Northwest Tune-Up 2025

I joined Tune-Up in January 2025 to lead the media team. By July we'd helped push the festival to 13,000+ attendees, an all time record. Three days of bikes, music and beer on Bellingham's waterfront.

The situation

Tight budgets. A small media team. A goal to grow attendance year over year without spending into it. The festival had momentum from prior years. The job was converting that momentum into more bodies through the gates, on a lean spend.

The strategic call

Brand only posts about the festival were the floor of our performance. Anything that either gave the audience something or brought a partner in beat them. So we leaned into two formats hard.

  • Ticket giveaways co-promoted with sponsors. Built around an action: tag a friend, follow both accounts, share to story. Pulled reach from sponsor follower bases we didn't already own.

  • True collab posts with sponsors. Published as collaborations so they showed in both feeds, not just tagged. Borrowed audience. Showed sponsors as participants, not patrons. Same content, double the surface area.

I led the Rainier giveaway and the Rainier collab end to end. Sponsor outreach, creative direction, copy, scheduling, all of it. The insight that came out of that work shaped the rest of the campaign: open the doors wider, perform above the floor.

The receipts

  • 13,000+ festival attendees, an all time record

  • 655,925 video views across campaign content

  • 12,010 content interactions, up 100% year over year

  • 157,880 total reach and 1,787 new followers

  • 60,000+ views on peak content days

  • 100+ posts published live during the festival

  • 150,000+ organic impressions from creator partners, zero paid spend

What I ran day to day

  • Media direction on the ground. Led the team capturing content live during the festival. Five videos shipped, each cut for social.

  • Volunteer creator coordination. Recruited 9 volunteer photographers and videographers and assigned them coverage areas. Coordinated 20+ outside creators on top of that. Reviewed every asset before it went live.

  • Live social. 100+ pieces of content out to Instagram and Facebook during the weekend. Captions in the festival's voice, laid back but actionable.

  • Sponsor and athlete activations. Built coverage around moments like Shimano athlete rides and Transition Bikes skills clinics so partners got visibility without losing the festival's grassroots feel.

  • Press and community. Wrote and distributed press releases. Submitted to regional event calendars. Promoted on Reddit.

  • Daily work in Asana. Tracked the team on tight festival timelines and kept distributed partners in sync.

Watch the weekend

The 2025 Tune-Up festival recap on YouTube. Three minutes of bikes, music and crowd.

Stay connected

Tune-Up returns to Bellingham July 10 to 12, 2026.



Northwest Tune-Up 2025

I joined Tune-Up in January 2025 to lead the media team. By July we'd helped push the festival to 13,000+ attendees, an all time record. Three days of bikes, music and beer on Bellingham's waterfront.

The situation

Tight budgets. A small media team. A goal to grow attendance year over year without spending into it. The festival had momentum from prior years. The job was converting that momentum into more bodies through the gates, on a lean spend.

The strategic call

Brand only posts about the festival were the floor of our performance. Anything that either gave the audience something or brought a partner in beat them. So we leaned into two formats hard.

  • Ticket giveaways co-promoted with sponsors. Built around an action: tag a friend, follow both accounts, share to story. Pulled reach from sponsor follower bases we didn't already own.

  • True collab posts with sponsors. Published as collaborations so they showed in both feeds, not just tagged. Borrowed audience. Showed sponsors as participants, not patrons. Same content, double the surface area.

I led the Rainier giveaway and the Rainier collab end to end. Sponsor outreach, creative direction, copy, scheduling, all of it. The insight that came out of that work shaped the rest of the campaign: open the doors wider, perform above the floor.

The receipts

  • 13,000+ festival attendees, an all time record

  • 655,925 video views across campaign content

  • 12,010 content interactions, up 100% year over year

  • 157,880 total reach and 1,787 new followers

  • 60,000+ views on peak content days

  • 100+ posts published live during the festival

  • 150,000+ organic impressions from creator partners, zero paid spend

What I ran day to day

  • Media direction on the ground. Led the team capturing content live during the festival. Five videos shipped, each cut for social.

  • Volunteer creator coordination. Recruited 9 volunteer photographers and videographers and assigned them coverage areas. Coordinated 20+ outside creators on top of that. Reviewed every asset before it went live.

  • Live social. 100+ pieces of content out to Instagram and Facebook during the weekend. Captions in the festival's voice, laid back but actionable.

  • Sponsor and athlete activations. Built coverage around moments like Shimano athlete rides and Transition Bikes skills clinics so partners got visibility without losing the festival's grassroots feel.

  • Press and community. Wrote and distributed press releases. Submitted to regional event calendars. Promoted on Reddit.

  • Daily work in Asana. Tracked the team on tight festival timelines and kept distributed partners in sync.

Watch the weekend

The 2025 Tune-Up festival recap on YouTube. Three minutes of bikes, music and crowd.

Stay connected

Tune-Up returns to Bellingham July 10 to 12, 2026.

PARTNERED CONTENT HIGHLIGHTS:

PARTNERED CONTENT HIGHLIGHTS: