Bringing the great outdoors, indoors. Sorry, no mosquitoes allowed.

July 1, 2010

Bringing the great outdoors, indoors. Sorry, no mosquitoes allowed.

Ah, camping. An American past time as American as apple pie and baseball. While most families enjoy partaking in camp fire grilled hotdogs and s’mores while kicking it old school at the campground – there are many who are and will be “camping” in a very different kind of way this summer.

Thanks in part to the lagging economy, many parents can’t afford to pack up the car with the kids, dogs and coolers in tow and head to the wilderness for a weeks worth of roughing it.

It’s simply too expensive.

Enter Bass Pro Shops ‘Summer Camps’. A six week program/adventure where kids can learn how to shoot a BB-gun, land a big mouth bass and pitch a tent all for free (and without having to worry about fending off hungry bears). The idea behind the ‘Summer Camps’ program is to build a bird loving, moose hunting, camp happy community for Bass Pro Shop loyalists and outdoor enthusiasts, and of course to buy products too. As Jim Wargo, Manager of the Harrisburg, PA location says, “We could just blast out advertising like a shotgun, but we’d rather have something interactive happening at the store that people can come in and experience.” So far the program has been a huge success, helping to significantly increase traffic and sales at all of the retailers 56 locations.

The lesson here is that sometimes making a connection via interaction rather than advertising can have a greater impact on both sales and brand recognition. So let the consumer in. Let them become immersed in your brands products and services. Then sit back, relax and watch them come back for more of the same (with wallet in hand).

But all of this enjoying the great outdoors indoors begs the question… without any pesky bugs to get under your skin, we wonder how Off and other insect repellent sales are doing?

To learn more about Bass Pro Shops less buggy approach to roughing it in the wild, take a gander at this recent Ad Age article http://adage.com/article?article_id=144668

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