Maybelline Glams Up Checkout Conveyor Belts

New York -- A patented process for advertising on conveyor belts in grocery stores is taking advantage of one of the last dead spaces in the channel. Maybelline New York recently completed a 10-store test with Envision Marketing Group LLC, Little Rock, AR, which originally marketed its belt advertising for local and community-based advertisers in the mid-South. Maybelline, the first major brand to test the technology, is looking into a larger nationwide launch.The 60-day test ran in June and July in 10 stores in eastern Oklahoma and northwest Arkansas with an ad for Maybelline's Great Lash mascara running across every checkout conveyor belt in the store. Maybelline New York is owned by L'Oreal USA."This is such a great way to reach consumers on a neighborhood level," says Kathy Orsomando, vice president of creative for Maybelline New York and Garnier. "We dominate the entire store, on every lane, which is amazing. Customers could go into a store with 10 lanes, and something is always visible. ... Compared to national advertising -- which we still do, of course -- this is on a whole different level. This is something customers see day in and day out, and it's in their neighborhood store when they're running to get a few groceries."Frank Cox, president and CEO of Envision, says the original business model was to run up to 10 advertisers' messages on one belt, but executives at Maybelline had a different plan. "What we found, as we approached that market [of larger regional and national advertisers], is that a lot of the national advertisers didn't care to be one of eight or 10 advertisers; they wanted the whole thing," says Cox. The conveyor belts are made of a substrate material that, together with the printing process, took the company more than a year to develop. The conveyors aren't made of the black rubberized material common in stores. "Our material has a special coating that was formulated by us and for us, and was specially designed to accept digital inks," says Cox. "You can't print on rubber; it wipes right off. So the trick for us was to create a belt material that we could digitally print on."The unprinted conveyor belts are bright white and are run on rolls through 16-foot-wide digital printers using a six-color process. A clear coat is then applied to the printed surface for durability in the marketplace. Under normal use, the conveyors can last up to six months, says Cox, but the company estimates that most advertisers will want to sign on for a 12-week cycle.Cox is very optimistic about the opportunity for this type of medium. "Research shows that people shop in their neighborhood supermarkets on average two to three times per week," he says. "Advertisers can look at not only a city but a part of it or a group of neighborhoods they want to penetrate with their messages. This medium allows them to target very specifically toward demographics for customers based on where the stores are located."For the test, Orsomando says she wasn't concerned about the stores' locations. "We weren't particular about the area of the country. This is, hopefully, just the beginning of a relationship, and if this works out well, we would be willing to invest in this," she says. "How great would it be if we dominated the store space on the belts in Wal-Mart or Target where 70% of our sales are?"The artwork, which was provided by Maybelline, shows model Christie Turlington, the brand's bright green and pink colors, and the wording "America's #1 mascara." "There are people who don't watch TV or who don't come into big cities and look at big billboards. This is taking a space that everyone can really relate to and making it productive," Orsomando says.The test was in place in time for Maybelline's "Is This In Your Bag?" Great Lash nationwide promotion that began last month. While the promotion wasn't touted on the belts, the artwork matched that used on a larger in-store effort on displays and endcaps. This method of advertising helps retailers, too, Cox notes. "It generates advertising revenue, which we share with the retailer. We're creating a new noncore revenue stream, and since retailers work hard to create profit margins in their business, that's important to them." A bonus is that Envision also takes away the operational headaches of the conveyor belts. "We're creating and installing the conveyor belts, and we also maintain them and complete a 10-point inspection on a per-lane basis every two weeks," he adds.

Maybelline Glams Up Checkout Conveyor Belts

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