Home delivery is not cheap for retailers. Not only do consumers want the best price on the products they buy, they expect free delivery, as well. Merchants looking for ways to protect profit margins have tried to steer customers to in-store pickup and lockers. Another opportunity that some see as a way to offset costs is the space on and inside delivery boxes where marketers looking to connect with consumers can place their advertising messages.
Barnes & Noble College, Saks Fifth Avenue and Zulily are among more than 25 retailers that are now allowing brands to pay them to place printed ads in boxes being delivered to customers, according to a Wall Street Journal report.
Advertisers decide on the number of boxes that will include ads. Retailers typically insert two to three printed pieces in each box and charge between 10 and 12 cents per ad.
Zulily has mainly placed ads from existing vendors in its boxes. Doing so provides its brand partners with the opportunity to reach an established audience while generating additional revenue for the e-tailer.
“A penny saved is a penny passed along to the customer,” Chris Johns, manager of integrated marketing and partnerships for Zulily, told the Journal.
Last year, Revlon put messaging on 10 million Amazon.com shipping boxes as part of its “Love Project” campaign. Each box included the Revlon logo along with an image of a heart and the social media hashtag, #LoveIn3Words.
The program was designed as an extension of a Revlon marketing campaign focused on connecting with socially-active Millennial consumers. The beauty brand ran a commercial starring Lady Gaga on last year’s Academy Awards telecast and committed to making charitable contributions of $1 million as part of the campaign.
On Revlon’s fourth quarter earnings call last year, former president and CEO, Fabian Garcia, said the goal of the program was “to enhance the brand equity, to learn a lot [about] how to partner with the best retailers online and, number three, to monetize the effort. So, we expect results, positive results, on the three fronts.”