Our challenge as marketers has always been to develop communications that reach our target audiences with sufficient frequency to stick our messages in their heads. Unfortunately, gone are the days when we had three networks that could reach 97 percent of the population. If we used the three networks (reach) to run 12 commercials (frequency) we were all set.

To be successful, both need to think in terms of a new evaluative criteria -- the "three Rs" of reach, recency and relevancy.

First, let me say, if you haven't read the previous article, "Recency and Relevancy", I suggest you spend your reading time there. It's a great testament to the importance of our passion at Archbold-- namely POP/POS marketing and merchandising.

It's been quite an adventure for Archbold's Western marketing region. Late in 2006, we opened our new Chicago office in Schaumburg. Chicago is the epicenter of marketing in the Midwest, and we found it necessary to join the party with a permanent presence here. What we have found while growing into this new community is that we are in fact bringing a valuable and rare asset to this regional POP market: CHARACTER.

Product manufacturers, importers, and marketing and brand management agencies in this region seem to be experiencing a "disconnect" in the POP and graphic packaging world. The marketplace is full of good ideas (and people who steal those ideas). And the marketplace is full of poor execution of those ideas (and subsequent finger-pointing). A graphic designer is seldom happy with the looks of the vehicle by the time it reaches the store floor or shelves. A marketing manager is unimpressed with his or her return on investment. A purchasing manager isn't given a full gamut of substrate, graphics, or fulfillment and logistical options-- "You can have any color you want... as long as it's black." And a brand manager is left with the proverbial head-scracthing, wondering, "what in the WORLD happened to my precious brand image?"

The notion here, is that there are two types of people in our industry: Creative people, and Production people. Archbold is successfully changing this notion one client at a time. This week, for instance, one Fortune 500 consumer brand company in Chicagoland added Archbold to their short list of POP/POS vendors for permanent and temporary displays, because we are achieving and demonstrating BOTH "Creative" AND "Production" excellence. This adds value to their brands, and maximizes their return on their marketing dollar at the point of sale. This passion for excellence in the seamless process from creation to execution is the heartbeat of every player on the team at Archbold, from a 3rd shift "production artist", through the CEO of our company.

Just last month, a purchasing manager at a large and quickly growing private label food and beverage manufacturer in Wisconsin said something that made my day. His statement was evidence that our passion-fueled philosophy is working. I'll paraphrase what he told me:

"We like Archbold because you're different. Typically with vendors, I deal with a salesman who comes in bringing me some ideas from some corporate or creative office, where I'll never go, or never see the guy who actually came up with the idea-- not to mention that I have no idea where or by whom the thing will actually be produced. But you sit with us, take ownership in our brand image, and help us come up with the best POP display that will sell that brand image to our customers. Our Account Manager knows what will make our brands look the best, running on the machinery that will actually be producing the display in Archbold. And I know that when my product display reaches the consumer, it's going to look exactly how we imagined it looking."

That's what we mean by bringing "character" to POP.

Tyson Aschliman- Regional Sales Manager

By Meyers Research Center

Supermarkets are struggling to keep their share of shoppers as mass merchant hypermarkets, drugstores and other rivals gain in popularity for items once only purchased in more traditional trade channels, according to a new study by Meyers Research Center.

To some consumer product marketers, retailers are the enemy. Rarely a day goes by when we don't hear a complaint about the process of getting P-O-P into stores. Some marketers see the whole process as adversarial and can be quite bitter about the experience; others are wistful, longing for a time when retailers were more passive and the world was a simpler place.
But the world has changed. Retailers aren't the enemy, but they really aren't interested in being your buddy, either. Good marketers are realists, and they understand that by working closely with retailers, they can (dare I use the phrase?) create a "successful partnership."

Remember when "sustainability" used to be called "recycling"?

The first time the word "sustainability" shows up in the Institute's archives comes in a November 2005 cosmetics category report, which discusses the trend toward natural beauty products. The first mention of a recyclable P-O-P display dates back to July 1990, when an article about fitness brand Weider notes that the company's temporary displays were often made from recycled die-cut cardboard "despite the slightly higher cost" involved.

Nearly two-thirds of shoppers polled in recent surveys by Mass Connections say their decision to buy products is influenced by signs and displays at least some of the time and that they are most likely to notice endcap displays.