It's All About the Message

There are two sides to Christian gift card company DaySpring, a subsidiary of family-owned Hallmark, nestled in the woods in tiny Siloam Springs, Ark. The company is spiritual, serious about delivering a strong message and the word of God. The other side is all business -- a company beginning to hit its merchandising stride. In the last two years, DaySpring doubled its P-O-P output, now producing close to 350 projects annually, and tripled its list of vendors.The company's P-O-P production growth parallels the growth of the Christian market as a whole. The misperception about "Christian consumers" is they only shop at small mom-and-pop Christian bookstores. But as Tim Ward, senior trade relations specialist at DaySpring, puts it: "They go to Wal-Mart twice a week like everyone does." Thus, more mass retailers are carrying inspirational product to reach these shoppers."I don't know if you want to hearken back to September 11," he adds, "but that really was a benchmark point. From that point forward, inspirational product really has kicked off." "DaySpring is noted as a leading force in the Christian market for distributing the word of God and for promoting our product," says Edward Grant, director of marketing services. "As that market grew, it kind of mushroomed over to the secular market, which is the Wal-Marts and card and gift shops."And the niche market has expanded in both secular, mass market accounts and the stores that built DaySpring -- Christian Bookseller Association accounts. This essential channel divide is DaySpring's largest challenge, and its reason for the upswing in in-store marketing. Mass market accounts such as Wal-Mart, Barnes & Noble, Target and Hallmark require larger rollouts -- faster and within their guidelines. CBA stores may have no requirements, but the small independent shops need to be educated on why a spinning floor rack will help their business grow.In either case, there's enough P-O-P to go around, and more vendors are knocking on DaySpring's door to produce it. "We're opening the market," says Grant. "These companies are realizing what we're bringing to the table, and they're saying, 'Hey, there's business down there.' We're basically becoming more of a player now."He adds, "Most people, when you say DaySpring, have no clue what that is. But the fact is, we're doing better P-O-P, our products are better, our parent company is Hallmark, and we're getting bigger distribution -- we're growing."Company HistoryDaySpring's products are primarily greeting cards. They're the company's "bread and butter," Grant says. DaySpring also sells daily planners, calendars, journals, gifts and religious prints. The company does have a few licensees that they build product around, such as Veggie Tales, Max Lucado and most recently Rick Warren, the author of "The Purpose Driven Life," which has sold more than 7 million copies. Ward says the licensed products are usually some of the more successful offerings. "They usually are so prominent in our market at that time, that it really carries a lot of weight," he says.DaySpring began 40 years ago when two pastors from California, Dean Kerns and Don Leetch, started with a printing press in a garage. They produced gospel tracts and slowly evolved into a small greeting cards company. In 1987, DaySpring was purchased by David C. Cook Publishing and in 1999 became a subsidiary of Hallmark. It employs more than 400 people.According to Grant, DaySpring is autonomous from Hallmark. The only time the two really cross paths is when DaySpring produces a line directly for Hallmark. Otherwise, DaySpring handles its own product development, display development and distribution."The relationship is wonderful," Grant says. "Here we have the opportunity to work with a major player in the social expression industry, and we get the benefit of all of their years of experience and mistakes to help us be better. And they share everything with us, to help us grow and be better."If Grant sounds a bit biased, it's because he began his career with Hallmark, working there for 16 years. The 1995 POPAI Hall of Fame inductee then left marketing for the supply side, working 16 years with different companies. Finally, he was hired back into marketing by Hallmark to head up Day-Spring's merchandising, which he's been doing the last two years.According to Grant's co-workers, his experience has helped to improve DaySpring's merchandising. "When I first came here, the HR vice president said, 'You come here with a lot of experience, a lot of background, a lot of knowledge that we need, but show us that you care before you show us what you know,'" Grant says. "What was really funny was after I was here for a couple months, he knocked on my door and said, 'All right, we know you care, now get back to work.'"Grant's colleagues at DaySpring say because of his knowledge, it's easier to form a marketing direction; that he knows materials and manufacturing; that he saves the company time and money. They also say he's spurred in-house design, which Peggy Evans, retail packaging/merchandising manager, says has really tightened the work process."There's not as much wasted time," she says. "When we used to depend on outside vendors to do our first concepts, we might go through three sets of concepts before we ever found what we were looking for. Now, we save ourselves all the time of going through that many concept steps to having some idea on paper of what we want it to look like before [vendors] start working on it."Picking Its PartnersThe process begins with the marketing department putting together a marketing direction and schedule. Then, as the creative department develops the product, the marketing team develops the packaging and P-O-P. If building a merchandiser, the team starts with concept sketches on paper based on the product, load-in, distribution and budget. They then review concepts, choose a final version and solicit quotes from outside manufacturers.And those quotes are adding to a larger vendor base. Two years ago, DaySpring worked with a short list of suppliers. "We've expanded our vendor base probably three-fold," Evans says.Grant says soliciting more vendors makes better P-O-P. "Better pricing, better quality, better service -- because the competition is tougher."Ward says it creates more variety, too. "Its not looking like the same piece modified by the same vendor." When selecting a vendor, Evans says the team evaluates the quality of the display, the service and of course the price. "If we've got five vendors, we're evaluating all five on what they deliver to us in a prototype: Did they deliver it on time? Is it within the price range that we want? Is it within the structure and the quality we want?"Typically, at least two to three vendors send in prototypes for each DaySpring project. The P-O-P process can range from three months to a year and a half -- mostly due to the channel differences. On an average project, DaySpring delivers around 1,200 to 3,000 displays to Wal-Mart and up to 1,700 displays to the CBA market.The company utilizes all types of materials, from corrugated to metal to wood. It creates temporary, semipermanent and permanent displays. In addition to P-O-P, DaySpring's advertising strategy includes print ads within trade publications, circulars, some regional radio, and press in secular and trade publications.The entire DaySpring marketing services department is divided into four sections: merchandising, packaging, trade advertising and trade shows. The department employs 10 people.Grant says the departments all chip in and help one another. They have to: DaySpring works 50 trade shows a year, manages 70 projects a week, produces more than 300 displays a year and is running off about 100 sales catalogs and flyers annually.Differences Between Secular, CBAThough DaySpring produces displays for both the secular market and the CBA market, it's the Christian bookstores to which they're most loyal. The Christian Booksellers Association generally consists of small, independent stores. Some larger chains include Family Christian, Lifeway and Berean. From a product standpoint, in the CBA market, DaySpring cards and gift items are all Christian and Bible verse-based. "When you start going into, say Wal-Mart, it turns into a mix," Evans says. "You have some [cards] that have a light message, some with no message or some with a heavy message all in the same display." Ward adds that the card messages "would be considered more inspirational" than religious.Making a clearer distinction, some secular markets receive a completely different brand called "Joyfully Yours." This brand is nowhere labeled DaySpring. The cards have inspirational messages, and share the same quality as a DaySpring card but without such enhancements as foil embossing or die-cuts. DaySpring created the Joyfully Yours line to "protect" its CBA accounts, Grant says."It's to hold the integrity of the DaySpring brand within Christian Bookseller Association accounts," Evans says. "That's our base, and that's our main customer. That's the customer the company has always committed to taking care of." While some secular stores do carry DaySpring, a Wal-Mart store will have a lighter-themed card because the Wal-Mart consumer may not want a "heavy" DaySpring card.CBA accounts, at least the small regional, independent stores, aren't well-versed in the importance of P-O-P. The storeowners are running a business for a different purpose, so DaySpring faces the challenge of teaching the Christian bookstores to merchandise more like a secular store."It's an educational process that we've embarked upon to help the CBA market understand that advertising and P-O-P and displays are helpful for their business to grow," Grant says. "Our challenge is to continue to educate them on the values of good merchandising."And as Evans notes, "Their shopper is changing." The Christian consumer is a Target and Hallmark consumer."They're in Wal-Mart and other stores. When they come into a CBA channel store, they expect that kind of quality and appearance, and that's where we're trying to help them with their merchandising," Ward says."We're telling the CBA market, 'You have to enhance your presentation to compete with the secular market because your customers are in there, every day, or more often, and you have to have some reason for them to come back to your store," Grant says.However, he explains that the merchandising must be appropriate for a CBA store and represent the Christian values for which the cards stand. For example, DaySpring isn't going to build a Christmas display centered on Santa Claus for a CBA account. Grant says he'll sometimes even test a display with a CBA account first to make sure it approves. That said, not every display has a heavy, religious focus.DaySpring developed a snowman merchandiser for 99-cent packages of notes, for instance. Grant says it began with a simple, small dump bin, but product sell-through was so huge it's now on its third year. DaySpring is also planning a huge Christmas Village display complete with houses and light posts for 2004. (Prototypes for both projects are already in for review.)While DaySpring may do the educating with CBA accounts, it's glad to take direction from its Bentonville, Ark.-neighbor, Wal-Mart. "They have very strict guidelines that we're happy to follow," Grant quips. "We're delighted."Evans points out that with a CBA account, merchandising decisions are pretty much made at DaySpring's discretion -- it's about what's best for the product rather the retailer. Not so with Wal-Mart. "Wal-Mart is very, 'This is what I want, this is when I want it, and this is how it has to be done.'"It's the Message That CountsMerchandising is certainly becoming a bigger focus at DaySpring. The company is turning half of an empty warehouse into a display lab. The lab will have three store settings: One simulates a Hallmark store, one a secular store and one a CBA account. Because the channels are so different in what they accept in the way of P-O-P, the store settings will help the merchandising team test ideas and create more efficient P-O-P, Grant says. "The merchandising budget is one of the largest in the company, and I would think it's a very high focus because whenever we do an advertising piece, or something that promotes the product, retailers in the Christian market really want to see how it's merchandised," Ward says. "And becoming more so," Grant adds. "As the competition becomes greater in the marketplace, the company is fully aware that P-O-P, and launching products and having a presence in the retail environment is extremely important."DaySpring plans to develop a coherent look for the brand and its displays, using like materials and a more consistent color palette, Grant says. "We'd like to get to the point when you walk into a store you don't even need to see the DaySpring name. You just know by the color, the fixture and the presence."However, when it's all said and done, it's the message that counts. It's the message DaySpring puts on its cards that drives the company."The key to our company is the message. What we put on the product. When the message really matters, you choose DaySpring. We put a lot of time and effort into the message and we support that with good artwork and original designs," Grant says. "We're not chasing dollars, we're chasing a ministry that is spreading the word of God in a professional, positive way."

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