One Calendar with Social Networking PowersRetailers Get Creative with Catalogues
Small and medium businesses feel the pressure of the recession more than larger retailers. But if you run a smaller retail shop, you might have taken cue from many of the larger retailers who put their funky print catalogue campaigns on hold this year due to spending cuts and to achieve that green-friendly image that so many customers appeal to.
“But [catalogues] aren’t disappearing, they’re adjusting,” says Catalogs.com founder Leslie Linevsky in an article from USA Today on large retailers such as Abercrombie & Fitch, Barney’s, Sears, J.C. Penney, and watch company Fossil and their creative catalogue campaigns. These retailers aren’t abandoning catalogue campaigns; they’re just scaling back on the number of print they mail out—and using more memorable campaigns to drive traffic to their websites.
Take Abercrombie & Fitch’s controversial A&F Quarterly Saturday for example. The retailer decided to launch a funky issue this year after a seven-year hiatus—despite the cuts to spending. The reasoning: to drive traffic to their website and Facebook page.
Creative director, Barneys New York, Simon Doonan says that print catalogues from large retailers are specifically “being aimed at young audiences in order to get them interacting with stores.” Stores like Barneys are making their catalogues more creative—even 3D—with the hopes of making direct-mail pieces more impactful and relevant to younger audiences. And it’s working, or so Doonan says, “The generation that shops at [Barney’s] is having fun with 3D…it resonates with the store’s audience.”
