News from Cord - From New England to Kew England!
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Ocean Spray has been active throughout the year to promote the health benefits of cranberries. Report by Lorraine Francisco.
Kew Gardens, in partnership with juice manufacturer Ocean Spray, floated 5.3 million cranberries in the Palm House pond for its Autumn Harvest Festival. This formed part of a 2006 campaign conducted by Ocean Spray.
The display ran from 7-29 October and aimed to re-create an authentic wet harvest, typical to the New England region in the US. To ensure the 5.3 million cranberries did not go to waste, they were taken out and composted at Kew.
“There were three large circles of cranberries on the pond, and there is also a semi-permanent display featuring information on the harvest and bulks of cranberries on display. This will run until the end of the year,” says Jonathan Duffin, UK business development manager at Ocean Spray International.
Agency Cord Promotions also sampled Ocean Spray products across four weekends at the festival. “We reached up to 10,000 people each weekend and attracted a mixture of consumers, including families because the festival ran during half-term,” says Cord senior account manager Nicola Johnson.
The activity at Kew was the climax of Ocean Spray’s 2006 campaign, which kicked off at the Vitality Show, Olympia from 30 March to 2 April. Three sampling pods plus seven staff and an event manager were at the stand, which sampled Ocean Spray juices as well as selling the products. Staff also trialled the new Ocean Spray Dried Cranberries range.
The campaign was aimed at upmarket, health-conscious female consumers and the Vitality Show activity managed to reach 48,500 women.
From 5 July to 8 October, Cord promoted Ocean Spray’s chilled range by visiting two supermarkets, such as Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Morrisons, every day. Guerrilla marketing was used to enhance the point-of-sale activity, with staff sampling Ocean Spray in town centres close to the supermarkets. They each carried a Bev Pack – a canister filled with juice that resembled a carton of Ocean Spray and was worn as a rucksack.
To enhance the store activity, Cord sampled Ocean Spray during June and July’s Tesco Race for Life, for Cancer Research UK. The team distributed 600,000 samples to participants and spectators over the weekends from 3 June to 23 July. The 12 races took place nationwide in Milton Keynes, Nottingham, Guildford, Liverpool, Chelmsford, Brighton, Blackheath, Exeter, Bedford, Southampton, Basildon and Pontefract. Cord also sampled at stores near race activity to raise maximum awareness.
“Based on the success at the Vitality Show, we worked with Ocean Spray to include sampling of the Dried Cranberries range at the same stores, and subsequently developed a separate stand,” adds Johnson. The range included three varieties: tropical, dried cranberries, and dried cranberries with nuts.
“The overall campaign has been a great success,” says Ocean Spray’s Duffin. “We reached different consumer groups at a variety of events and at in-store point of purchase. It was good to be at the Vitality Show and at Kew Gardens because visitors tend to be more relaxed, which meant the marketing of the product had a different approach.
“And although sampling the product was important, there was also the element of raising awareness of the store, and the background to Ocean Spray and its health benefits.”
DELIVERING THE MESSAGE:
Cord has worked with Ocean Spray since 1999 and it was important that promotional staff knew about the product. “We make sure staff have a passion for the brand,” says Johnson. “We hold a briefing session with the client and staff to discuss market share, where the brand is going and product knowledge.”
Staff were given briefing notes that included any targets given by the client, the importance of smiling when approaching consumers, and a Frequently Asked Questions sheet on cranberries’ health benefits.
As Ocean Spray is a female-biased product, staff were predominantly female, aged 20-40.
EVENT MAGAZINE – NOVEMBER / DECEMBER 2006 ISSUE
