”, or “pro-Democratic message” and “funny,
humorous buttons” - if you plan on producing several buttons for your CC anyway.
Customized buttons
It is possible to create templates of buttons, which can be altered to read “John for CandidateX”. This would enable you to sell buttons as a fundraiser with people’s names on them - and
depending on the design(s), you could probably sell a LOT!
Graphics & Other important documents
Posters
Poster DA :
When you hold normal meetings for your chapter, or when you are doing some event, how do
your members find you? The front of this poster is something that you can actually use all year
around. The bottom fifth of the A3-sized poster is in white (matt, not glossy), so you can write by
hand where you can be found: “2nd floor, room 210. Tonight at 7pm!”
Poster GP :
Outside your voting center, at the front door or in the winding hallway... How do your voters find
your voting center? The back of this poster is something that you can actually use all year
around. The bottom fifth of the A3-sized poster is in white (matt, not glossy), so you can write by
hand where you can be found: “2nd floor, room 210. Tonight at 7pm!”
Signs for tables
When your voters come into your voting center, what will they see? Where do they go? What do
they do? We have created some signs for your voting center coordinators:
Sign CHECK IN HERE
Where you will check your voters’ membership details and get them signed in.
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Sign VOTE HERE
Where your voters will pick up their ballots.
Sign JOIN DA HERE
For those voters who wander in off the street, so to speak, we allow them to join DA right there
on the spot - and vote. How D(d)emocratic of us!
Sign VFA
For the voter registration table! This is where your voters will go - EVERY ONE OF THEM - after
they have voted in the Global Primary. We need to make 100% SURE that every single voter reregisters using VFA. If there is a line at this table, tough! Make ’em do it! This is EXTREMELY
IMPORTANT! (Note: You could also provide envelopes and stamps, with the correct
denomination, to make it easier for your voters when they re-register - so they can mail it off,
right after they leave the voting center.)
Postcard mailing
DA-Germany has created a new “maxi-size” postcard with a section which can be cut off and
shared with a friend (one for each recipient, of course). This means that DAG will not only be
reaching out to all its members, but hopefully also TWICE that number! Originally, DAG wanted
to have that section (the tab) be perforated, but the Deutsche Post thought it was too risky that
the perforated tab would come off when it goes through the machines. So, DAG opted for the
“old-fashioned” cut-it-yourself design. This is a great way for Country Committees to check the
accuracy of their street addresses in the database, and as DA-Austria suggested, the donations
you get from such a mailing normally cover the costs 2-fold or 3-fold.
Postcard front:
Shows the VFA logo twice, once for the recipient of the postcard (the larger one) and once for
the person DAG hopes the recipient will try to get to vote (the smaller cut-off tab).
Postcard back:
On the left, the back of the cut-off tab (for the recipients’ friends) and in the middle, an
explanation of the goings-on surrounding the Global Primary in Germany, as well as a request
for volunteers and donations. The “stamp” is also integrated into the design.
Important documents
We will be putting up everything we can get our hands on, all documents that MUST be made
available to voters at the voting centers: ballots (of course!), Delegate candidate statements,
challenge forms, voting center rules, voting center guide, etc. Check here for last-minute
additions, etc.
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