This is the story of how America’s Great Department Store, against the backdrop of an economic and category crisis, catalyzed consumer participation, brand equity and sales growth during the holiday season.

Campaign Objectives

Our campaign had three objectives:

Drive Consumer Participation - Getting the customer to engage with Macy’s during the holiday period is critical to Q4 business.

Grow Brand Equity - As a retailer of “wants vs. needs,” it’s critical for Macy’s to generate top-of-mind consideration, brand affinity and cultural relevance.

Grow Overall Sales - The 4th quarter holiday period generates approximately 40% of Macy’s sales, and is the main driver of sales momentum for the entire year.

Strategy & Execution

In 1897, an eight-year-old girl named Virginia O’Hanlon inspired the most famous newspaper editorial of all time by writing a letter to the New York Sun asking, “Is there a Santa Claus?” This became the inspiration for the creation of an unprecedented entertainment franchise that snowballed from an in-store activation to a 30 minute TV special, merchandise offering, smartphone app and local school play performances across the country. It's precisely the creativity and diversity of executions spawning from this simple question that made for such an effective campaign.

Results

Macy’s brand equity was shown by both Interbrand brand tracker and Brand Z longitudinal data to have grown exponentially. In addition, consumers’ emotional affinity with the brand soared.

The franchise can also claim a contribution to the strong sales growth Macy’s enjoyed as a result of upticks in brand equity and consumer participation. This took place in the context of broad decline in sales in the department store sector, in addition to a bleak economic situation overall in the U.S.

Conclusion

The creative industry has for years provided brands with the solutions they need to capture and engage their customer base. We believe that “Yes, Virginia” stretches the limits of what marketing is capable of, both as a creative property and an extremely cost effective marketing tool. And we think we’re just getting started….