Brand Increases Sales Two-Fold With Brand Re-engagement Strategy.

Over the last 6 years, we’ve worked with Neil Capstick – founder of affordable luxury hair brand Neal & Wolf – to develop the brand & its watertight proposition “Indulgence Redefined’ and have helped it thrive and grow with its capsule range of products that were exclusively developed for professional hairdressers to use and retail in their salons.

So when Neil approached us early this year and said “I’m ready. Ready to introduce new products, grow the brand and take it to the next level” we accepted the challenge with relish.

We set to work reassessing and researching the marketplace, overhauling the brand collateral, website and POS and working with Neil to develop a strategy for growth – involving the launch of new products, seasonal campaigns, entry into new markets and developing existing markets.

The sweet smell of success is already apparent. Since introducing the new direction and assets for the brand, sales for Neal & Wolf have doubled in just one month.

Stunning new branded kits for the Neal & Wolf sales team, incorporating beautiful trend looks, professional product guide, with tips and facts about each item in the range enable the sales team to portray the brand’s affordable luxury appeal to the industry. Plus, a stunning new brand brochure reveals the whole Neal & Wolf positioning to allow salons to see, first hand, the exciting direction of the brand and how they can be part of its success.

New packaging and seasonal campaigns have been introduced. Summer Solstice was the debut seasonal campaign, which saw the brand dovetail product launches with fresh and exciting trend photography, clever social media campaigns to engage the hair industry and PR materials to excite the press.

Sam Griffiths, Sales Director, says: “Over the last five years, I’ve seen Neal & Wolf boost profits of pretty much every salon that retails the brand. Its winning combination of affordable luxury, great looks and performance gives it that that magic universal appeal. 

“But salon owners need to know the brand is going to keep delivering for them. We understand this, which is why the introduction of the exciting new POS, brand materials and website – with trend looks and step-by-step styling tips – that Propaganda have produced for us are making it even easier for salons to see how Neal & Wolf is an absolutely must for their business.”

Watch this space for details of Neal & Wolf’s thrilling winter campaign… coming to a salon near you from September…

What do you get if you put …

5 models, 2 wind machines, 1 trampoline, an incredible photographer and a load of Tangle Teezers into a studio for 12 hours?  You’ll find out at Salon International in October.

Last week Propaganda and Tangle Teezer shot their first collaborative photoshoot – the results of which will be revealed later in the year as part of a revolutionary campaign for the iconic hair brush brand.

But in the meantime, here is a little bit of behind the scenes action…

Following the news that Seabrook Crisps has been sold to private equity firm LDC in a deal reported on The Business Desk to be worth £35m, Julian Kynaston, Founder and Chairman of Propaganda also ends a successful partnership with the Bradford based business. The collaboration has lasted almost a decade and there’s the prospect of new ventures ahead.

Julian became a non-executive director of the business in 2005 and helped to devise a strategy for growth, which arrested a sales decline at Seabrook and re-established the brand as a firm favourite for British consumers. This sale fulfils an ambition to grow the brand for exit, and closes a chapter in the close business relationship between Julian and the Seabrook board.

Ken Brook-Chrispin, former CEO of Seabrook Crisps said: “Julian joined us as non-executive director almost a decade ago, with a brief to devise a strategy for growth and exit. During that time, we’ve worked together closely and counted on him for his advice and strategic counsel. Not only has he been a professional and personal advisor, but he’s also become a personal friend. I’m looking forward to working with him on new projects in the future and continuing this successful partnership.”

Julian Kynaston said: “Working with Seabrook has been both stimulating and exciting and this news signals the next stage in the relationship between Ken and I. I know Ken will be moving on to new ventures and we’ve already spoken about how we’ll continue to work together on a range of projects. Part of my brief for Seabrook was to revitalise the brand and turn around its fortunes, ready for exit. With that now achieved, we’re ready for the next challenge.”

Since late 2014, Propaganda have been working closely with Spectrum Yarns, an original spinning mill in Huddersfield, to develop a growth and repositioning strategy for their brand – Glenbrae.

As producers of the finest quality knitwear they are a well-known name within the golf wear sector and produce club-crested knitwear to some of the finest golf clubs in the country, including Gleneagles. In a bid to broaden the brand’s reach, Propaganda completed a strategic audit of their market position. Through this process, we identified that whilst Glenbrae is already trusted by the UK’s top clubs, there was still 40% of the golf market that was untapped. Additionally, our research found that whilst club members were enjoying the quality of their club-crested knitwear, they weren’t aware of the brand behind it.

With a heritage which stems back to the early 1900’s, Glenbrae uses the worlds most advanced machinery and weaves in the knowledge and expertise of their craftsmen to create their exceptional hand finished knitwear. Propaganda identified that it was vital to leverage this insight when developing the future direction of the brand.

During the development, and whilst analysing Glenbrae’s extensive customer list, Propaganda identified a new route to help generate growth for the brand. It was apparent that whilst the brand was best known for golf crested knitwear it was already producing crested corporate wear for some of the UK’s most well known and prestigious names, including Maybach, Porsche and Leander Rowing Club. And thus a new strategy was developed to broaden its target customer base with a fresh offer: ‘Glenbrae Plus’.

The new proposition has been developed to target organisations with a need for crested knitwear, and broadens business opportunities to new audiences beyond the traditionally targeted golf sector. As a result, Glenbrae anticipates the move will open up significant new sales channels for the brand.

The repositioning has launched with a new visual identity, created and developed by Propaganda, which reflects the heritage and quality of the brand, with a suite of premium sales collateral and new e-commerce website – which focuses on retailing non-crested Glenbrae knitwear direct to consumers. Initial results have been exceptional, with one customer asking if the changes were going to mean an increase in price to reflect the quality of the branding. Quite a compliment!

Look out today for the launch of The Car People’s brand new TV ad ‘How Car Buying Should Be’, which kicks off a new campaign focusing on turning car buying on its head and making it a great experience for the customer.

Customer service has long been at the heart of The Car People’s offering, and the TV ad highlights the differences between their attitude and that of many other car dealers. It’s about advisors who don’t hassle you, but do all they can to make buying a car simple and easy. It’s about having a huge range of cars to choose from, and access to detailed information on all of them via The Car People’s Virtual Sales Advisor app. It’s How Car Buying Should Be!

To make the ad, we took The Car People’s well-known animated characters and brought them into the real world, using stills and footage from real Car People showrooms to give Martyn – the ad’s star – the chance to walk around and present real vehicles. We worked closely with Finger Industries, who created the animation, to make the best use of animated and real-life space to showcase the car-buying experience, which – at The Car People – focuses on helpfulness, friendliness and fun. To top it off, we added a voice over by comedian Reece Shearsmith.

We’re delighted to see the ad air today on ITV and Granada – it’ll be on until the 25^th July, so keep an eye out for Martyn when you tune in!

[youtuber vimeo=’https://vimeo.com/133539506′]

Propaganda chairman and founder Julian Kynaston has been featured in a new hardback book capturing inspirational photographs of prominent figures and those involved in the Scot Street Style movement. #Onward is a photographic record compiled by Gordon J Millar, Creative Director of Scot Street Style, and showcases the wide and varied creative community.

Julian first met Gordon at the creative Gathering in Edinburgh in 2014, an event intending to show that creativity isn’t restricted to a small number of what are generally termed ‘creative industries’.  At the time, Julian reflected about the event: “Of all the creative gatherings I’ve been to, this is the purest. It’s inspiring in so much as it doesn’t try to group creatives into their specialism – those types of events are to my mind a little of a contradiction.” Since then, they’ve formed a close friendship and collaborative working relationship.

The book celebrates individuals from all walks of life, as Gordon sets out his thinking: “We want to raise aspirations, smash negative stereotypes, and strive unremittingly to achieve our potential as human beings.” He took inspiration from prominent figures, including the Dalai Lama, while developing the concept. Copies are available for purchase here.

This June, Clipper delivered the 3^rd in their popular series of Future Forums, which covered the growing challenge of dealing with retail returns.  Having previously held events on the topics of e-fulfilment and portcentric logistics, these Future Forums support Clipper’s position and reputation as sector thought-leaders.

The event, held at The Cumberland Hotel in London’s Marble Arch, was attended by a long list of retail supply chain experts from high street names such as Argos, Ann Summers, Liberty and Sainsbury’s.

The session was introduced by Clipper Chief Executive, Tony Mannix, and included insightful keynote speaking slots from PWC and retail experts JDA. The event was also an opportunity to introduce the newest name to the Clipper family, Servicecare, who were able to demonstrate their class-leading expertise in electronic repair and returns, which uniquely enables Clipper to provide reverse logistics capability across all elements of retail.

During a recent Brand Health exercise that Propaganda conducted for Clipper, we tested and validated the growing importance of a specialist returns process for retailers. Boomerang™ was the sub-brand created by Clipper to address this growing retailer need and it’s already helped numerous Clipper clients to take cost, complexity and risk out of their supply chain.

During the event, Tony praised Propaganda’s insight and strategic role in developing Boomerang™ and bringing the proposition to market. Quite a team.

Global haircare phenomenon Tangle Teezer has signed up with Propaganda on a marketing brief aimed at embedding the brand and growing sales, which will include repositioning the business to help promote new products aimed at the blow-styling market.

Tangle Teezer is a British designed and manufactured haircare brand, which uses patented brush designs to effortlessly detangle hair. Their products are now distributed in 53 countries across the world, from Singapore to Sweden.

Entrepreneur, inventor and founder of Tangle Teezer, Shaun Pulfrey said: “We’ve been incredibly successful with Tangle Teezer and have a significant ‘first mover’ advantage with our innovative products. Through speaking with our customers and the wider market, Propaganda discovered invaluable insights about our brand. We’ll be using these to take Tangle Teezer to the next level and to help us ensure the business continues to innovate and stay as an ‘essential’ haircare product. Customer loyalty is very important to us and this is a theme we’ll look to build on in the coming months.”

Propaganda Director, Julian Horberry continued: “We have a long and proud tradition of building brands and discovering key insights, which can unlock transformational change for business. Tangle Teezer is another client that builds on our expertise in the beauty and haircare sector, with existing and previous clients including Neal & Wolf and ghd. We’ll be working with Shaun and his team to implement the findings gathered during the insight process, which will help to build the brand for the future and ensure their popularity and sales continue their positive trajectory.”

Tangle Teezer has enjoyed considerable success since its launch to market in 2007. The business has grown to a turnover of £23m and has been widely recognised as a phenomenon in the haircare market. During our unique Brand Discovery™ process, we found that whilst tens of millions is spent on R&D in the haircare market, the brush sector had largely been left behind. Tapping into this theme will be a key consideration moving forward, and a new brand proposition will be launched at the industry signature event, Salon International, in October 2015.

We recently worked with Celeste Arnold and Luke Cannon to shoot some ‘Get the Look,’ styles for Neal & Wolf.

The shoot forms part of the Summer Solstice campaign that we created for Neal & Wolf, to show 4 x get the look styles that will sit on the Neal & Wolf new website in the ‘Be Inspired’ section. This section is of added benefit to the Neal & Wolf consumer, who can visit this part of the website to learn how to create salon inspired looks at home which incorporates with the ethos of  the brand which is everyday indulgence.

So if you would like to find out how to create: Mermaid waves, a Polished Pompadour, an Artisan Chic up do or Bohemian Flora for your summer style this summer then follow the easy step-by-step guides that you will find on nealandwolf.com in the next few weeks.

June has seen the launch of Neal and Wolf’s Summer Solstice campaign, inviting stylists and consumers to redefine their summer style.

With the launch of a summer collection and new aerosol hairspray Control, the sales team have been equipped with a brand toolkit to engage salons and stylists with the success and commercial opportunity of Neal and Wolf.

To support the campaign, the website has been developed to drive online sales through a new mobile responsive e-commerce platform. Alongside the launch of the website a film was created to celebrate the brand’s phenomenal growth over the last few years.

The brand now has a loyal, social and celebrity following and we are continuing to work with Neal and Wolf on their Winter and social campaigns.

Look out for the behind the scenes blog coming soon to show some gorgeous summer hairstyles and get the look guides that will be appearing on the website to compliment the summer campaign, in the next few weeks.

It’s been three months since the brand launch and Lavitta is going from strength to strength.

The response from consumers and press has been fantastic, with particular highlights including our launch on Ideal World TV, featuring at The Haven Breast Cancer Charity Fashion Show and being showcased by Gok Wan on This Morning.

With new collections set to launch soon and Autumn/Winter and Christmas planning well underway, we’re looking forward to continuing a busy, exciting and successful 2015 with Lavitta.

As reported a few weeks back, our Senior Planner Cynthia Bernard beat a strong shortlist to win The Management Consultancies Association’s award for Young Consultant of the Year at a plush ceremony in central London. Well the good news doesn’t stop there, as the write up of her achievement appeared in The Times this week.

The article featured in a special awards supplement, distributed nationally to hundreds of thousands of Times readers. In the piece, Cynthia talks about the diversity of clients she works with, but a defining approach Propaganda takes to ensure we get to the heart of the issue: empathy. That’s just one of the reasons why Brand Discovery works across such a wide range of sectors, Cynthia explains.

Planning is integral to Propaganda’s strategic offer, and Cynthia has designed and implemented Brand Discovery programmes for clients as diverse as Ann Summers and ReFood. There’s not much about the process that she doesn’t know – in fact, she wrote the book.