Tom's of Maine Plays to Emotions

Kennebunk, Maine — For a natural-products manufacturer such as Tom’s of Maine, an Earth Month campaign would seem the perfect fit. But the Colgate-Palmolive subsidiary only started focusing on national consumer and shopper marketing activation around Earth Month a few years ago – with mixed results. “We weren’t really breaking through,” says Matt Smith, shopper marketing team leader at Tom’s of Maine.While Earth Month promotions often focus on saving money and the planet at the same time, Tom’s of Maine decided to connect with its target consumers and their families in a more emotional way. “And what we learned is that our target cares about the environment,” Smith says. “But it’s not just for herself and for today. It’s for future generations. It all came down to her kids.”This insight, in turn, led to the creation of a “Start Young, Live Green” campaign for Earth Month this year. Instead of focusing on shopper savings, the effort emphasized sustainability and the fact that the company helps to create a better planet by giving 10% of its profits back to non-profit organizations.Tom’s timed the campaign to coincide with its “Goodness Report,” an annual corporate sustainability report. The report was brought to life on the company website with numerous videos explaining the company’s sustainability efforts.Tom’s partnered with recycling and upcycling company TerraCycle, Trenton, New Jersey, to launch what they called the first used-toy recycling program. Families could sign up to receive a free toy recycling box, then fill it with used toys and use a prepaid shipping label to send the box to TerraCycle for recycling into park benches and other items.Tom’s also partnered with green mom personality Sara Snow on a radio media tour to promote the program, which went viral, earning more than 40 million media impressions, and the boxes were gone within a few days. “We didn’t know how big this would be,” Smith says. “We’d never done anything like this before.”The “Start Young, Live Green” effort included national and geo-targeted Facebook, Twitter and Instagram activity aimed at driving awareness of the campaign and of key in-store events. The campaign also included fun online elements available on a dedicated Earth Month section of TomsofMaine.com. These included a downloadable Green Getter card (similar to a paper fortune teller) that kids could play with to learn educational green tips, and a recipe for creating do-it-yourself sidewalk chalk using an empty Tom’s of Maine deodorant container.Building on the chalk idea, the brand worked with Whole Foods to create the first Tom’s of Maine recycling and upcycling endcap. It featured Tom’s of Maine toothpaste and deodorants, upcycled TerraCycle tote bags made from toothpaste tubes, samples of the DIY chalks and the chalk recipe cards.Shelf signage at Whole Foods also focused on sustainability as opposed to product information. In front of the deodorant products, signage highlighted the chalk recipe. In the oral care section, consumers could find tear sheets on how to sign up for the Tom’s of Maine “Natural Care Brigade” recycling program.At 11 Whole Foods stores in the U.S., Tom’s of Maine also held “Growing Up Green” events featuring large-scale murals by Whole Foods chalkboard artists, chalk drawing for kids, giveaways of the Green Getter cards, and handouts of kids’ and adult toothpaste samples.At Hannaford stores, strawberry seeds were handed out along with samples of Silly Strawberry natural children’s toothpaste. At Wegmans stores, small sapling trees were given away. Efforts for Target included an endcap display and a digital campaign at Target.com. For Walmart, the promotion included a Collective Bias influencer campaign.Also at Wegmans, Tom’s of Maine had Earth Month endcaps in addition to freestanding floor displays. The endcaps included info cubes about the “Start Young, Live Green” campaign. Because the endcaps were slated to stay for 13 weeks, the cubes had product information on the other side that could be turned around and revealed once Earth Month was over. “The customer really loved it because it made things more efficient at the store level, but for us it really lived into our values about environmental stewardship,” Smith says.Tom’s of Maine will measure the success of the “Start Young, Live Green” campaign based on consumer awareness and share growth in the category. Smith noted that, in terms of share growth, the brand had its best Earth Month ever, and that key customers reacted positively to the campaign. “We look at this particular campaign now as a model on how to create a big idea around an emotional insight that connects with our consumer in a way that’s unique, that’s differentiated, that adds value to their lives,” Smith says. “Creating a holistic program around that with strong in-store activation is a recipe for success.”In addition to TerraCycle, partners for the campaign included lead agency The Mars Agency, Southfield, Michigan; PR agency Cohn & Wolfe, New York; and digital agency VML, Kansas City.

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