This thesis was conducted in co-operation between two students, The other student studied in Arcada University of Applied Sciences and another one in Haaga-Helia Universtity of Applied Sciences. At the end of the work there is also a longer summary in Swedish.

Thesis focuses on event arrangement and marketing, and on motivating children and young people. Thesis includes planning and arranging a football event for 5-12 year old girls. Thesis was assigned by Gamlakarleby Bollklubb (GBK). We co-operated also with the city of Kokkola as well as companies from the region. As requested by the co-operation partner, the Sports services of the city of Kokkola, we acknowledged also the Finland100 celebration year in planning and arranging the event.

GBK needed to arrange a low-threshold sports event for children and this way to build more awareness for the club in Kokkola. The aim of the event was to promote women’s league season opening match, which took place one week after the event. By this event, we aimed to target new girls to participate to this hobby, but also to offer a new kind of event for those already active in football sports. Our objective was that girls would get a positive picture of football as a hobby and that the event would possibly inspire people to start playing football as a new hobby.

The thesis discusses theory on event arrangement and marketing comprehensively and describes the principal shortly. Based on theoretical knowledge we have been able to plan and execute a football event for girls. The planning, execution and analysis of an event were a considerable part of this thesis.

We marketed the event in schools, preschools and kindergartens. Event advertisements were also put on display in different sports facilities and shops in Kokkola. Various media - such as Facebook, Instagram, Unelmat liikkeelle –web page, homepage of GBK and articles in newspapers - were utilized in marketing of the event.

The aim was to get about fifty participants for the event, which was reached. Almost one hundred girls with their parents came to the event. For the purposes of after marketing, we collected contact information of the participants.

The principal was satisfied for the result and hoped that FutisFun would continue to be arranged also in the future. In the discussion part we have considered possible development ideas, which can be utilized in the next FutisFun event.