Wednesday, September 18, 2013

Week 4 - News Article - Warehouse store comparison: Costco, BJ's & Sam's Club

This week an interesting article comparing some of the usual products you will see at Costco, BJ's & Sam's Club was released. A few of them I had no idea were avaliable within the stores.  

Beyond Big Screen TV’s, Cellphones, and Bulk food…..Costco also offers purchasing a car to go in your driveway at a no haggle price and one I never knew…a mortgage for your home. This is something I had never thought of going to Costco for. Full article below showing some of the different usual product offerings you will find in Costco, BJ's and Sam's Club. 


Although this article doesn't really have any effect on Verizon, I found it to be enlightening and shows that the stores business models are molding to being more and more of a one stop shop. What will they come up with next! 

Week 3 - Costco Store Visit/New Display

Mid last week I took a little visit to the Costco Store here in Greenville,SC to check out the Wireless Kiosk and see what was new in the store.

Believe it or not the main Wireless Kiosk was super busy with about 6-8 customers working with the three Wireless Advocate Associates which made it hard to talk to them or get too many good pictures free of people.

I did want to share with you two pictures I have of the New Digital Phone Display which I feel like really adds to the Wireless area within the stores, although nothing on the new display is carrier specific. Below is a picture of the display in the Greenville Store   It is located on part of the Endcap on the aisle next to the main Kiosk.





Plan-o-gram
It has been awhile since anything new has been added to the Costco Wireless area and thought it was worth sharing in case you haven’t checked out a Costco lately!

Monday, September 9, 2013

Week 2 - News Articles - Bulk Shopping From The Boxed App


Here are two articles on a new app called Boxed that gaming developers have created to take a chuck out of bulk shopping at Sam’s Club, BJ’s and Costco. The app is available on iTunes already and will soon be available on Google play.

As the article states, the warehouse club-on-your-phone will initially be available to shoppers in New York and surrounding areas along the East Coast and will be expanding across the country in this fall. It will be interesting to see if the app takes off and if it will have any impact on sales in those stores in the near future.





Something to watch in the next few months!

Monday, August 26, 2013

Week 1 - Tailgating with Tablets - Image Recognition Promo Sweepstakes

Costco Image Recognition Promotion Sweepstakes

In order to increase the number of customers who use Costco as their primary retailer for their cell service with Verizon, and get them to keep coming back to the retailer over and over again. I am proposing that Verizon holds a Tailgating with Tablets sweepstakes starting August 31st thru December 1st.



How it works:

Customers will see an oversized display of a Tablet merchandised with Pepsi cases as they walk into Costco stores. It will have instructions that prompt the customer to snap a picture of display through Pongr (which is a mobile shopper marketing platform for image recognition). The picture is then emailed to Verizon and the image is verified with computer vision and the customer receives an instant response message that they were entered in the sweepstakes.

Customers may enter the promotion sweepstakes one time a day for a chance to win a the daily tablet that is given away to one lucky customer. Daily winners must sign their tablet up for a service through Verizon for the first year.


Add-ons that could be included to the promotion: 

A Tailgate party could be given away to 10 lucky contestants at the end of the sweepstakes sponsored by Pepsi, $1000 cash value. 

What it looks like: 

Tailgating with Tablets
Giving Away a Tablet a Day!
Enjoy an ice cold Pepsi while watching the game on 
your tablet with America's Largest 4G LTE Network.  

Enter once a day for your chance to win today! 
1. Snap a picture of this display
2. Send Photo to Verizon@pongr.com
Exclusive Offer at Costco 

(For visual use only - FPO graphics)


Endcap Layout
Top: Image of a game that a fan would be watching at their tailgate
Middle: Sweepstakes Messaging as you see above
Bottom: Pepsi merchandised inside of the tablet, with stair steps on the inside that would be shelves to hold the product.
Approximate size: 4ft x 6ft shipper/Endcap fixture



Example of another brand using a similar promotion: 


A similar example of this was done by Big Green Egg and Lays to give you an idea of the how proposal could work.



Pros for Verizon: 

  • Based on submitted photos, Verizon would know when and where people are interacting with displays within Costcos. 
  • The images serve as a secondary way to check to make sure displays are set up correctly in stores. 
  • Builds an alliance with Costco by helping drive customers to come back to the store. Customers can enter the contest one time a day to increase their chance of winning.  
  • Engages customers, getting them excited about Verizon while driving sales.
  • Customer must sign up for a year of Verizon service for their tablet. 
  • Customers who opt-in to the sweepstsakes are integrated into Verizon's existing CRM as well. 
Other possible promos to do with a similar concept: 
  • Black Friday Promo
  • Father's Day Promo
  • Holiday Themed Promo
  • Etc. Etc. 

I felt that this sweepstakes worked best in Costco verses Fry's since Costco is a food/beverage retailer as well, which goes along well with the Tailgating theme. Pongr is a great tool that would be great to see Verizon use in the future for a sweepstakes promo or in another way within the stores. Shopper marketing campaigns using image recognition technology and direct response can be built specifically at any scale for the brands needs. There are endless possibilities with this technology and how you could use it in shopper marketing.