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Brianne Mahon and a design from the
Grad 2010 Collection.
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May 3, 2010 – Carriage House Florists in Saskatoon is using social media, on trend designs and edgy photos to go after this year’s graduates.
This is the first year the shop has put together a targeted grad promotion – their Grad 2010 Collection – and designer Brianne Mahon is leading the charge. The idea stems from the shop’s foray into Facebook. “I’ve been developing our Facebook page since October. And we thought that the Facebook page would be a good way to reach young
consumers. It’s a tool they use all the time so we thought we’d just try it out and see what we could do with it,” says Mahon, who’s been with the shop for three years and in the industry for six.
For the Grad 2010 collection, Mahon worked to create several different pieces, from ‘Dazzling Diva’ to ‘Punk Rock Princess’ as well as classic, modern, non-traditional and contemporary designs to appeal to a variety of consumers. The designer thought beyond just the corsage and created floral accessorized bracelets, necklaces, shoes, belts, clutches, head bands, hair pieces and rings, to name a few. Customers will also have the option to customize any piece to suit the colour and style preferences of the graduate.
Once the designs were prepared, Mahon worked with a local photographer and models to capture and showcase the whole collection. The entire crew is actually composed of people who’ve worked at Carriage House Florist in the past or are current employees. “It took about four hours to take the whole photo shoot and we just went to places that represented the city of Saskatoon. We went down by the river and we also tried to do a funkier, trendier setting and went to a graffiti wall to give it an edgier feel.” Mahon edited the photos to include inspiring quotes and popular music song quotes and also created two slideshows – one to display ‘The Classics Collection’ and another for ‘The Creative Collection,’ which is made up of fun and contemporary pieces.
The designer is now in the stages of marketing the photos and the collection via Facebook. She says area schools have Facebook pages they’ve created so graduates can co-ordinate to ensure that no one is wearing the same dress. “I will be posting a brief marketing message on these types of pages along with one photo and a link to our page that
will hopefully encourage graduates to come check us out. We will also be offering a chance to win a gift certificate if they order by a certain date. The purpose of this will be to encourage graduates to order early,” says Mahon. She also plans to create a small album that shows the floral hair bands and hair pieces that the shop has to offer and will drop these albums off at local hair salons. She’s hoping to create a mutual relationship with these businesses so salons can use the photos to give clients a visual of what’s available and send customers to the shop.
Mahon says what makes Carriage House Florist’s Grad Collection unique is the fact that it was completely influenced by young people. “I am a 21 year old designer, our models were 20 and 22 and our photographer was 26. I believe having young people work on this album gives us an advantage, in the sense that is gave us insight and a greater understanding as to what types of accessories young consumers will actually wear and be interested in purchasing.”
To check out Carriage House Florists full collection and Facebook page, visit: www.facebook.com/carriage.house.florists.
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