Projects
purewhite took HSBC’s January Sale out of the red and into the black.
Background
After two years of diminishing returns on its annual January Sale event, HSBC was eager to breathe new life into the campaign and inspire staff to increase sales.
Already investing in the preservation of the Brazilian rainforest, the bank saw an opportunity to further enhance its ‘green’ credentials with an incentive for staff and customers. It would donate £2 to WWF to support a preservation project aimed at protecting over 300 million trees.
Brief
HSBC asked us to produce a package of information booklets, detailing the January Sale offers and other items linked to the campaign, to be distributed to every HSBC branch in the UK and call centres around the world. Our brief was to create a concept that was novel and flexible, yet consistent with the overall look and feel of the January Sale campaign.
Strategy
We recommended creating a small pocket guide for staff to keep with them as a quick reference tool and designed looseleaf pages to be fastened with nickel plated rings that would allow staff to clip the guide to their uniform.
We then produced spiral-bound training guides that were sent to all branch managers before the campaign started. They could then brief their teams in detail about the campaign.
In keeping with the ‘green’ ethos of the campaign, we sourced recyclable, environmentally friendly 100% natural cotton bags to contain the sale items. We also sourced 25,000 pencils made from recycled newspaper and 3,000 baby oak trees for staff members to plant to offset some of the carbon footprint. All training literature was printed on FSC (Forests Stewardship Council) stock, using vegetable-oil-based Alpha Eco inks.
For look and feel, we sourced and retouched imagery of rainforest trees and leaves, and placed these throughout the marketing material.
We oversaw all aspects of the campaign, from sourcing imagery through finished design to print, as well as installing large format graphics and vinyls to lifts and entrance barriers at HSBC’s Canary Wharf headquarters.
Results
Overall, the January Sale campaign delivered very positive business growth for HSBC. Growth in the premium customer segments was significantly higher than other campaigns.
- Deposits to savings accounts grew by
17% year on year - Staff engagement was high, with strong participation in all internal elements including the competitions
