The Windy City certainly lived up to its name during the annual Shopper Marketing Expo this month in Chicago. We were buffeted by winds up to 55 miles per hour. Fortunately most of my time was spent indoors at the historic Navy Pier. The Expo brings together the brightest minds in the shopper marketing space and serves as an opportunity to share best-in-class examples of practical applications at retail. During one of the dinners I was seated next to a senior brand manager from Kimberly-Clark and we toasted each other for being fellow Gold Hub Prize winners. His team won for work related to Kotex and Poise feminine care products. It was gratifying to realize that our young, agile studio in Charlotte is competing at the level of national and international brands like Kimberly-Clark and their agency partner JWT/OgilvyAction. As we like to say, sometimes the biggest ideas can come from the smallest agencies. Learn more at www.birdsonggregory.com
Birdsong Gregory has been a strong proponent and supporter of AIGA for quite some time. For those unfamiliar with the organization, "AIGA is the professional association for design, a nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing design as a professional craft, strategic tool and vital cultural force. Founded in 1914, AIGA today serves more than 22,000 members through 66 chapters and 200 student groups across the United States. AIGA stimulates thinking about design, demonstrates the value of design and empowers the success of designers at each stage of their careers."
In fact, the AIGA Charlotte chapter recently did a membership spotlight on our very own Rhonda Sergeant who has been a member for over 12 years now!
AIGA Charlotte is also known for bringing a variety of renown speakers to town and hosting its very own design related events. I was honored to place 3rd in their first ever Meet & Tweet event two weeks ago. Designers from all walks of life picked a tweet out of a hat and then had one month to illustrate the tweet in anyway they saw fit. The work was then printed, painted or stenciled and displayed at Common Market Southend for one night only. A panel of highly qualified judges reviewed the posters and honored the top 5 with invaluable street cred and spray painted birds. Carefull, I think they are still wet.
On May 21st, the day of my first NASCAR race – the 2011 All Star Race, I knew that I was in for a treat with screaming fans wearing wife beaters and drinking beer, rubber burning on the track and cheering on my favorite driver- Jimmy Johnson, but I had no idea I was in for a bigger surprise than that. Come to find out, it also happens to be the day the Lowe's Motor Speedway is debuting the world's largest HD TV! This TV officially surpassed the Dallas Cowboy's stadium TV under construction and is larger than the White House, coming in at whopping 200 feet wide and 80 feet high.
Working at this shopper marketing agency, my mind can't help but wonder – will advertising on this massive screen support the bigger is better theory?
Just as racing season hits its peak in Charlotte, with the Coca Cola 600 this weekend, I encourage you to check it out, and get a double dose of live experience mixed with heart-pounding action on the world's largest HD TV.
Most shoppers look for the iconic cigar chomping Vlasic stork in the pickle aisle, but lately, thanks to a new instore ad campaign for one of America's most popular pickle brand, you can find the stoutly billed Groucho Marx-imitating bird in other parts of the your supermarket. Like next to ground beef in the butchers case. After all, what goes better with a hamburger than a nice crisp dill pickle? Research shows that a majority of burgers are served with pickles, and as grilling season gets underway the timing is good.
Along with shelves and grocery carts, vinyl ads also will appear on supermarket floors, while displays near the pickles themselves will dispense coupons and recipes. Along with this in-store advertising, which will run through September, the new Vlasic campaign includes recent ads in print magazines like People and Dash and on websites including FoodNetwork.com.
Vlasic, a brand of the Pinnacle Foods Group, spent $7.9 million on advertising in 2009 and $8.4 million in 2010, according to the Kantar Media unit of WPP. Eric Hintz, vice president for marketing at Pinnacle, declined to reveal the exact cost of the new campaign, but said marketing expenditures in 2011 would increase by double digits over last year.
As a Charlotte based shopper marketing agency, birdsong gregory is experiencing this trend firsthand and is excited about how retailers and product brands increasingly understand the importance of being relevant at the shelf.
According to a recent survey by the GMA and Booz, 55 percent of brands plan to increase spending on shopper marketing by more then 5 percent annually over the next three years, which is more than those intending to increase spending on social media (52 percent), Internet advertising (41 percent), print media (14 percent) or television (7 percent).
Some other examples of fun instore marketing juxtapositions:
To promote its soy and teriyaki sauces, Kikkoman dispenses recipes for marinades and coupons from a shelf display in the meat section during grilling season and places turkey brining recipes in the poultry section before Thanksgiving.
In an instore Valentine’s Day promotion to encourage using M&M’s in recipes, the Mars brand recently placed displays in the bakery aisle at supermarkets with cupcake recipes featuring the candies.
2011 has been a busy year for Birdsong Gregory, Shopper Marketing agency out of Charlotte, NC. One of our big new ventures this year has been launching a campaign for our client, Husqvarna with a new category of riding lawn mower. With this, we created campaigns and brand identities around their three core brands: Weed Eater, McCullouch & Poulan Pro within this new division. BG promoted this new product by creating identities through naming, logos, print ads, banner ads, videos & websites for each of the three brands and the category.
To learn more about this new product and to see some of our work, please check out the following:
The beef scented billboard we designed for our North Carolina supermarket client Bloom has been featured everywhere from Nikkei Marketing Journal in Japan to the Today Show and even mentioned on an episode of the CBS show CSI. But to be featured in the comics – well that's when you know you've really made it.
A few weeks ago the Blondie strip above referenced the existence of a BBQ scented billboard. Needless to say this has been a pretty powerful advertising vehicle for Bloom – delivering unearned media impressions to the tune of millions of dollars. And it's also nice to be recognized by our industry peers. The Bloom scented billboard was awarded a Gold ADDY just last week from the advertising community in Charlotte.
A recent post from Advertising Age sheds a little bit of light on a planned in-store kiosk from Kraft to take shopper marketing to a new level.
Using a consumer's list and shopping history (derived from scanning your loyalty card and/or shopping list), it regurgitates suggested recipes and adds new items to the shopping list that are needed to cook the meals. Kraft has not deployed it anywhere yet, but is in discussions with unnamed retailers about possibly launching it soon.
"Shoppers struggle with 'What am I going to make?' every single night for dinner," said Don King, Kraft's VP-retail experience. "This is designed to try to help that process go smoother." Along the way, it drives more purchases at the store, including more Kraft brands.
The kiosk also includes a small camera that scans an image of the shopper's face. Using video analytics technology, the machine derives a basic profile -- such as age and gender. Now if the kiosk could only come to my Charlotte home and cook for my family!
From the blog at birdsong gregory, a Charlotte, NC shopper marketing and advertising agency.
The Wall Street Journal has an interesting article on the impact of social media during the recent Egyptian revolution. Quoting the article, "The events in Egypt reflect different roles for different kinds of social media. Rafat Ali, founder of paidcontent.org, says Facebook helps organize people, such as detailing how and where to gather physically, while Twitter is for "amplification," enabling people in real time to share news and comment... For authoritarian leaders used to controlling media and events, time and technology are not on their side."
From the bg blog - Charlotte advertising and shopper marketing agency, birdsong gregory.
In what may be the beginnning of a trend in marketing magazine subscriptions, Sports Illustrated has announced plans to eliminate the option of only subscribing to a print edition. Acccording to a post at AdAge.com, "The idea is to offer a universal price for access to the brand on any platform you like. That will please the kinds of subscribers who've complained in the last year about being asked to pay again for their magazines' app editions."
With so much communications going digital these days, how long will it be until we see then end of printed news? Keep an eye on this blog from Charlotte advertising and shopper marketing agency, birdsong gregory, for more insights.
Check out the top 10 words you can now find in the dictionary that began as trademarked brand names for new products – fun stuff like pogo sticks, granola, jungle gyms, and heroin. Here at birdsong gregory, our Charlotte ad agency, which, by the way, specializes in POS design, is currently working with a couple of clients on projects that have the potential to add a new word to the dictionary. Exciting marketing and branding challenges, so please stay tuned.
Charlotte’s street-wear stalwart The Niche Market recently reopened it’s doors this past weekend under the new ownership of Adam Cook and Stephanie Michelle Genter. Niche operates in the Historic South End District and has built a online reputation over the past 5 years for being one the few retail stores of its kind in the US to carry well-known boutique brands and limited releases from labels like Nike, Vans and Johnny Cupcakes.
In an economic environment like this, the value and vitality of private retailers who cater to such a small segment of the market will always be questionable, especially if they’re not fully immersed in that particular scene. Impostors are easily identified and labeled as such through social networks and banished to a life a mediocre sales and limited support by those who don’t fully “get it”.
Fortunately, this store has managed to retain it’s roots in the arts, music and skate culture while elevating the in-store shopping experience. This is achieved in part through the owners DIY attitude, the blu-collar / trouble-maker theme that runs throughout the men’s product selection, the hand painted type, and an eclectic mix of relics from early 20th Century Americana. Most importantly, the updates feel like a natural extension of the new owner’s personal style, not some pre-defined fad or stuffy interpretation of one. Well done!
As a recent transplant to the area, I have been on a fun journey exploring what Charlotte has to offer in the way of food (and so far, I have been pretty impressed). This weekend I finally made it to Pasta and Provisions, a place I had been hearing about for a while. The experience did not disappoint – they have more handmade fresh pasta offering available under one roof than I have seen anywhere.
But what stood out to me wasn't the approachable gourmet environment or great selection of all things Italian. It was the service. This is an environment where it is obvious the staff loves to work. And as a result, the shoppers enjoyed being in the store, resulting in satisfied, loyal customers.
After getting an overview of offerings and recommendations from the man behind the counter and narrowing down my selections, I made my decision to try their rosemary/garlic and arugula/black pepper fresh pastas cut into linguine.
Then, as I was checking out, it happened. Knowing I had recently moved from Chicago and it was my first time in their store, they gave me one of the pastas free for being a first time visitor as a way to welcome me to the area. In the world of retail marketing and shopper insights, this stuck out as such a powerfully simple move. And more, it was the first step in converting me from a visiting customer to a loyal shopper.
There is much we can learn from how smaller retailers approach their point of sale. Here are some quick take-aways:
Love what you sell. If you do this authentically, it will be an important part of your brand, as well as a way to differentiate yourself aside from the products you sell.
Empower your employees to satisfy customers. Ultimately the focus should be on sales and satisfaction. If you are focused purely on sales, this will be reflected in how your employees treat customers. Satisfaction sells and satisfied customers buy more.
Focus on the checkout. All of retail has to be focused on selling, but that shouldn't be at the expense of the last interaction your customers have with you. Checkout is the opportunity to start of the relationship and seed return trips. Ask yourself this question: are your customers leaving happy?
Loyalty is built one customer at a time. There is much talk about loyalty in shopper marketing, but the conversations tend to stay at the macro level. Ultimately loyalty is a micro conversation, requiring a focus on every customer and every transaction. Employ empathy as a strategy - walk in your customer's shoes and proactively look for ways to improve the experience.
My experience at Pasta and Provisions was a reminder of how powerful a retail interaction can be. The great news is that if you get the above right, not only will you begin to build loyal customers, you will experience exponential growth thanks to satisfied customers spreading word to others.
After all, sometimes loyalty is as easy as giving away your noodles.
My wife and I took a last minute trip to Chicago a couple weeks ago after she found some inexpensive tickets online. Neither us had been to the windy city and we were looking for an excuse to get out of Charlotte so it seemed like the perfect time see a ball game, sample the cuisine and put away the work for just a moment.
We hopped on an early flight into O'Hare and met a friend at Hot Doug's around 10 am Saturday morning. While enjoying our foie gras hot dogs and duck fat french fries he suggested we take the Architectural + Historical Cruise. I appreciate the local's taste in encased meat products, but I'm usually not one for being herded like cattle through bus terminals and sweaty guided tour lines while waiting to catch a glance of something that never quite lives up to the hype. Despite my hesitation, we inquired with the concierge at the hotel and were greeted with a poster sized folded brochure with tons of factual information and two beautifully designed Chicago Line passes. They looked like European currency and featured large portraits of those responsible for sculpting Chicago's skyline over the years. I'm a sucker for good design, count me in!
The next day we catch a cab to the River East Art Center and make our way down the docks past newly renovated studios that face the water. Once the boat is full with anxious tourist and egger students we set sail out of Ogden Slip and make our way to the Chicago River. Our tour guide was more than thorough and paused only once to clear her throat after becoming visually upset while mentioning the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. I don't want to bore you with the details but the next hour of our ride was filled with some of the most amazing architectural vistas I've ever seen, truly unbelievable. The Chicago Sun-Times had this to say about the tour "Without question the best architectural tour available in Chicago". I'd have to go a step further and say it's one of the best things to do in the city, period! Everyone enjoys unplugging and getting away from the day-to-day to reenergize, but to learn more about this American city that bounced back from disaster to design and create architecture the entire world marvels at was quite inspiring.
Benjamin Gelnett is the new Senior Graphic Designer at Birdsong Gregory and has worked professionally as a graphic designer since graduating from SCAD in 1999. During this time he's created a variety of advertising campaigns, packaging and POS components, brand identities and sales and marketing materials for brands such as Gulfstream Aerospace, Bombardier, Renyold's Alcoa, Hunter Fan Co., Ecko Unltd and Muzak.
Our grocery client Bloom is at it again with another scented billboard - this time using peach to promote the fresh offerings at its new store location in the Dilworth neighborhood of Charlotte. If you're in the Southend area of Charlotte roll down your windows near the Chik-fil-A and soak in the peach. The chain achieved international attention earlier this year by erecting the nation's first scented billboard to promote its Sheffield & Sons beef brand. That charcoal and BBQ scented board drew the ire of PETA, but was generally praised on the internet for its innovative approach. Learn more about our Shopper Marketing agency by visiting www.birdsonggregory.com
Shopper Marketing tends to focus on using shopper insights to enable selection at the point of sale. However, in categories that are complex, overwhelming or otherwise hard to navigate, enabling deselection is just as important. You have to enable your shoppers to deselect what they don't want before they are able to select what they want. I learned this lesson while working on Millstone, at the time a P&G premium coffee brand. In an intimidating category like premium coffee, we found that organizing the shelf based on shopper insights gained from research brought about more clarity and ultimately, more sales.
The above picture is a fun way to approach another category that can be intimidating - wine. Press in Charlotte, NC chose not to take the typical approach to categorizing wines by regions or varietals, instead creating fun categories based on what the shopper will experience. Deselection ultimately should enable better and faster selection and in this example, narrow down a large wine list into a smaller set of relevant options.
That's right. birdsong gregory is beefing up its shopper marketing capabilities to help retailers and manufactures spend their marketing dollars in a more effective fashion, i.e., where it counts – at the store level.
We have a couple of new hires that will be starting this month who have worked for big, global retail branding agencies – and small retailer brands you may not have heard of - like WalMart. ;)
Together with our existing team of designers, writers, and brand strategists, we have some robust expectations for what lies ahead. We'll keep you posted…
Here at birdsong gregory, a Charlotte-based shopper marketing agency, we've known for years that in-store advertising is a great way to reach people in that critical "moment of truth" where decisions are made on which brand of charcoal or cat food to buy.
And now Bloom, one of our retail grocery clients, is making a bet that broadcast ads delivered between the aisles will be an effective way to reach the kind of purchase-focused, motivated audience in a way that top-of-the-funnel living room broadcasts cannot.
Automated Media Services plans to test its system, 3GTV, this summer in Maryland and Virginia at nine Bloom stores. Known as A.M.S., the company has been working for years on a system that would deliver television in retail environments; and one that would enable ad agencies to plan and buy commercial time in stores just as they do on the networks, channels and stations shoppers watch at home.
We'll keep you posted on what Bloom's shoppers think
Through our work with Britax, our shopper marketing agency in Charlotte has gained experience and expertise in the "mom/baby" space. So lately we've been making contact with prospective clients who go to the market through the same channels and have similar target audiences. One such company is Boon Inc. They are commit ed to "... creating nothing but the most innovative gear—and keeping it affordable." And I must say, their design sensibilities are top notch. Every product they produce looks museum quality. The video above shows me feeding my daughter Charlie with a traditional spoon (what a mess!) and then using Boon's Squirt spoon - what a difference. I suspect Boon designed the spoon after hearing from Moms how much of a pain it was to feed kids on the go. So the food itself is contained within a squeezable reservoir in the spoon. For a Dad like me though, it's just means a whole lot less food on my kids face.
Our family hosts a party each year for the Superbowl so I rarely get a chance to watch the game - much less the commercials - until about the second half. So the morning after I usually catch up on the advertising and marketing highs and lows. Advertising Age posted the commercials here . I didn't see much to rave about this year. How about you? Perhaps the economy is still at an awkward phase and marketers are reluctant to really let loose.
This blog post is from birdsong gregory a Shopper Marketing and advertising agency in Charlotte NC.
Just on the other side of the mountains from Charlotte, a group of top executives from some of the world's leading companies — including PepsiCo Americas Foods, Wal-Mart, Nestlé, Kimberly-Clark and The Walt Disney Co. — gathered in Knoxville late last year to help the UT College of Business Administration launch its inaugural Shopper Marketing Forum.
UT has two other forums: the Supply Chain Strategy and Management Forum and the Forecasting and Demand Management Forum, both under the umbrella of the Demand Supply Integration Forums. The forums are research-based think tanks that bring UT faculty together with company executives to address key industry issues. Member companies pay a fee to belong to the forums and attend the twice-yearly meetings.
Some of the issues explored at the shopper marketing forum included collaboration among supply chain partners in retail; improved metrics and return on investment (ROI) for marketing initiatives; gaining deeper insights into shopper thinking, behavior and value perceptions; and enhancing shopper experiences through state-of-the-art technology such as social networking and virtual simulations and displays.
The 
In what may be the beginnning of a trend in marketing magazine subscriptions, Sports Illustrated has announced plans to eliminate the option of only subscribing to a print edition. Acccording to a post at AdAge.com, "The idea is to offer a universal price for access to the brand on any platform you like. That will please the kinds of subscribers who've complained in the last year about being asked to pay again for their magazines' app editions."
Our family hosts a party each year for the Superbowl so I rarely get a chance to watch the game - much less the commercials - until about the second half. So the morning after I usually catch up on the advertising and marketing highs and lows. Advertising Age posted the commercials 
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