Ideashop - Just another WordPress weblog

BK Enterprises is a local convenience store that provides phone and Oyster top ups as well as Newspapers, snacks and food and drink. The shop is owned and has been run by a lovely dude called Kenny for 20 years. He also sells Jamaican patties (which in his opinion are the best you can buy), has recently set up an internet area in the back and is in the process of obtaining an alcoholic beverages licence. Over the last few years he has found his store footfall dwindling due to the appearance of a Tesco, Lidl and Costcutter nearby as well as other newsagents opening up over the road.

Our challenge was to get more customers through the door.

We suggested a number of things.

The first thing we noticed was that Kenny was a lovely guy with a deep knowledge of the local area and that actually he is a really strong selling point. So why not look at changing the name to reflect that. Nobody says ‘I’m nipping down to B K Enterprises for some milk’. They would however say that they’re ‘popping over to Kenny’s’.

One of the things we pointed out was that when people move into an area the first shop they go to tends to become their local. So we suggested going to the local lettings agents and giving them a welcome pack with local information and a welcome voucher for new tenants to the area. This would be redeemable in the shop for something like bread, milk and tea, or a free paper etc.

We also told them to put an A-board outside the shop to advertise the patties as no-one know about them until they are already inside the shop.

We suggested that for the internet users he offers a cup of tea or coffee.

They sell stationary and used to get customers coming in from the post office over the road. We discovered that his traffic had begun to decrease when it closed down. We thought that he could apply for a Post Office franchise as there are none in the local vicinity and there is already a post box outside the shop. And because Kenny was one of the people who campaigned to keep the original one open, this could make a great local news story and get his shop in the local press for some free publicity.

Post by Jamie Romain, Art Director, Ogilvy One

The story was a classic class of Brand Identity. Josh Lever – charismatic, driven, enthusiastic (a Richard Branson in the making) clearly has an ambitious vision of how to manage his company Chemistry. Since the age of 15, Josh has been DJing and planning events. Today his enterprise has skyrocketed to a successful approach in managing high-end birthdays, weddings and celebrations. Marketing collateral was impressive with good visuals of what Chemistry can do in a brochure format and accompanying website. www.chemistry-events.com

The problem? How can Chemistry create a branded identity, and encourage further word of mouth, when it is their events that they should be primarily remembered for. Creating a distinctive identity would ensure future events and revenue in light of established competition. We sat down in a cafe for some tea and an oversized plate of chips and got to it.

We all warmed to Josh quickly, he knew what he wanted from Chemistry and articulated his brand principles clearly. Firstly it clear on talking with Josh that Chemistry provide experiences, not events. This distinction could set Chemistry apart from competition -  birthdays, weddings, anniversaries – these are all experiences. Each could be unique and tailored. Positioning himself as a provider of “experiences” rather than merely an “event planner” would allows Chemistry to be more experimental and risque – something Josh was keen on. And it would present a distinctiveness in the market.

How to create brand resonance though? We explored the idea of branding videos of the party for party-goers to take home with them. These videos would be fully immersive for the viewer – as if you were actually there – first person camera shooting / lots going on. The video would start: ‘Chemistry presents…..’  – in doing this Chemistry instantly creates ownership of the event, which would further encourage positive referral in a market dominated by word of mouth. Josh soon got the idea – by creating ownership, and taking leadership of an industry sector by creating that ownership – his company would become the market leader as matter of course.

Additionally we explored the possibility of Chemistry creating their own quality control organisation – imagine a ‘ Guild of Quality Service for Experience Events’ – Chemistry would set the standard in the industry – others would have to try and catch up! Creating a quality standards campaign could also be a great way to generate PR.

Josh clearly had a lot to drive him to success. With these minor tweaks in positioning and branding Josh will create a set of standards and a market in which Chemistry would be the flagship brand. The events that he’d managed in the past were clearly memorable and successful, by exploring in-event experience – e.g. video interviews – a multi-video wall of people from the party, post-event branding through video tagging software and customer testimonials – Chemistry will have even more successful events and a very successful brand.

Plus Josh mentioned he may be able to plan my next birthday party – so expect invites in the post soon!

Posted by Nick Bennett

Brixton Cycles, is a one-off. A workers co-operative at the heart of SW9 that sells and fixes all kinds of bikes from commuter, to racing to mountain bikes.  If you are part of the biking fraternity its a destination in its own right and celebrated its 25th birthday a few years back.

The Problem:

There were several things BC wanted to do

1. Keep their much loved customers up to date with all they were doing

2. Grow their community, be part of their community and introduce more people to cycling

3. Make sure that they were selling, stocking and buying the right kind of kit and bike gear

What we suggested:

Crowd Sourcing

Brixton Cycles has an irreverent, slightly anarchic take on life which is instantly recognisable in their branded clothing. To grow their community and engage with them better, we recommended a bit of crowd sourcing- asking their customers what designs they would like to see fronting next season’s cycling gear. We also suggested that the Brixton Cycles staff wear the merchandise while working on the shop floor or fixing bikes to help identify them to customers, and make it easier for people to know who to ask for advice and help in store.
Know Your Customer

We also suggested that Brixton Cycles establishing a database of customers and create a facebook page in order to send out email/newsletter bulletins and also post status updates letting people know about promos, events, sales and anything else the Brixton Cycles is getting involved with.

Taking it To The People

We wanted people to register that Brixton Cycles is really part of their community and something that is unique.  So we suggested setting up a chalk A board outside and use it as a megaphone/ means of sharing and writing down the staff’s witty, irreverent and politically flavoured thinking.  This was a way of taking the shop’s attitude out on the street and also creating something of a local talking point for the neighbourhood as well as putting a smile on the face of all those commuters cycling past everyday. We also thought it might be nice to make what ever was on the board that day the shop’s facebook status to keep all the Brixton Cycles community- local and virtual- in the loop.

Keeping Track of Sales

With a secret sale coming up for their valued customers, we recommended that Brixton Cycles pay close attention to every item rung up on the till that day- which brands and labels were the most popular and what price points proved to be the most popular with the shops loyal fan base. Gaining this information would help them stock exactly what people wanted to buy and ensure faster through flow of goods and even happier customers.

www.brixtoncycles.co.uk



The Herne Hill Society is an amenity group for the Herne Hill area. Now, it might just be me, but I had no idea what an amenity group did.  Apparently they do a whole bunch of things including: organise talks on topics of local interest, write books about Herne Hill history, monitor planning applications, encourage improvements in local amenities, etc.

Their problem was that their membership was skewed towards older, white, middle-class residents – and so wasn’t representative of the local area.  They wanted to broaden their membership base and encourage more active involvement from their members.

We suggested that the first thing they might think about doing if they wanted to broaden their membership base was get rid of the word “amenities”.  You’re not going to find many people who, on a sunny day, suggest “exploring the local amenities”. It seemed an old-fashioned way to talk about what they did.  Which was a shame because what they did – bringing people together to learn about and improve the local community – wasn’t old fashioned at all. It was something very relevant to people’s day-to-day lives in the area.

Currently the Herne Hill Society promotes itself and seeks out new members by distributing leaflets.  They also send out a newsletter 4 times a year. Rather than just passively tell people what they did through leaflets and a newsletter we recommended they enter into conversations with people, so people became involved right from the beginning:

We suggested they:

Foster good relationships with local estate agents – who could then tell prospective Herne Hill residents about all the great things the Society was doing for the neighbourhood.

Donate some of the books they’d written to local cafes as coffee-table pieces – in exchange they might be able to leave membership leaflets in the cafes.

Get the community to talk to them about what they’d like to see happening in the area – this could be through postcards left in cafes.

Get local schools involved: get kids to write short pieces on local history and this publish it in the Herne Hill Society newsletter.  Every parent wants their kid published!

Compile a list of case histories of interesting projects they’d done. Pitch some of the best case histories to local papers like Lambeth Life.

www.hernehillsociety.org.uk

Streets Ahead came in to see us about their brand. The group plan to turn a largely disused street into a green space for the local community. The site is positioned between two primary schools in Lambeth, so transforming it into a green space would provide a safer thoroughfare for the pupils and their families, as well as providing a recreational space.

They have already achieved so much by securing funding and council support. However they still need to involve the local community. And for that they need a brand or identity that local residents can relate to.

As Van Gogh had lived in the area they had considered naming the campaign in his honour in some shape or form. We felt that there was a possibility that local residents may not consider him to be representative of their community. There was also the concern that this direction wouldn’t be descriptive of the campaign’s function or say very much about what the group was trying to achieve. Sunflowers and iconography related to the artist have been used by so many groups and have so many connotations that it wouldn’t be doing the campaign any favours.

After working through the ideas behind the campaign we suggested the name ‘Grass Routes: Streets for People’. We also offered some ideas for a logo, which involved grass growing up through concrete, tarmac or between streets. Both of these suggestions were well received. So much so that at the time of writing, they have already adopted the new brand. How’s that for a speedy turnaround?

We wish ‘Grass Routes’ the very best of luck in their campaign.

Post by Tracy Brown