When Melinda and Dale Whybrow of Pictures Plus in Launceston asked Photo Direct to contribute towards an advertising feature to be run in the local newspaper back in November nobody anticipated the delightful results that would follow.First up Photo Direct’s marketing advisor, Pete Budd, visited Melinda and Dale to hear at first hand the story behind their move to a new store located next to the Centro Shopping Centre at Kings Meadows in Launceston. After explaining the rent increase issues that drove the idea to move from the Centre to a building just opposite, Pete was interested to learn about the changing nature of Melinda and Dale’s service offering to customers. The thoughtfully-designed store has four Kodak kiosks, a Noritsu 3011 with film processing and an HP Z3100. Interestingly the HP wide-format inkjet printer is now the workhorse of the business reflecting the changing consumer demands in photo printing. Learn more here
Photo books, calendars, cards, block mounted prints and acrylic wall art are high in demand. Growth areas are canvas and framing. These are trends that Photo Direct is seeing in other stores where retailers have switched their emphasis from 6×4 prints to wide format output. Pictures Plus also offers a consulting service for its printing and framing services, which has proven to be a real winner amongst those customers unfamiliar with the new world of digital output. Check this link.
Excited by what he learned Pete provided marketing advice to Melinda and shared the story with Keith Shipton at Photo Counter. Keith then spoke to Melinda and this inspiring story subsequently ran in Photo Counter
At around the same time the advertising feature appeared and based on customer feedback “The Examiner” promotion clearly helped drive interest and sales at Dale and Melinda’s new store. As a result of the success generated Melinda provided the newspaper with a testimonial on the effectiveness of running an advertising feature. The good news since is that “The Examiner” Newspaper has twice run a feature of their own that promotes the case for retail advertising using none other than Melinda’s testimonial thus extending the Picture Plus story!
To discover more about the sales and profit potential offered by wide format printing talk with your Photo Direct sales rep today. You’ll be delighted at what you learn!
