Clintons – celebrity, digital, personalisation, PR & Christmas
Christmas is a critical period for most retailers – but particularly so for high street retailer Clinton Cards. Last year, the company sold 18.4 million Christmas Cards, 4.4m wrap items and 3.8m gifts. Valentine’s Day by comparison generated 2.2m card sales. However, with the company losing £10.7million this year, Clinton’s have launched a new product they hope will boost business.
The loss of £10.7million this year by Clinton Cards was not unforeseen and as such they began revitalising the brand in late 2010/early 2011. This started to have an effect over summer in the form of improved sales. But a Halloween horror show resulted in a huge surplus of stock that had to be sold off at heavily discounted prices. If anything, this means Christmas 2011 has taken on extra importance for Clinton’s overall business.
So what can we expect? Well a big part of Clinton’s turnaround strategy this past year has involved bringing the brand into line with changing consumption patterns. For example, it recently ran a major TV campaign (the first in years) in support of its Celebrity Fastcard, a video greetings card delivered to mobile or email.
Continuing with the digital theme, it has also launched a new website. Now, visitors to the site will find a user-friendly landing page where they can preview celebrity greetings before purchasing (examples being David Hasselhoff, The Saturdays and Alesha Dixon). Not only that, but they will find a big shift towards personalised cards, says marketing director Tim Fairs: “This is the first year we’re including personalisation into our Christmas card offering, which we anticipate will make up 50% of online sales”.
While TV is taking up a large tranche of Clinton’s marketing budget this year, there’s also a substantial role for PR during this crucial festive period. Last week, the company launched a consumer campaign offering someone the chance to have their ‘best ever Christmas’ wish come true. Driven via Facebook, people are being asked to share the Christmas wish that would make it the best ever for them or someone they know. One winner will be chosen at random and Clintons will make their wish come true. Continual spot prizes are also on offer so that people are encouraged to return. In parallel, conversations around the entries and theme are being driven via social media channels.
The PR dimension to Clinton’s strategy isn’t only consumer-facing. There’s also an internal angle. Just prior to the launch of the Celebrity Fastcards line, managers from all 650 Clintons stores attended a one day conference to learn about the range. While there, they met one David Hasselhoff – an event designed to enthuse staff. After the conference, all of the managers also received a Celebrity Fastcard greetings video to their mobile phone so that they could show colleagues and customers how the digital card is received. It’s too early to know if this will be enough to revive Clinton’s fortunes, but we’ll check in again during 2012 to see if there’s any evidence of an upswing in transactions.