CLINTONS

Clintons.  The last time I went in there I was probably about 12.


NOBODY sends cards any more, and we feel that this is the card shops problem.  


In Wolverhampton town centre, the only card shop I remember is Clintons.  If I go back there now, there are LOADS, including 'Cards Galore' and other miscellaneous.  These shops boast  at the fact that they sell cheap cards.  Boast!  


This is a great shame.  I always keep my cards - so does my Mum.  She keeps everyones.  I'll be looking around the house and find a stack of cards with 'To Hugh, happy 18th' written in them.  Hugh is 23 now so they should probably be thrown out.


The fact is, the card is often more important than the present.  It's the bit with the writing in.  The 'thought that counts' part.


These days a card is more important than ever.  Anybody can write 'Happy Birthday!xoxo' on my 'wall' on Facebook.  If someone were to actually send me a card, I would be well impressed - (might even give them a kiss).  


So why do people only write Facebook messages these days?  Because it's EASY.  You don't even have to see the person.


We've got two things here now - ONE - we don't want to buy cheap cards, and TWO - we don't want to send cards at all.  


It's embarrassing to send a bad card.  A bad card is worse than no card - it's the impression you're going to leave behind.  


It's less embarrassing to send a Facebook message - there's no human contact involved, which is a great shame as that's the whole point of cards.  


So how can we get people to buy cards from Clintons?  


Clintons isn't that cheap - it's pretty average.  The cards are pretty average - but far better than cards in other shops.  They won't disappoint. 


We want to show Clintons as the card shop that won't disappoint. 


Which brings us to our solution - YOU CAN'T GO WRONG WITH CLINTONS. 




So - we invented GIVE-A-CARD-A-PHOBIA.  


It's a serious problem.


We all know that feeling you get when you open a card/present you don't like.  The pretending bit is. the. WORST.  Nobody should have to go through that when giving/receiving cards. 


We wanted to think of the WORST case scenario when sending a card.  Obviously nothing life changing is going to happen, but those uncomfortable moments can last a LIFETIME.  Not ideal.  


So - we would like to introduce to you...PAT.


Pat lives in fear of sending/receiving greetings cards.  It got so bad for her that she couldn't even POST cards.  A true give-a-card-a-phobe.  


We started watching programs/clips of typical Channel 4 documentaries - the kind when they follow people around with an enormous list of questions.  


So we learn of Pat's plight.  Our original line was : DON'T DISAPPOINT.


As give-a-card-a-phobia is quite common, we thought we'd carry on going with it.  Play on the whole documentary feel to the video and push Pat further.  Where does she go next? 


It is quite often the case that when someone has been through a serious mental illness, they want to help others.  This is what we thought Pat would do.  So she set up a website where you can download fake smiles for when you're giving cards, motivational envelopes for when times are tough, and even a club which she let us film (storyboard).


We ended up with one film - one storyboard and a website/ambient pieces.  The film would interest people as EVERYONE can recognise the symptoms of give-a-card-a-phobia.  They can relate and when they seen it on the telly associate the Clintons brand with a good card giving experience.  


The mock-charity spotify ad and the website would then catch them online - while they might even be considering writing a cheeky 'Happy Birthday' on Facebook.


But something was bothering us.


We watched it.


And watched it again.


We listened to the Spotify.


Read the website.


Then it clicked.


Don't Disappoint.


What kind of a line is 'Don't Disappoint'?!


It leaves a bitter, commanding and painfully stark taste in the mouth.


It's too harsh for Clintons - after all, it is only a card shop.  


So we re-assessed.  We went back to our strategy - to show Clintons as a card shop that WON'T disappoint.  Already 'WON'T' felt like a calmer word.  Almost like Clintons won't let you down - not DON'T let other people down.


We wanted people to be a bit more at ease still - as giving a card is such a stressful situation already, and we settled on the line, 'YOU CAN'T GO WRONG WITH CLINTONS.'


It felt a lot nicer - more supportive and gentle - far more 'Charity-esque'.


However, the word 'CAN'T' let off a spark inside us.  If you can't go wrong with Clintons, then you CAN go wrong with something else.  Uh-oh.


Now, at this point we loved Pat.  She was great.  She just wasn't satisfying us anymore and didn't fulfill the potential in this new line.


We also did a little more research into Clintons to try and discover something more we could sell - something that people aren't 100% familiar with.


This led us to attempting to market the gifts that Clintons sell.  They're not too big and not too small, which fits in with our 'can't go wrong' line.


So how CAN you go wrong when giving gifts?  


Then it came to us.


ANOTHER potential awkward moment.


So.  You've been going out with someone for a week...then, all of a sudden it's VALENTINES DAY.  Shit!  You hardly know this person what the hell are you supposed to buy them?


Enter JUMBO-GIFTO SYNDROME...


...and enter Emily.


Emily gets too carried away with gifts.  She has no sense of how big is too big.  This can be a serious problem - especially with men.  No man wants a sky-message from a girl they've been seeing for 2 weeks.  Emily doesn't realise this.


So we made another TV ad for Emily - in the same mockumentary style as Pat's give-a-card-a-phobia.  And with a whole new syndrome came a whole new world of possibilities.  


In the video she mentions a chart - a scale graph.  We felt this would be a perfect poster for our 'you can't go wrong with Clintons' campaign.  It's helping you not go wrong.  The poster would go around shopping centres - near Clintons stores so you don't have to go out of your way to get to there.  It's also nice to look at and takes a little longer to understand, so would be perfect for cross-track on the tube - or even on the tube itself.  This poster would probably have most effect around valentines day.  It also lends itself well to being a hand out.


So we now had 2 TV ads.  Everyone knows that campaigns come in threes - which is pretty lucky as we had managed to find a THIRD potentially embarrassing situation.


POST MIXED-MESSAGE STRESS DISORDER.


You buy a card for someone - usually when you're in a rush, it looks great on the outside but HELLO hidden-inside-possibly-insulting-message!  


This happened to me once.  I didn't really give a shit at the time because I was 8 years old or something but if it happened now I'd probably be a bit mortified.  More recently my Uncle bought me a card for a 1 year old but either he didn't realise or he thinks it's 1990.


So - one more disorder one more character.


James has suffered from pm-msd since buying a girl a mans card.  Quite embarrassing.


We used this newest disorder/character to promote another gem that we found whilst researching.  You can personalise your Clintons card online!  Fancy that!  Going all MoonPig on us.  


Clintons personalisation can help you with this problem - you'll never say the wrong message again.  You can't go wrong with Clintons.  


We gave James a video - but also felt as if he needed more.  The others had something so it wasn't fair to leave him out.  We wanted to target people who were already online, so created a banner which would inform them of Clintons personalisation.


The banner tricks someone into believing they HAVE mixed-message disorder.  Haha!  Very cunning!


The banner would then take you to Clintons website where you can personalise your cards & what not.  


So up to now, the website belongs to Pat.  She's got all her envelopes & smiles on there.  But that was in the 'don't disappoint' days.  Move over Pat there's two new sufferers in town who want a piece of the action.


So we scrapped the online smiles.  We felt the motivational envelopes had more power behind them.  They were generally a bit more believable - which is the feel we were going for.  


So we turned them into posters which you can cut out and keep the envelope.  This again lends itself well to being a handout.  It could also be really massive - maybe even cross tracks again, for when you've got time to read it/understand what it's all about.


We now had 3 films, one spotify ad, one banner and two posters, but since we trashed Pat's website (sorry Pat) there was nothing good to end up on.


However, there was one aspect of Pat's website that we DID like.  Pat ended up getting better and turning her life around.  We still wanted people to realise this fact and felt like the others needed a bit of hope as well.  


The nice twist in Pat's story is that now people who've been on her scheme send HER thank you cards.


So we thought Emily - with a little help from Clintons - now designs gifts FOR Clintons.


James sent the right card to the WRONG person & ended up falling in love.


We felt this new web setup would allow for people to still familiarise with our 3 people and continue onto the 3 most important parts of the website - cards, gifts and personalisation.


People will now feel at ease buying a card from Clintons as they know - you can't go wrong.