If you have been browsing on Pinterest in the last 24 hours you may have seen their latest and greatest type of pin.. the PLACE PIN! Well, last night Pinterest had a big roll out party at their San Francisco headquarters and I was one of 150 local "power pinners" who were invited to help celebrate! You have NO IDEA how excited I was!
When I asked other people if they had been invited, the answer I always got was "No. But I'm jealous.. I wish I could see what it is like!" I totally understand that.. and so I thought I would do a quick post to share my experience.
(If you want to read the more technical side of the roll-out, (what it means for Pinterest's bottom line, the criticisms and the rationale behind the event go here, or here, or here.) There were "real" media on hand to cover this event but I AM NOT ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE! I'm just a Pinterest FanGirl.)
The Pinterest building itself is an old warehouse in the SoMa (South of Market) part of San Francisco. The style is industrial vintage, and the entire place is filled with charming nosalgic items like old cameras and type writers:
In the waiting area, a very Pinterest-worthy gallery wall, with interchangeable frames holds their latest press releases and media buzz.
One of their big feature walls in the main atrium displays some wonderful neon art:
The whole vibe was creative and fun. Does your office have a giant LEGO wall? And George Takei humor?
If you can't read it it says "You are my P-I-N-S-P-I-R-A-T-I-O-N"
They don't just work at Pinterest, they also USE Pinterest just like the rest of us. Check out the names of various conference rooms in the building.. they could be names of Pins straight off of someone's board (I get the humor.. "BOARD rooms"):
And instead of flow charts and dry erase boards, they actually had giant pin boards to track their goals and accomplishments. This was in the atrium, and each of the frames contains changes implemented to Pinterest since the initial roll out, many requested by Pinterest users themselves. It included things like "Rich Pins", "Web Analytics", "Secret Boards" and "People who pinned this also pinned this":
We weren't told anything before the event other than they were going to share something new with us.
But now that I know it was all about Place Pin I see they had clues everywhere.
They had stations set up where you could mail postcards to anywhere in the world, and they even had a craft where you mod-podged vintage maps to cork circles to make your own coasters:
The food tables were adorned with vintage objects you would have collected on your vacations.. snow globes, little Eiffel towers, and my personal favorite, the golden gate bridge:
The tables themselves were decorated with simple carnation bouquets in ribbon wrapped mason jars (How Pinterest-y!) They also featured a signature drink, which of course was served in a jelly jar. The cocktail (which I forgot the name of) was Maple Syrup Bourbon, with a splash of ginger beer, a little berry schnapps and some cranberries as garnish.. needless to say, one was plenty for me!
(Hey Ben.. Tell that to my recipe board.. I would have to live 200 years to
actually make every recipe I have ever pinned. But I digress..)
He then explained what a Place Pin is. Basically, it is a pin which you can link to a spot on an intereactive map.. so if you are planning travel or want to visit certain restaurants or tourist attractions, you could set up a Pinterest board and a map and have everything you need right there on your phone.. via the Pinterest app. In your hand you hold a map, which is associated with beautiful photos you have pinned which will then lead you to the direct links to the location's websites, hours, menus, reviews etc.)
Another cool thing is that Pinterest has teamed with Partners like Trulia, UrbanSpoon, Foursquare and Walt Disney to auto-integrate location data into their new Place Pins (much like my rich pins, which integrate my site's data into pins coming from TheKimSixFix.)
I personally don't pin many places on Pinterest, but I can see how it
could be a useful new tool to people who have "places I want to go" or
"my dream vacation" boards. Maybe Place Pins won't take the DIY world by storm,
but it is nice to know I could plan my next trip to Haven!
After we got to play around with the new Apps for a while, the night was drawing to a close. Of course we couldn't leave without a parting gift. Cute little leather luggage tags displayed neatly in a vintage suitcase (more of the traveling theme):
I really did have a great time and I felt like this was a once in a lifetime opportunity to visit a company whose product I use daily. Pinterest has changed the face of the blogging world, and this was a wonderful chance to meet the people behind the P. They were just as interesting and diverse as you would expect people who work in the business of 'Pinspiration' to be!
This post was shared at some of these linky parties.
I love your ideas. Thank you so much. I come to your blog weekly, just to let you know... its great.
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