Originally appeared in ParkNews

ParkBoston Street Arcade Event Wins Parking Matters® Award

June 8, 2016-

Charlotte, NC- Passport, North America’s leading mobile payments provider for parking and transit, was recently recognized by the International Parking Institute for its “ParkBoston: It’s Game Over for Quarters” marketing initiative in Boston, MA in October 2015. The company’s marketing program won a Parking Matters® award at the recent International Parking Institute Conference and Expo in Nashville, TN.

The Parking Matters® Marketing and Communications awards program is designed to recognize outstanding parking related marketing, public relations, or communications programs and campaigns. Eligible programs use a wide spectrum of marketing tools, from advertising and public relations to collateral development, signage, special events, direct mail, video, and social media.

Passport worked closely with the City of Boston, organizing the first-ever street arcade event featuring arcade games on the streets of southend Boston, where Bostonians were invited to play using the quarters they no longer needed to feed the meter. The award-winning “ParkBoston: It’s Game Over for Quarters” street arcade event celebrated the ParkBoston app’s citywide deployment in a unique way that also brought additional app awareness and usage.

Boston Mayor, Marty Walsh, even took part by playing competitive games of bubble hockey with ParkBoston users.

Marketing efforts included a social media campaign, a PR campaign to ensure local media coverage, life-size banners along the streets of Boston, and ParkBoston branded giveaways at the event. All of these efforts were under the tagline, “ParkBoston: It’s Game Over for Quarters”.

The street arcade event was unique and effective in the way that it brought the Boston community together under the ParkBoston brand. The positive, fun showcase of parking technology proved successful in furthering the adoption of the mobile payment service.
“We’re thrilled to be recognized by the International Parking Institute for this event. It’s working with great partners, like the City of Boston, that enables us to create fun and innovative ways to generate awareness about technology that is making life easier for consumers,” said Daniel Bliley, Director of Marketing at Passport.