Business News
St Ives and Thorntons Remind Shoppers of Dates To Give Sweet Gifts This Spring
Tuesday 10. March 2009 - SP Group, the leading provider of POS, POP and related services (part of St Ives plc), has produced innovative, retail promotional materials for Thorntons spring campaign.
The material included POP and window displays to mark and remind consumers of the three main occasions for the spring season – Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day and Easter. By installing one display that encompassed all three calendar events, SP Group was able to provide the client with a flexible, cost-effective solution that successfully communicated the dates, while also driving sales for its chocolate gifts.
“Research shows that a good proportion of UK consumers do not associate the 14th February with Valentine’s Day, or know when Mother’s Day and Easter fall. As such, our brief for the Thorntons spring retail campaign, was to create retail promotional materials to more effectively communicate the dates of these three events,” explains Sarah Bell, Account Director, SP Group. “To achieve this, Thorntons’ creative team designed the initial concepts, tying in packaging designs for the seasonal products, and we then worked with them to develop these ideas and put them into practice.”
“Together, we came up with a design that would clearly communicate the dates of the three events through a series of numbers. The numbers were free-standing polystyrene units that could be positioned to display the dates 14th (Valentine’s Day), 22nd (Mother’s Day) and the 12th (Easter) and count down from four days prior to the event, providing an effective reminder for passing consumers – namely men under pressure not to forget these occasions! This concept ensures we can highlight all the key dates using a minimum amount of display material, providing value for money over the three-month campaign.”
The campaign materials for all 642 Thorntons retail outlets in the UK, also consist of vibrant window enhancements featuring a flag icon (e.g. a flower for Mothering Sunday). In addition, window posters communicate the key message for the approaching event, with fabricated birdcage-shaped tables used to display the seasonal themed products in store.
Lisa Kesterton, Consumer Communication Executive, Thorntons comments, “We’ve been working with SP Group for our POP requirements for over eight years now, and have frequent and open communication with the team when it comes to making our campaign concepts a reality. SP Group is always very proactive in sourcing the best solution to meet our requirements, and we value their input throughout the production process.
“For this particular campaign, we had to consider that some elements of the window displays would not be on show all of the time, and that each retail outlet would need to store various pieces. This posed a problem particularly for the bulky number units, but SP Group ensured that these units were designed and produced in such a way that they could be easily packed into a box and stored neatly until required. It is this kind of exemplary customer service, attention to detail and practical solution that we appreciate when working with SP Group.”