CASE STUDY: COLERAINE SHOPPING GROUP

Product: Coleraine Retailing shopping cooperative

Background: The retailers of Coleraine town on the North Coast of Ireland wanted to attract shoppers from surrounding towns at Christmas. A group of interested retailers was formed and an advertising budget agreed.

Target Audience: Christmas shoppers from the North West of Ireland.

Advertising Strategy: UK agency Levy McCallum were appointed to the project and briefed GHM to plan and buy a campaign using local media during the build up to Christmas. Coleraine town was concerned that they would lose out to the attractions being offered by other local towns such as Derry city and cross border shopping in Letterkenny.

Media Strategy: Working to a budget of £3k we decided that it was best to target one area only and Derry city was selected as the best target. Derry offers 150,000 potential shoppers, is within easy driving distance of Coleraine and is well served by local media.

As Coleraine was trying to attract shoppers away from Derry city we had to be aware of the reaction of those local media who did not want to alienate their existing Derry city retail advertisers.

Eventually we decided on a five week radio campaign on Q102.9 FM only. The commercials were of 30" length. Starting in mid November and running up to Christmas Eve the campaign was designed as a TAP package. The spotplan needed to attract shoppers throughout the week and not exclusively at weekends. In planning the campaign we had to be careful that our commercial was not transmitted with other Derry retailer advertisers.

During the five week campaign more than 250 spots were transmitted and we estimate that a 60% reach of the Greater Derry area was achieved.

The Coleraine Shopping Group reported that more shoppers were attracted over the Christmas period and that most of this increase occurred during weekdays.

The Coleraine Group has decided to repeat the campaign over the Easter period.