Arjowiggins Creative Papers is the world’s leading manufacturer of creative and eco-sustainable papers, with 7,700 employees and operating in 82 countries. Products in the Arjowiggins papers portfolio continually achieve best-in-category performance for paper capability and print performance and are available globally. Each range offers a high quality finish for a wide variety of applications.
Arjowiggins is committed to improving the environmental impact of its business, identifying energy saving opportunities to minimise its carbon emissions and pioneering the development of energy-free biotechnologies for water and pulp treatment. All of Arjowiggins’ creative brands have been labelled FSC since June 2008, and the company is constantly expanding its premium recycled paper ranges, as well as its CarbonNeutral® offer under the brand Conqueror.
Strategy – broader business issues the company is facing
In order to ensure paper remains relevant in today’s changing communications landscape, Arjowiggins Creative Papers is focussed on driving forward new product innovation, combining style and creativity with unrivalled environmental credentials to ensure it is able to deliver innovative yet sustainable solution for designers, printers and end users.
The world of fashion has a crucial influence on the paper industry. To drive the Rives brand forward and increase sales and relevance of the product, Arjowiggins Creative Papers decided to rejuvenate the Rives paper collection, introducing new colours and textures that reflected the latest season’s trends, styles and colours to inspire new ideas in paper. This strongly influenced Rives’ global ‘Think Chic’ marketing campaign, which incorporated targeted communication to key designers and printers and PR both in the UK and globally
Objectives of the campaign
The Rives relaunch needed to:
- Raise awareness of the Rives collection amongst designers and printers
- Create a buzz around Rives among the high-fashion and luxury community
- Promote the key benefits of Rives, particularly its eco-credentials and luxury textures
- Convey Arjowiggins’ central Think Chic’ campaign message through the Rives relaunch
The target audience
Arjowiggins’ campaign aimed to appeal to the company’s regular audience of niche print and design media. However, Lexis was also asked to extend its reach to highfashion and luxury communities, both online and in print.
Key target titles included Creative Review, Design Week, Grafik and Print and Paper Monthly.
Media, channels or techniques used
After the partnership with Jean-Pierre Braganza had been negotiated and planned, Lexis approached target media to inform them of the partnership. Having demonstrated the innovation and news value of the paper corset, Lexis secured three top-tier media attendees to sit on the front row at Braganza’s Fashion Week show: Design Week, Grafik and Creative Review. These media channels were chosen because they reflected the design, creative and luxury elements of Arjowiggins’ campaign.
Collateral created at the LFW event – including video footage and photography – was seeded to online media through a social media release, using the surprising design partnership as a compelling news hook. The story was picked up across target design and fashion media, and Grafik magazine even exclaimed: “The paper garments wouldn’t be practical in the real world, but that’s not really the point here. It would be interesting to see more designers explore the potential of paper in their work – here’s to more unexpected collaborations in the future.”
The second phase of Lexis’ media campaign concentrated on pushing the rejuvenated paper collection and “Think Chic” marketing campaign throughout the printing trade press. Using the Fashion Week collateral and amplifying the existing designer conversation online, Lexis was able to secure a number of top-tier media hits – including front-page coverage in Print and Paper Monthly.
Timescales of the campaign
- January 2010: Brief to Lexis
- February 2010: Partnership negotiation with Jean-Pierre Braganza
- 19 February 2010: London Fashion Week show and Rives Campaign Launch
- 19 February onwards: Campaign sell-in and coverage
Results
Media results:
- 3 top-tier attendees at LFW event
- 25 pieces of coverage, including design blogs – with a total reach of over 200,000
- More than 500 views of the Braganza video on YouTube, and increased WOM through Twitter
- Feedback from sales team that designers were aware of the collaboration
Client testimonial
“The PR campaign designed by Lexis in the UK helped us bring our brand Rives & Sensation alive in the UK market. The clever partnership with Jean-Pierre Braganza, a protégé of Karl Lagerfeld, during the London Fashion Week was a great proposal from Lexis.
“The LFW collaboration made our campaign real and was appreciated by our clients of graphic designers and creative printers. Journalists really appreciated the exhibition of paper accessories made in Rives. The PR plan in the UK also inspired our international PR. Further to the LFW show, the press conferences in France and in Italy were presented like the UK activity where paper accessories made by local Designer were presented.
“As benefit of this partnership, fashion schools are willing to organise activities about paper & fashion. Our sales force also fed back that the campaign was “very creative” and surprisingly trendy saying Arjowiggins Creative Papers is definitely about Inspiration”. Farida Tir, brand manager – Rives
