DS Smith takes the lead in Butcher’s pet food promotion

Butcher’s Pet Care has joined forces with DS Smith to incorporate a redeemable voucher into its existing consumer pack, helping to drive brand engagement and sales among pet lovers.

During an on-site technical workshop, Butcher’s challenged DS Smith to cost-effectively incorporate promotional activity into its existing high quality, corrugated 12 pack consumer box that would support its sales and promotional strategy.

DS Smith presented a range of options including special varnish effects, foil blocking and random coding. However, after joint consideration, the best solution was a HD pre-print liner to the existing litho printed pack offering the shopper a redeemable £1 voucher.

The resulting pack encourages repeat purchase of the high quality product and supports brand loyalty and engagement – key strategies for family-owned Butcher’s.

Established in 1987 by Graham Baker, who still chairs the business today, the firm produces food packed with natural goodness for dogs and cats. Employing more than 200 people at their base at Crick in Northamptonshire, Butcher’s believes its products speak for themselves and therefore want its packaging to do the same.

Tony Foster, sales and marketing director at DS Smith’s UK packaging division, commented: “The Butcher’s promotional pack is a great example of the benefit that can flow when customers and suppliers work together on pack design, which is why we love hosting customers at our sites. Creating this high quality pack and including the redeemable voucher, complements the values of Butcher’s as a family-run company and generates loyalty with the shopper. Using DS Smith to support a brand’s promotional activity really helps customers move their products off the retail shelf into the shopper’s basket.”

Sarah Alexander, Head of Marketing Department at Butchers, said: “DS Smith was central to the development of this promotional idea. We wanted to increase brand engagement but not sacrifice our family heritage. Through considered consultation together, DS Smith was able to get the balance just right.

This solution has already delivered results higher than ever seen previously:

• Redemption rates >35% against market norms of <1.5% which we are now monitoring to understand the impact on long-term loyalty trends.
• The reverse-printed coupon also allowed us to create noise & vibrancy for the shopper at fixture and protect the brand from the risk of mal-redemptions often seen with inserted coupons, which had been a big concern.

The collaborative approach DS Smith provides really suits the way we work and it’s great to see this method have a direct impact on sales.”