adidas New Zealand will be showing off one of the latest in marketing technology to its head office in Germany, all thanks to a Hamilton print company. Last November we told you about Print House in Hamilton’s new integrated multi-media technology that allows ultra thin video screens to ‘show-and-tell’ about a product. adidas New Zealand tried it, loved it, and are taking it to the company’s HQ in Germany.
The system can incorporate a stand-alone video screen and player within a page of a book, but in this case the technology is being used in point-of-sale display stands. Retail and trade marketing manager for adidas New Zealand, Sarah Satterthwaite, says the compactness of the technology and the impact it makes with potential customers means it is ideally suited to adidas’ new miCoach SPEED_CELL product. It’s a device that fits inside an adidas shoe which records downloadable data so that the wearer can track their performance and compete against other wearers on-line.
The Video-in-Print currently operating in display stands at 14 stores in New Zealand with plans to increase this to 22 stores by the end of 2012.
“We have had great success with the technology in our Newmarket store in particular, with the store reporting that many of its sales are directly attributable to seeing the product on screen.
“Because many of our potential customers will have seen this product on-line, we can follow up that exposure in stores with this moving image technology,” says Satterthwaite.
She says the technology is a perfect marketing solution and hopes that adidas’ head office in Germany might pick up the technology, once it sees how it has been used in New Zealand.
The technology was developed by U.S. company Americhip and is already in use in many parts of the world. Hamilton’s Print House has the distribution rights for New Zealand. Print House’ chief executive Brett Phillips says it has been a boost that such a massive international brand such as adidas has picked up the video in print devices.
“I’ve found that once companies see the potential for this technology as an integrated communication and marketing tool they become pretty enthusiastic quite quickly. It is also very satisfying to know that this is generating sales, because at the end of the day that is what it is supposed to do,” he says.
The video in print technology allows various chapters of video to be played, it can be activated through sensor movement and it can be presented physically in a way that fits with the sophistication of products.
“We’ve found through selling our products in large stores that there is lots of competition for attention. The layout of modern stores also means that ideally marketing materials need to be compact and free standing. Video-in-Print has delivered us a solution which meets all of these requirements,” says Satterthwaite
“We’ve found through selling our products in large stores that there is lots of competition for attention. The layout of modern stores also means that ideally marketing materials need to be compact and free standing. Video-in-Print has delivered us a solution which meets all of these requirements.”
