Call for Sponsors 2025
Things just keep getting better!
Moving into year three of the post-Covid reboot of the Carolina Code Conference, momentum just keeps building.
In 2023 we started back with a great single day event with 15 speakers from 83 applications, 24 sponsors, and 150 attendees that sold out in 25 minutes. In 2024 we expanded to a 2 day event and for the first time resulting in a fantastic event with 30 speakers from 209 talk submissions, 24 sponsors, and 266 attendees and tons of energy.
This year we hope to make 2025 better than ever and that starts with our 2025 sponsors!
For 2025, our sponsorship tiers are laid out with the same structure as 2024 so there won’t be any surprises there. As with every other aspect of the conference, we are constantly experimenting and trying new things to see what works and what doesn’t.
Changes from 2024
Here are the changes from 2024 that you’ll want to know about.
Just as we incentivize returning attendees with early access tickets and a 20% discount, we’re going to do the same for our returning sponsors! All returning sponsors are offered a 20% discount on their tier of choice!
Through some discussions with venues around the area, we are considering putting out our first ever Call for Training to allow sponsors to offer paid training classes to conference attendees the Thursday before the event begins. If you would be interested in offering a single day training course, please reach out via email to sponsor@carolina.codes to express your interest.
We’ll begin including our sponsor logos with a link to our main sponsor page in the footer of our official emails, giving your brand a little more exposure with every message!
We’re dropping the Digital Swag Bag. Only a couple of sponsors participated in our first attempt last year and the reception was fairly mixed, so for now we’re going to retire it. If you’d like to offer a post-conference promotion to attendees just let us know and we’ll be happy to discuss options.
No more podcast inclusion on the Carolina Code Cast…because the Carolina Code Cast itself is slowing down significantly. As much fun as the podcast has been over the last year it was a big time sink to try to maintain the production schedule that we felt was necessary. There are still several episodes yet to be published after releasing 27 last year (and those are still coming), but at the moment the time simply isn’t there to include it with our sponsor benefits.
Scholarship tickets will no longer be tied to sponsorships. We will still be reserving a chunk of free scholarship tickets that will be made available through contests like Advent of Code as well as other promotions and giveaways, but it created some confusion to associate them with the sponsorships last year.
2025 Overview
We have 4 primary sponsorship tiers: Bronze, Silver, Gold and Platinum and a single premium Title sponsorship that can be discussed as well (ie - The Carolina Code Conference by Premium Title Sponsor). The expected audience size will remain 300 attendees each day thanks to the capacity at our beautiful and functional venue by Flywheel! Since the expected capacity remains the same as 2024, all sponsorship tiers will be priced the same as well.
Sponsorship spots can be claimed at any time between now and when the conference begins on August 15th, but the earlier the better. Physical booth space for sponsors at the event is limited, which limits the available sponsorship slots at the higher tiers so claim them early!
Also, the deadline for logo inclusion for our 2025 Lyrical Code t-shirt will be June 30th.
2024 2025 Website Opportunity
We are still working on our polyglot website for a polyglot conference project, but with everything we tried out in 2024, this project didn’t have the bandwidth needed to get launched. We needed to work out tooling, hosting, volunteers and time.
Luckily, thanks to our 2024 sponsors Fly.io and Codegiant.io, we have hosting and tooling for the project secured! Now we just need volunteers and time.
Eventually, we hope to allow this site to feature technology from our sponsors every year, in addition to the favorite languages of our community (with benchmarks!). If that sounds like something you’d like to be involved in, just let us know!
Sponsorship Features
A few items to highlight this year that will be available in various sponsorship levels.
Topic Requests - As a sponsor at the event, you may want to ensure your target audience is in attendance. If you’re hiring for PHP, Cybersecurity, .NET, Java, Rust then it’s more likely your target audience will be in attendance if there’s a speaker covering the subject. While we do not sell speaker slots for the event we do weigh a number of factors during talk selection, including the preferences of our sponsors.
Social Media - We have multiple social media channels and we’re happy to post about your company in various capacities, including tagging your accounts on your preferred platforms. We currently cast a wide net but the number of platforms are rapidly expanding. If you would prefer to see us active on a platform we don’t currently support, please let us know. We’re currently active on LinkedIn, Twitter/X, YouTube, Mastodon and Instagram.
Conference T-Shirt - Last year’s t-shirt and source code was a huge hit. This year, rather than waiting to do the song selection with online polls in the middle of the year, we let our 2024 attendees vote during the conference. This year’s winner, All Star by Smash Mouth. We were thrilled to be able to colorize the logos of our Platinum and Gold sponsors on the 2024 t-shirt and plan to do the same this year as well. Take a look!
Our 2024 Lyrical Code T-shirt with Colorized Sponsor Logos Now Hiring Email - Prior to the conference this year, we will send out an email summarizing available positions with our sponsors who will be in attendance. All paid sponsors (including Bronze Tier) can include positions in this email so that potential candidates may come prepared to speak with you during the event. These will be due 1 week prior to the event.
Job Board - There will also be a physical marker board where available jobs can be written. Sponsors will get first access to this, but any other attendees will have access to fill in positions if space is available.
Video Sponsorship - Conference videos will feature your logo and a link to your company. Visit our YouTube channel for examples from the 2023 and 2024 events.
Booth Space - Now that construction of Flywheel Greenville is complete, we have a much clearer picture of available booth space for our sponsors. Five large booths are available including a 6’ x 2.5’ table for our Platinum and Gold sponsors, with 2.5’ diameter high top tables available for our Silver sponsors for your display. Position preferences will be allocated by sponsorship tier and sponsorship date.
Badge Scanner - Sean Reid came through last year with a prototype badge scanning system, Stinking Badges, that our sponsors we were able to utilize in 2024. We can’t wait to see how it’s been updated for 2025! Rumor has it there may even be a talk in the works…
Naming Rights - If you have a creative idea for something at the conference that we can put your name on, talk to us about it. If there are hard costs to putting your logo on something like a lanyard, you will be responsible for those. In 2023 we had the Seek Quality Conference Retrospective and the Engineer Kit Lunch Hour, where mentorship and career opportunities were discussed. No guarantees here, but we are open to discussing just about anything to help our sponsors.
Conference Chat - Last year we setup a Zulip chat system for conference attendees to interact with each other, speakers and our sponsors. All sponsors will have access to this system.
Sponsorship Tiers
Bronze Tier (No Limit)
$500 sponsorship. Items in Bold are described in detail above.
Logo and excerpt on the website with link to your company
Grayscale logo inclusion on the Conference T-shirt
Social Media shout outs
Inclusion on a “Thank You Sponsors!” slide in the opening talk
1 Full Ticket (both days, $150 value)
Inclusion in the Now Hiring email in advance of the conference
Silver Tier (Limit 10)
$2,000 sponsorship. Items in Bold are described in detail above.
Logo and excerpt on the website with link to your company
Logo inclusion on monitors throughout the venue during the event
Grayscale logo inclusion on the Conference T-shirt
Social Media shout outs, including “be on the lookout for…” style posts just prior to the event
Mention of your company before the introduction of at least one speaker
Video Sponsorship with company logo and link with at least one speaker video
Booth Space at the event for company promotion, swag giveaways and interviews
Inclusion on the Now Hiring Email and premium access to the physical Job Board
Topic Requests for programming language, technology or speaker topic consideration during the event
2 Full Tickets (both days, $300 value)
Gold Tier (Limit 4)
$5,000 sponsorship. Items in Bold are described in detail above.
Logo and excerpt on the website with link to your company
Logo inclusion on displays throughout the venue during the event
Color logo inclusion on the Conference T-shirt
Social Media shout outs, including “be on the lookout for…” style posts just prior to the event
Blog post and Email about your company on the site that will be distributed to our entire mailing list
Mention of your company before the introduction of at least one speaker
Mention of your company during the conference welcome
Repeated mentions of your company throughout the conference
Video Sponsorship with company logo and link on multiple videos
Booth Space at the event for company promotion, swag giveaways and interviews
Inclusion on the Now Hiring Email and premium access to the physical Job Board
Topic Requests for programming language, technology or speaker topic consideration during the event
Naming Rights to an aspect of the conference either during or after conference activities (see above)
4 Full Tickets (both days, $600 value)
Platinum Tier (Limit 2)
$10,000 sponsorship. Items in Bold are described in detail above.
Color logo inclusion on the Conference T-shirt and the website with link to your company
Logo inclusion on displays throughout the venue during the event
Social Media shout outs, including “be on the lookout for…” style posts just prior to the event
Mention of your company before the introduction of at least one speaker
Mention of your company during the conference welcome
Repeated mentions of your company throughout the conference
5 minutes during either the opening or closing of the conference to Address the Attendees
Blog post and Email about your company on the site that will be distributed to our entire mailing list
Video Sponsorship with company logo and link on every video
Optional inclusion in the Digital Swag Bag
Premium Booth Space at the event for company promotion, swag giveaways and interviews.
Inclusion on the Now Hiring Email and premium access to the physical Job Board
Topic Requests for programming language, technology or speaker topic consideration during the event
Naming Rights to an aspect of the conference either during or after conference activities (see above)
Optional Podcast interview by a member of your company
6 Full Tickets (both days, $900 value)
Optionally, you may host a Friday Night Event for conference attendees that we will promote as part of the conference itinerary. Last year Fly.io held a Happy Hour at New Realm Brewing that was a huge hit!
Thank You!
If you would like to discuss sponsorship opportunities, please reach out to sponsor@carolina.codes. This event cannot happen without your support.
Additionally, we’re always happy to discuss, Community, Media and In-Kind Sponsorship opportunities for organizations who wish to help us promote the event in other ways. Contact us to discuss any ideas that you may have!
*Per the same conference rules for speakers, political sponsorships will not be allowed.