Sometimes some of the best sales strategies "just sort of happen." Kurt Sward, president of Fulton & Maine Advertising Inc. in Rockford, Illinois, can attest to that: When looking for the perfect holiday gift for his advertising agency's clients in 1991, Sward and partner Brian Makela stumbled on an idea that brought clients back asking for more.
Using an old Sward family recipe going back four generations, the entrepreneurs mixed up homemade batches of a premium barbecue sauce, dubbed Sam Fulton's Hog Sauce, and sent it to their clients. Sward and Makela ensured their holiday package also doubled as an understated, yet effective, sales tool. Hog Sauce recipients would receive free Hog Sauce refills for a year, as well as several friendly postcards from Sam Fulton, the fictional character behind the product, full of recipes, restaurant recommendations and other tidbits.
The gift allowed Sward and Makela to showcase their advertising talents because they created the product and designed all the labeling and packaging themselves. "We didn't feel we'd have to send them blatant promotional messages about us," Sward explains. "Really, the best way is to let the customers remind themselves about us."
Clients' rave reviews spawned a Hog Sauce gift-giving tradition at Fulton & Maine, and even led the partners to open a successful spinoff company last year in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Called Sam Fulton Inc., the firm enables other companies to send Hog Sauce to their clients, too. "All year long, every time [your clients] replenish their supply, they're going to remember who gave it to them," says Sward, whose company produced about 5,000 bottles of Hog Sauce in 1996.
Each Sam Fulton Inc. customer gets exclusive Hog Sauce-giving rights; a database ensures only one company will give the gift to a particular client. The gift package comes with a jar of Hog Sauce, a hog's-hair basting brush, a bag of maple and hickory Smokin' Chips, and a cookbook of favorite Fulton family recipes. The gift packs, which retail for $44.95, have elicited so much consumer interest that Hog Sauce will soon be found in gourmet shops and grocery stores nationwide. -C.M.
Contact Sources
ABRA Auto Body & Glass, 6601 Shingle Creek Pkwy., #200, Brooklyn Center, MN 55430, (800) 536-2334, (612) 561-7220
Burson-Marsteller, (212) 614-5249, Diane_Perlmutter@yr.com
Coletta & Co., 41 Union Ave., Memphis, TN 38103, (901) 528-0800, ccoletta@mindstrange.com
Communications/Marketing Action, 114 E. 32nd St., New York, NY 10016, (212) 685-9333
Bruce Judson, (800) NET-1133, ext. 125, judson@newmedia.timeinc.com
Guy Kawasaki, (http://www.evangelist.macaddict.com), e:mail: kawasaki@apple.com
Philip Nulman, 3 Old Hwy. 28, White House Station, NJ 08889, (908) 534-4041
Al Ries, (http://www.ries.com)
Marlene Rossman, c/o Rossman Graham Associates, 201 E. 17th St., 17th Fl., New York, NY 10003, (619) 268-9092, (212) 533-5981
Sam Fulton Inc., 2288 Gunbarrel Rd., #111, Chattanooga, TN 37421, (888) 726-3858
Small Business Administration, Office of International Trade, 409 Third St. S.W., 8th Fl., Washington, DC 20416, (800) 8-ASK-SBA
Jack Trout, c/o Trout & Partners Ltd., 2 Pickwick Plaza, Greenwich, CT 06830-5530, (203) 622-4312
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