whizdumb

Dust off your fanny pack

Meg Kinney has written a much needed piece about the Art of Shopping.  Her premise is that "If everything around Shopper Marketing is evolving, then so, too, must our approach to its creative."

I hope this is a catalyst for some great discussion in "the fanny pack of the marketing world" (as AdAge once termed the below-the-line space). It's about time this space got some more attention publicly from plannerly folks, as it is really a new frontier for planning.  I work in the space everyday.  We talk a lot about shoppers, not just consumers.  Of course they're the same people; but a lot of marketers don't tend to think of them that way.  As more opportunities open up for planners, I think in the coming months and couple years there will be a lot more heard from this space creatively.

Especially rich in potential is the opportunity not just to be noticed, but to be interesting in a shopping environment.  At the moment the retailers - not the brands - are the source of interest to people as they shop.  They're creating experiences and spaces that amount to something.  In some ways the brands are just part of the bigger picture.  When you acknowledge that the retail environment is now simply another medium - albeit one where people are in a certain mode (shopping) - then it sits on the same playing field as other means of contact.  It should be just as interesting.  Russell posted a video by Jeffre Jackson that explores interestingness quite well.

White as Milk

According to coloribus this is from AMA Leo Burnett in Egypt.  It's strange... is it a gurerilla execution?  A print ad (if so, what the hell is up with the production value)?  It seems spec or a guerilla one-off.  What is admirable about it is its simplicity and complete lack of gaudy claims. 

Logo tinkering

This is a nice new campaign from Perrier via Ogilvy in New York. This new trend around using the brand logo space is a great way to cut through in a cluttered environment. Hell it's one stop shopping - look in one place for messaging and brand logo. The campaign is being brough to life by on-premise themed events that have things like sword swallowers under the Riskier theme, beach themes under Sunnier, etc. So far I believe this is only being used on the logo in ads, not on actual product in store.

Primary packaging is the next place to go, and it takes real courage for brand management. Heinz's "Say Something Ketchuppy" promotion from a few years back did a great job of that by replacing the venerable TOMATO KETCHUP in the logo with sayings such as WILL WORK FOR FOOD and HIDES GRILL MARKS. The campaign is now on a customized label thing but that's another story.

Few brands have taken the on-product step. Snickers is one, though the SATISFIES message that replaces the brand name is on the reverse of the primary packaging. Its campaign includes a lot of outdoor with copy that replaces the logo altogether. Here is one of their recent bus wraps that says HUNGERECTOMY. Talk about unintended (?) innuendo. HUNG-ERECT-O-MY.

Mary Jane In-Store

This creative was done as a pitch by a small agency called Spinach, Inc. for the pro-pot group NORML (National Association for the Reform of Marijuana Laws).  It's spec work but was apparently adopted by the Georgia NORML chapter who sold it in to three small grocery chains. There is a ton of alternative media stuff out there, especially in print and outdoor.  But this is just great to see that the in-store environment is starting to be seen as place for ideas beyond coupons and CPG claims.  The challenge, of course, is retailer approval which makes this space so unlike normal media.  But as it becomes more of a measured medium this will change.

It's the little (dead) things that count

There is something mildly depressing about being at a friend's house and seeing a plant like this languishing in the corner.  Which is why I want to give props to Home Depot's kick ass policy of accepting returns on dead plants up to a year after purchase.  I can basically kill anything in a pot within 2 months.  Don't ask me why I keep trying, it's probably some kind of pride thing.  And hey, every now and then something lives.  But mostly I bring back my pathetic potted failures and, as long as I've saved the receipt and the bar code, they accept the poor thing without question.  That's service.

You have a barcode scanner in your pocket

Okay, this is pretty amazing. Your camera phone can now act like a barcode scanner and enable you to comparison shop on the spot. For example, you're at a Best Buy. You see a DVD you'd like to buy. Take a picture of the barcode and your phone will tell you how much it's selling at Amazon and give you the option to buy it on the spot. At the grocery store and the olive oil seems a bit pricey? Scan it and see if it's cheaper down the street. You download the free Scanbuy Shopper software to your camera phone. The possibilities are pretty mind boggling for this thing. I can't use it because they don't support Verizon but I'd love to hear how it works from a real person.

Upside down retail

Talk about disruptive retail. This store is literally upside-down. It's probably quite disorienting at first but is sure generates talk value. It's called Viktor & Rolf and I haven't been (it's in Milan, Italy) but would love to see it. There are lessons here for how to truly break up what is standard in a boutique, and perhaps even in malls, a grocery store within a store, pop-up retail, etc.

Viva Famima!!

A successful Japanese chain of convenience stores has just opened four stores in the US, all of them in West L.A. I visited the one on Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica. It’s quite a cool concept. The store is the size of a small 7-Eleven but with a much more mellow feel. There is not a lot of aggressive display activity and there is an amazing range of products, all high end. These range from paper towels (actual there was only one brand of paper towels, Seventh Generation) to Japanese candles and pottery, to sandwiches, soups and stationery. One of my favorites was a small tin of "Little i" mints with a cosmetic mirror built in.

There were a lot of green products such as Tom’s of Maine toothpaste, and I was struck by the beverage selections – no cans except for Red Bull, and tons of exotic teas, Jones and Izzie sodas, lots of juices, etc. There was a small row of Coke and Pepsi products in the bottom row of the cooler but they actually looked really out of place. About a quarter to a third of all the products were Japanese. Instead of hot dogs and taquitos in the hot cases, they served sticky buns and fried bread.

Their website is surprisingly transparent about their marketing strategy. They talk about how their targeting of young upscale women, including Japanese people living in America. They compare how a traditional convenience store layout is controlled by the manufacturer, but in their concept, the layout is determined by shopping ease, and “an alternative for the intelligent, concerned, or curious … with the primary objective of improving the well being of the customer.” That's some pretty fancy talk compared to what you'd expect from folks running the 'sev on the corner. Quick-E-Marts of America, beware.

Tylenol, Sudafed, Campbell's Soup...

This is a cross placement of soup in the cold remedies section. It seems totally intuitive, yet still disruptive amidst boxed medicines. I love those 'stupid simple solutions'. But too much cross placement could lead to a point where a shopper may not know where to find something. Wait... come to think of it, doesn't that happen already?

I'll take 2 GRPs and a bushel of strawberries

To me, advertising is at its best when it requires the viewer to connect some dots. This may be a couple years old but I came across it when reading through a friend's Communication Arts back issue. It's difficult to find disruptive creative in a grocery store, perhaps even more so in the produce section. Who wants to be bothered with a cereal ad while choosing an orange? People who love fruit, that's who. The problem wiht this sort of media is that you don't simply make a 'produce section' ad buy. It takes a movement of people to get this approved. The agency, client, sales force, store managers, etc. all have to really buy into it. Then it actually has to get executed flawlessly across hundreds of stores. But this is untapped space for marketing and it's exciting to me. If you've spotted any other worthy in-store examples send them on or comment below.