Back-to-School in Full Swing

The back-to-school season is on the lesson plan for retailers, who are hosting a wide variety of promotions this summer. Activity began in earnest in mid-July at retailers including Kroger, whose central division is offering "back to school" bucks redeemable for discounts on school supplies with purchases greater than $24. That promotion kicked off July 14. In August, Kroger's Fred Meyer division kicked off a cause campaign donating $1 to local schools with the purchase of apparel from Osh Kosh B'Gosh Co.; Levi Strauss & Co. replaced Osh Kosh as promotional partner for subsequent stages of the campaign. Among other supermarket chains, Albertsons' Florida division is dangling a $5 gift card with the purchase of 11 participating Kraft items, while its Intermountain West division hosts an incentive from ConAgra Foods offering $5 off total receipts with the purchase of $20 in participating brands. The incentive is backed by a sweeps awarding 10 laptop computers. Albertsons' Osco Drug is offering two free music downloads from connect.com with each purchase of participating Johnson & Johnson products including Tylenol, Pepcid AC, and Imodium. Both Jewel-Osco and Shaw's are offering savings on school supplies with the purchase of P&G products. (See "P&G's brandSaver Saves Music, Too" in Related Articles.) Safeway is hosting a "10% back to schools" promotion through which a portion of proceeds from participating products go to local schools. Manufacturers involved include Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Procter & Gamble, Pfizer and Campbell Soup Co. Safeway is also hosting a cross-merchandising program offering a Testrite notebook with the purchase of two bags of Hershey Co. candy.Cross-merchandising is a popular tactic in the supermarket channel. H-E-B dangles free private-label lunchmeat, batteries, bread, potato chips and waffles when shoppers buy specified backpacks, and also hosts a sweepstakes from Sanford Corp. awarding Dell computers and televisions. ShopRite offers $6 off school supplies with the purchase of $25 in participating Procter & Gamble products, and Giant Eagle takes $3 off school supplies when shoppers buy five Kellogg Co. products. Meanwhile, Publix is linking to General Mills' evergreen Box Tops for Education program for an exclusive promotion. Stores will distribute promotional packages of GM products that carry two or four Bonus Box Tops, which shoppers can collect for the school of their choice. The schools that collect the most earn up to 50,000 Bonus Box Tops. A dedicated web site, publixboxtops.com, supports. In other channels, JC Penney is conducting a sweepstakes awarding a chance to take a player from the National Football League to the winner's school. In addition, in conjunction with Seventeen and Cosmo Girl magazines, the department store chain will host events in New York, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles and Miami, at which participants can compete in a dance contest for a chance to win a grand-prize meeting with a Los Angeles casting agent. The events will also feature gift bag giveaways, create-your-own music stations and style advice. The NFL sweeps and dance competition are part of Penney's back-to-school campaign, which features an umbrella theme of "all access." Significant P-O-P support includes ceiling-mounted motion displays of the campaign's mascot, dubbed "bobblehead dude." Additional support for the campaign, via DDB, Chicago, includes two TV spots, print ads, and a web site, jcpallaccess.com. Elsewhere, CompUSA dangles two roundtrip airline tickets from Flyfree America with the purchase of any desktop or notebook computer worth $499, and hosts a sweeps dangling a Honda Element or free college tuition as grand prizes. OfficeMax offers a coupon with any purchase providing 15% off a purchase at apparel store The Children's Place. Walgreens hosts a sweepstakes awarding a $50,000 grand prize, two $25,000 first prizes, and 20 second-prize computer and printer combos from Hewlett-Packard. Sponsoring vendors are Kraft Foods, Kimberly-Clark, Energizer Holdings, Boots Healthcare's Clearasil and HP. Entry forms are available in the chain's EasySaver rebate catalog. This is the third staight year Walgreens has hosted the sweeps as a back-to-school hook.

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