I was say the coolest thing was when I was approached in the pits and given a doughnut for a post on chiefdelphi. I was like sweet! Free breakfast!
I enjoy my 461 piece-of-2003-robot (I believe it’s a battery cover) from the Indiana State Fair. Oh wait… I’m not supposed to have that… am I? :yikes:
remembers
I think it was 229 who gave out stress-reliever balls at LI.
I definitely got some use out of those. They were cool looking too!
How about those tape measures team 88 gave out!!! hahaha people loved them!!! We only had like 300 though or our head bands that we were giving out… people loved them…
Personally I liked the parachuters… they were awesome!!!
Nobody like out flashing Canadian snowflakes? 
This is probably the wrong forum to bring up the rules in, but. . . .
Isn’t it illegal to give away anything but pins?
Technically you’re not supposed to give anything away, your supposed to trade. You’re also not supposed to have music in the pits, music on your carts, powered carts etc…
No. The rules do state though that food items are dissallowed. Pins and other items are allowed to giveaway/trade. So as long as you don’t give away food cough like some teams did this year cough then you are good to go.
I wanted one of them so bad… but was not able to get one. 
Although, if you really want to be popular next year, your team should have extra team jersey’s to trade with people. I know of at least a handfull of people who wanted them in a bad way, myself included.
cool! well, Team 236 (my team, lol) also gave out stressballs… that’s how we got those cool sunglasses! hahaha. We also gave out got bot stickers… which reminds me, i have to put mine on my car!!! hahahahaha!!! 
Some people did get a Team 188 jersey. I believe that a few members of Team 22 got some from when the came and were billeted with our team. I know of 1 MC who got one but that might be all. Now If you would like to purchase one that might be arranged. I believe that they cost our students $40.00 CDN so thats why they were not too available. As for the flashing snowflakes, we made 600 that were given out at 2 regionals and Championships. If you really want one of those I know that I gave some to the mentors of Buzz while watching the Leafs in Atlanta.
Your what? I never saw those… hmmm… I think a few kids on the team got them though… I’ll have to check them out…
In the Regional Events section of The FIRST Website under Site Info it says, "Do not give out any free products. . . ". While it mentions food/drinks specifically, I’m pretty sure that the word “any” covers everything else.
candy, water, soft drinks, or fruit.
site info
In otherwords don’t compete with the local vendors.
and don’t create an increased cleaning situation for facilities.
At So Cal we clarified the site rules. They just didn’t want any “hard” food brought in from the outside - no glass bottles, no fried chicken that would leave bones…
Turned out we could bring in “soft” foods - i.e. pizza, mcdonalds, subway, unless the crowd got so big and facilities felt the need to “tighten” the rules and scale back to no soft foods allowed in at all either.
So Cal “site info” uses the same words “Do not give out any free products…” and goes on to give examples of what they mean, edibles and drinkables.
Our team gave out nut n volts magazines, yo yo’s, frisbees, rcu armbands…in addition to buttons.
We have a middle school spirit team that picked our giveaways and we let them decide. Little screwdrivers and stuff that is hard to describe but was very popular at the regionals-little putty things that make splat noises when you stick your finger in. Very middle school! My favorite though is our bright yellow, six sided “Robot on Board” signs. They are on the van right now.
curious If you ever get a chance, post a pic?
Let’s see… at nationals some people on our team had silly putty in Easter Eggs, except I don’t know who they got it from. However, it amused me endlessly, so that was good. 
I also liked 868’s plastic callipers because they were cute…and the technokats keychain flashlights.
Hmm…someone gave out bubbles, too. Lots of fun stuff this year
By the way…if anyone ever wants a 469 banana I have a million extras…
Ellen
Cheryl, remember those “Baby on Board” things that got put on the back window of your car? Replace “Baby” with “Robot” PM me with your address and I’ll send you one. I’ll see if I can get a pic.
LOL I did see those…you’re the team that was covered in Caution tape, right? I rather enjoyed team 1278’s “Sleep Is Weak” stickers.
Not us with the caution tape but maybe some of our “Robot on Board” signs made it to the nationals, even if we didn’t. Our look was definitely black tie this year…