Making the Most of the Fall + Thanksgiving Shopping Season
I’m a big fan of using holidays (major holidays and even the so called made up marketing holidays) and seasons as a basis for planning your shopper marketing activities, in places like social media and inside stores. Have you thought of considering the Fall + Thanksgiving season as a series of “mini events” in an effort to stretch out the season and create more purchase opportunities?
You may be tempted to think of some holidays as just a one-day events, but in reality most holidays are made up of several mini events that we can leverage in our shopper marketing. How many mini events can you think of for the Autumn season? Turns out, there’s a lot and some depend upon age and life phase. I’ve already written a blog post focused on the Halloween holiday; see that here. For this new blog post, I’ll use the Thanksgiving holiday as an example on how to connect with consumers. Let’s take parents of young children as our example; here are just a few of the “mini events” (and buying opportunities) you can build shopper marketing around leading up to Thanksgiving.
Build Shopper Marketing Around These ‘Mini-Events’ Leading up to American Thanksgiving
Holiday mailer (left) and in-store menu (right) from Whole Foods Market, leading up to Thanksgiving 2019.
Home decorating - odds are those who decorate the home for the Fall season have already done so leading up to Halloween. As the Halloween decorations come down and get stored away, out comes additional decor just for Thanksgiving. This type of decor could include: a cornucopia (horn of plenty - ideal as a table centerpiece or foodie gift basket for a hostess gift,) window lights, welcome mat at front door, Fall flowers or plants, tablecloths, place settings, scented candles & pine cones, etc.
Fall decor at front door of American home.
Ordering the turkey, or ham, or lamb, or beef, or whatever main food item planning to be served. According to the National Turkey Federation, about 51.6 million turkeys were eaten on Thanksgiving Day last year. Turkey is the traditional main meal on American’s Thanksgiving table, and they sell fast, so ordering in advance is important.
School parties - most American children will have a Thanksgiving party ahead of the school break for the holiday. With that comes purchase opportunities for kid-friendly Thanksgiving foods (lots of moms and dads searching now on Pinterest for the cutest Thanksgiving snack ideas,) crafts and classroom decorations.
Traveling for the holiday - don’t forget that a lot of Americans will have kids out of school, plus have a few days off work around the holiday. With that comes travel - mostly traveling to celebrate with family, in many cases long distances. According to AAA, more than 54 million Americans will travel this Thanksgiving. Travel offers purchase opportunities for not only transportation services, but also travel-friendly snacks, host gifts, etc.
The BIG shop before the party - If you’ve not been to the grocery store the day before Thanksgiving, prepare yourself! It’s crazy! I always do my big Thanksgiving grocery haul at my local Whole Foods Market (speaking of Whole Foods Market, have a look at their current shopper comms for Thanksgiving 2019 here via my Twitter feed.) I personally tend to get most shelf-stable things I need two days before, but then do a fill-in trip the morning before Thanksgiving (to pick up the turkey and other perishable items I prefer to have as fresh as possible.) Most shoppers will come prepared with a shopping list for this type of holiday shop, but this is also a great opportunity for teasing shoppers with impulse buys (pumpkin or gingerbread flavored everything, for example) or simply up-selling their planned purchases.
Kid’s decorations around the theme of being thankful - if children will be at the party, they’ll need some entertainment. American families often provide a fun, Thanksgiving themed game, craft or decoration for children to play with. In my house we have been doing a gratitude chain during the past few years.
Thanksgiving day gathering/party - The host of the gathering, or party, is likely to have everything they need by the day of Thanksgiving and will likely spend most of the evening before and morning of preparing, prepping food and cooking. If the host is having guests, beyond their immediate family (perhaps ‘Friendsgiving’) guests will likely swing by a store the day of (most stores are still open on Thanksgiving morning) to buy specialty desserts, flowers, wine, or other gift for the host.
Giving back - Americans are some of the most charitable people in the world. Thanksgiving tends to bring out the best of many of us. You’ll find that some hosts will encourage their guests to give to charity instead of bringing a host gift, many families will go do a community walk, called a turkey trot, which often gives back to charity, and it’s also common to find that families will go do a volunteer activity after Thanksgiving dinner (go feed the homeless at a homeless shelter, pick up trash along roadsides, etc.)
Remember, just as soon as Thanksgiving is over, America starts preparing for the next major holiday, Christmas. Read our other blog post on how to get the most out of Christmas.
Being the marketer that I am, my favorite from this list is the BIG shop before the party. The researcher side of me loves to observe both the planned & impulse purchases people make.
Hungry for more insight around how to connect with shoppers during major holidays? Work with us on a one-on-one consult to brainstorm how to get more of your products into shopping carts during the holidays. Learn more & contact us here: www.greenpursepr.com/consult.
Speaking of holidays, Green Purse PR creates an annual list of holidays, specifically for food companies. It’s called our Holidays List for Food Marketing. It’s a social media planning resource available here (stay tuned here for the 2020 version coming out very soon.)
Some behind-the-scenes of my own preparation for Thanksgiving dinner. I work with Global Animal Partnership, the leading animal welfare label for meat and eggs. My Thanksgiving turkey is always G.A.P. animal welfare certified!
My go-to appetizer at Thanksgiving — a “meat-forward” cheese plate.
Me, Lisa Mabe, being thankful for my family, including my daughter. We always dress to match on holidays!
- Lisa Mabe-Konstantopoulos, Founder, Green Purse PR