38-39_Grid 29/03/2017 12:52 Page 38
In Conversation With... Tim Fairs
Emotionally Charged It will be five years next month since American Greetings bought Clintons from the administrative receiver and took it back into private ownership, away from the prying eyes of the City and the short-term demands of being a PLC. Now though, it has launched its own FTSE Index - based on Feelings, Thoughts, Sentiment and Emotion - which tracks the nation’s mood through the sales of greeting cards. PG met up with Tim Fairs, vp marketing & eCommerce at Clintons, to hear more about this innovative ‘emotional state of the nation’ address. Emotions have been running especially high at Clintons of late. Firstly, as reported in last month’s PG, there was quashing the unfounded, irresponsible journalism in the Telegraph that made false claims that the specialist card chain was planning to close a quarter of its stores. Then, a few weeks later, there was a social media outcry that also made it into the press, sparked by a customer taking exception to one of the 4,000 cards the retail chain stocks on sexist grounds. Full credit to Clintons, it responded swiftly, acknowledging that the card had over-stepped the taste barrier and removed the design from all stores.
38
PROGRESSIVE GREETINGS WORLDWIDE
Now though, its latest emotional outpouring is proactive rather than reactive. Instead of responding to highly charged accusations about its business, the major card retailer has gained the emotional upper hand, revealing findings of a major research project which shows how the nation’s emotional psyche reaches peaks and descends into troughs at different times of the year, reflected in the card buying patterns of the general public. In what Clintons aims will become an ongoing Emotional Index, it has tracked the sales of its occasions greeting cards by
Inset: A Clintons’ window fanfaring how there were over 1,000 greeting card designs on offer, as well as a major Disney Beauty & the Beast competition, plus some of the new bath and body products. Left: Tim Fairs is spearheading a major PR thrust to promote Clintons as well as card sending in general. Bottom: Clintons’ FTSE Index will track how consumers’ emotions change over the course of the year.
sentiment. The cards were allocated into headings of Happiness, Excitement, Compassion, Sadness, Gratitude and Worry. Cards relating to specific events, such as birthdays and wedding anniversaries, or calendar events such as Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day and Father’s Day were not included in the study. The first batch of results (that covers the the period June 2016 - January 2017) show that the nation was happiest in August last year, saddest in January this year, were most worried in October and November, the most compassionate in December, showed the most gratitude in July and were the most excited in September. ‘Compassion’ was expressed through sympathy cards, and cards of sorrow or regret were used to track ‘Sadness’. ‘Happiness’ was tracked looking at sales of congratulatory cards, while ‘Excitement’ included cards with a good luck message. Thank you cards showed ‘Gratitude’, while ‘Worry’ included get well soon cards. Tim Fairs, vp marketing & eCommerce at Clintons, who has spearheaded this survey, summed up: “We like to think of it as our own FTSE Index - Feelings, Thoughts, Sentiment and Emotion. It’s a way of judging the mood of the country and tracking that across the year. Following the dramatic series of world events last year, we wanted to find out how the nation was feeling, which is why we have decided to track the country’s emotional stock exchange.” While Clintons is not positioning this survey as a ground-breaking medical discovery,