The holiday season is a time for sharing. For promotional products professionals, it’s great when that sharing involves end-users sharing photos using a product. Nicholas D’Eramo, co-owner of Triple Stitch Promotions, Prospect, Conn., described a promotion that landed his client in a highly-sought position and allowed for a lot of sharing.
Promo Marketing: Could you describe a promotion you thought was one of your best?
Nicholas D’Eramo: Probably one of our best ones we’ve done volume-wise and effectiveness-wise was last year. One of our clients was trying to get end-cap space at Walmart. They sell soap, and, pretty much, Walmart doesn’t sell soap in their end-caps at Christmastime. So they needed to put a promotion together to somehow secure that space and increase sales. So, what we did was designed, with the company, a little, tiny Christmas hat—little wool beanie hats. We created a series of these hats, three different prints, and we had little ones that went on top of the laundry detergent bottle with a little loop so they could be holiday ornaments, and a hang-tag on the side for a social media campaign. And, lo and behold, they pitched that to Walmart and they wound up securing all these phenomenal end-caps at the holiday season in Walmarts throughout the country. We sold them close to a million hats.
PM: What did you like best about this promotion?
ND: Not only was it successful and sales went through the roof, but [the client] had a very successful social media campaign tied into it. It was a social media campaign where they asked people to take pictures of the hats. Some people would put their hamsters in the hats, and it was adorable. Probably the biggest compliment was that they were taking these things and selling them on eBay for five, six bucks a piece. It was a very successful campaign, and it achieved several things. It was a tremendous social media piece, they gained a bunch of people on social media, they secured the end-caps and they increased sales.
It was kind of fun putting the whole thing together. The design aspect was exciting. It was a huge promotion.
PM: Did you encounter any problems in the promotion?
ND: Really none. It went very smoothly.
PM: What advice would you give distributors looking to pull off a similar promotion?
ND: Really look outside the box. Our typical world is, we take orders every day. Be more than an order taker. There are so many other opportunities. This is one that I probably would not have thought of. Get to your clients and get to know what their goals are. Maybe you can help through promotional products to meet those goals. That’s what we did here. We knew that their goal was to be in Walmart during the holidays, and we really helped them achieve their goals through a promotional product. Get to know their needs and their goals.
