Rick Canale, managing director for Boston's Exotic Flowers — the official florist of the Boston Red Sox — has reason to celebrate. First, his Red Sox team won the 2007 World Series, and second, his shop created a buzz through marketing it alongside the baseball championship.

He says Exotic Flowers mimicked the Taco Bell model:  The national fast-food chain promised to give away at its stores on Tues, Oct. 30, one free taco per person if a base gets stolen during the World Series.
 
Canale implemented a similar idea. Exotic Flowers promised one free red rose — redeemable at an Exotic Flowers location — each day for the duration of the World Series to members of the Red Sox Nation, a paid membership program which features special offers for big-time fans. Exotic Flowers announced the plan on Oct. 24, the first day of the World Series, through a press release to the media and to some 5,000 subscribers of the florist's newsletter.
 
The buzz that idea generated was immeasurable, Canale says. Even if people weren't breaking down the doors to get their free rose, he says he was satisfied with how quickly word of the promotion spread with the press release being forwarded to so many different people.
 
The effort paid off in keeping his business top of mind with consumers. In the aftermath of the World Series, Canale says Exotic Flowers received a lot of orders from people wanting to send thank you flowers to friends, co-workers and family for scoring them hard-to-get tickets to the baseball championship games.

Read more about the creation of a nationwide baseball PR campaign waged by eight florists as well as the media attention it generated in previous issues of E-Brief.

--Cassandra P. Foster
cfoster@safnow.org

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