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Supermarket Sweep Tesco To Unveils New Look Card Departments After two and half years in the planning and ‘behind the scenes’ development, a completely new look greeting card department is on the brink of being unveiled in selected Tesco stores. The mammoth project, initiated by Hallmark in response to a challenge laid down by the Tesco senior management team two years ago to “reimagine” what the grocer’s greeting card offer could look like, will be integrated into 19 Tesco stores between the beginning of September and the beginning of October. The radical new look has a ‘boutique’ style feel with ‘bays’ and feature tables to entice the shopper. The new fixtures will have fewer tiers meaning that more of the card design will be visible, while wider aisles create a more pleasurable browsing experience that is conducive to card buying. “This is a hugely significant development, not just for Tesco and Hallmark, but for all of the publishers whose cards we broker in as well as for the industry as a whole, as it raises the profile of greeting cards in the UK’s biggest retailer,” commented Angela Anderson, who joined Hallmark from
Tesco last June to manage the Tesco account for the publisher. The new look has been developed in different formats so that it has the potential to be rolled out throughout the Tesco estate. The first phase trial will see the retail concept being introduced into five very large Tesco stores, five of its large stores and nine smaller stores. In addition to the greeting card selection (which will include Hallmark branded, Tesco own brand and designs from 36 publishers that are brokered in), the new department will also include giftwrappings and party products. Above: Tesco is looking to add a bit ‘extra’ to its greeting card sales with the new look departments. Left: Hallmark’s Angela Anderson (second left) at last month’s Retas Awards.
The creative spirit is clearly flowing throughout the Hassett family. Among the latest launches from Bexy Boo at Home & Gift in Harrogate in July was a card range that founder Bexy Hassett had designed in collaboration with her young daughter Amelie. "Before Bexy Boo started trading, Amelie, then aged 10, sat in the park after school, armed with a pencil and some paper. While my boys, Joby, 7, and Arlie, 5, played on the swings and slides, Amelie and I got our creative heads together and started doodling," revealed Bexy. They came up with the idea of using a letter tile as the body of an animal and putting its head and its feet on the top and
on the bottom. Three years later, with a little bit of tweaking, and lots of bright colours added, Amelie’s Zoodles were born. Printed on 300gsm board, the kooky range features 12 designs for girls and boys aged 1-6. Bexy says she's hoping that one day Amelie will join the business and help with creating new ideas and designs, "but being editor of Elle or Vogue is still on the top of her career list," she quips. Above: Bexy, Amelie and the newly launched Amelie's Zoodles range.
Jeremy Turns Radio Star It's been an amazing year for PG's columnist Jeremy Corner and md of Blue Eyed Sun. Not only did he recently get invited to Buckingham Palace to collect a Queen's Award, but he was also asked to be a speaker at the Sage annual summit in Chicago. Rubbing shoulders with the likes of Richard Branson, actress Gwyneth Paltrow and actor Ashley Kutcher at the conference, he was subsequently interviewed on Bloomberg Radio - which is Above: Blue Eyed Sun's Jeremy Corner was interviewed by Bloomberg Radio while at a Sage conference in Chicago. broadcast throughout America - with an invitation to come back next time he finds himself in New York or San Francisco. "I shared the success of the company, which is named after a line in the Bob Dylan song A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall," Jeremy told PG, revealing to the radio station how the company has grown since it started out 16 years, and how a personal development exercise, Look Back From Perfect, had helped Jeremy and his wife Jo to halve their working week and double their income. Inevitably, Jeremy was asked about his reaction to Brexit, explaining that it had come as a shock for the company. "Being in the Remain camp we didn’t want to leave the EU. We’ve grown our export business massively in the last few years and are now in 18 countries around the world including the States, where our cards are in the Papyrus stores. Export has been a really important part of our growth and we didn’t want to make it any more complicated or difficult than it already is. In the short-term, the £pound has really tanked, so all of our dollars and euros and international deals are slightly better for us, which is good. But the concern is that we have no idea how it’s going to affect our local market in the UK." (See pages 86-87).
Rhino Project Leading balloon supplier, Pioneer Europe, has lent its support to an ambitious balloon project with a serious message. During the week of August 8-14, 2016, balloon professionals from all over the world created and installed a variety of Rhino balloon sculptures in their respective cities or towns. The sculptures worked towards a common goal - to raise awareness and funds for the Rhino poaching crisis in Southern Africa. The main event took place on August 11 and 12 at the Menlyn Park Shopping Centre in Menlyn, Pretoria, where a group of local balloon artists, under the leadership of Guido Verhoef of the Above: A Rhino balloon sculpture. Netherlands, created the largest balloon sculpture ever made on African soil. At a height of some 7 x 15 meters and an estimated 35 000 balloons, it has the distinction of being the biggest balloon Rhino in the world.
PROGRESSIVE GREETINGS WORLDWIDE
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