I recently learned that the Caylee Marie Anthony Foundation chose our 8" Kirby Brown Bear with imprinted t-shirt (S2158) to comfort families and children in distressed situations.
You can view the 2 minute segment from CNN's Larry King Live interview that explains the purpose of the foundation and how the bear will be used.
This is a testament to how a stuffed toy can outperform other forms of advertising and promotional marketing pieces. The creative team at Barker Specialty understands how to develop a cause promotion that serves a greater purpose. Not only will it help the foundation fulfill its mission to prevent child abduction through the creation of awareness of child safety measures, but will also provide support to families and law enforcement during child recovery efforts. This cause promotion assists in the well-being of children that need comfort and support during difficult and stressful times.
You can support the foundation by clicking here to donate. To learn more about the Caylee Bear Program click here.
Carol Floyd, Blake Advertising Inc. (ASI/141075) used our 8" White Rabbit plush toy (S2041) in 100 Easter baskets in celebration for The Lovelady Center in Birmingham, Alabama. The pictures of the children with rabbits and baskets tell a wonderful story.
We are happy to hear and see the success of the event. It was a pleasure working with you.
Here is an actual, dyed in the wool, success story from Jeff Hamilton in Southern California on how a Patriot Vendor, Artistic Toy, got him out of a very tight spot:
My client had ordered 750 - 8" custom stuffed bears back in the beginning of December for an event that began this past Sunday,March 15th. After multiple assurances from the initial vendor, we were informed on Friday, March 6th at 2:35 PM PST that their order was not going to make it in time for their event.
We called Jim Socci at Artistic Toys at 6:30 AM PST on the morning of Monday, March 9th. Jim and his crew pulled a miracle out of thin air. Not only did they deliver the bears on the morning of Thursday, March 12th, the client was elated with the new choice of bear provided versus their initial selection.
Our advice is, if you're doing stuffed animals, there is only one choice, Artistic Toys. Thanks again, Patriot vendor, Artistic Toys.
The last 3 weeks, Artistic Toy has been busy building character with its first Character Marketing Sales Team. The team consists of 23 top salespeople working together to implement Artistic Toy’s Character Marketing Sales Playbook. After three weeks of 1 hour web conferences over 70% of the team members are joined to a private Facebook group where they share ideas, case studies, proposals, prospecting campaigns, and presentations. In addition to sharing and learning, the team members have developed several proposals to introduce characters into existing and new client promotional marketing campaigns. Character Marketing is a philosophy that leads to success, best stated by Ralph Waldo Emerson:
“Sow a thought and you reap an action; Sow an act and you reap a habit; Sow a habit and you reap a character; Sow a character and you reap a destiny."
While discussing the BINGO sheet (One Page Business Plan) with Jim Nixson, The Vernon Company, he realized the opportunities are abundant with characters in marketing and it would be nearly impossible to exhaust them all.
Leon Davidson, Promoshop – Sacramento, said he has worked with a large university for the last 10 years and he always knew there was an opportunity to develop a plush toy mascot for them, but he just needed some help to get the proposal together.
Walker-Clay Inc. - Amanda Clay is literally going to the bank with a proposal to help her bank client energize a savings program for children.
Cary Romanoff, Ice Box Promotions, is thinking about ways to make their very own “Ping” the penguin a hot character to draw more attention to their brand through the use of a stuffed plush toy miniature.
Ted Davies, Paradigm Partners, reports an opportunity to make a bear an important game piece in a grocery store promotion.
Win Oppel, Ad-Merica, is discussing ways to expand a regional utility company’s energy conservation program with a custom plush toy replica of a character in a coloring book currently being used in their marketing.
Sherrie Rhoads, Success Promotions, Inc, received an email from a hotel client inquiring about plush toys with a Caribbean theme for their children's amenity program and to sell in their retail shops. While responding to her client’s request she asked some key questions and made a recommendation to consider branding themselves with their very own plush toy character that a guest cannot find anywhere else to act as a powerful reminder of the resort. This recommendation landed her an appointment with the General Manager of the Hotel.
Even in the doom and gloom of the economic crisis, this cast of characters has realized that it’s their Character that will pull them through. The team has proven that it doesn’t matter if your client is in a serious business or fun business you can find ways to use characters as powerful marketing tools that can be used in any and all industries.
Artistic Toy launched a trial campaign late last year and early this year to all the people that attended the Cliff Quicksell webinar or pre-registered to see us at the ASI Orlando Tradeshow to receive box mailer to 10 clients or prospects for FREE.
The mailer is being being shipped today (Feb 9) to over 350 distributor sales people's clients. We are very excited to learn about the results of this mailer.
It would be our intention that our participants would secure lots of plush toy orders from this mailer; however, our measurement is also on how many:
1. Phone Calls that New Prospects Take from You 2. Appointments You Make with Prospects / Customers 3. Presentation/Proposals Given 4. Quote Requests 5. New Orders (T-Shirts, Bears, Mugs, etc)
Please send us an email or leave a comment on our blog to let us know what reaction or benefits you are getting from the mail campaign.
Just because the holidays are over doesn't mean the giving season is. Artistic Toy (asi/37122) is looking to counteract the negative perceptions of the economy and spread the word on product safety by orchestrating a massive toy giveaway over the next 30 days. "We got a lot of good inventory, it's been here too long, and we want to move it," says Artistic Toy president Jim Socci. "And I want to build relationships with distributors. It's really been a lot of intensive thinking about the best way to inspire and spark people to use promotional products. The best way I knew was to get products into people's hands. And if we can do that at little or no cost, and we can bring a lot of joy into the community, it's going to be a phenomenal result."
Artistic Toy is hoping to donate tens of thousands of stuffed animal plush toys to non profit and community organizations. The Allentown, PA-based supplier is relying on distributors to get the word out – and help earn themselves some much needed promotion and goodwill through the campaign. "We want to encourage and promote our distributors to get out there to make some phone calls," Socci says, noting that a wide selection of toys will be available with no set up charges or extra accessory costs for imprints.
Socci says that a key reason behind the campaign is to help clear up the increasing concerns about toy safety, particularly in the wake of last year's passing of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act. Through the giveaway and its products, Socci hopes to show what it means to be compliant, as Artistic Toy has tried to achieve under the new provisions. "There are requirements and deadlines that are rapidly approaching for compliance," he says. "We want to be on the forefront of that."
To that end, the company will also host a free Webinaron the subject on January 30 at 2:00 pm EST. Socci says the session will demonstrate the steps it takes to become compliant and how the changes could affect the industry. "Many people haven't heard the word yet or haven't had the time to realize that it's not just toys that are going to be impacted," he says. "Toys are the number one thing that people are concerned about for a while now. But it's also children's products. I have a suspicion that distributors and salespeople aren't there yet and don't understand that."
Artistic Toy recognizes the need to promote safety of its products and the value of working with qualified marketing and product experts to ensure that safety and security of everyone's prosterity is protected.
We have launched a global initiative to give away products to promote toy safety and our distributor partners.
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