At Hellema in Friesland, the Netherlands, it was product manager Frank Wildschut and his team’s dream to inspire customers – from all over the world – with their world of biscuits, bars and bites. Especially now that, due to COVID-19, all food trade fairs have been cancelled and customer visits are no go. “We were quick to agree that we wanted to, nevertheless, organize a live event with a global reach,” explains Frank. An exciting challenge for Frank’s team and for Creators Dock!
The collaboration between Hellema and Creators Dock resulted in a number of highly successful live Meet & Taste events. In a self-made recording studio in Hellema’s production facility in Friesland, a series of innovative online meet-ups were organized. At Creators Dock we made the presentation and mock-ups for this online presentation.
Personal attention is key
“The customers were at home and excited to be able to take part in something out of the ordinary. They received a personal invitation to book a time slot and a TasteBox was sent to their home address,” Frank relates. The sample box, full of individually packaged new products, was developed by Creators Dock. Key to the TasteBox was to give the receiver a sense of surprise, involvement and personal attention.
Already during the preparations for the live events, it was clear that customers were readily picking up on it. And account managers were left with client appointments for a total worth of 4 to 5 days, from Germany to Scandinavia, from China to Canada, not to forget Australia, Russia and more. Everybody was enthusiastic and curious.
Great success – to be continued
Frank confidently concludes: “Looking back, we can see that, in fact, we achieved much more than during a trade show, both for the customer and for us. The customer had the entire team at his disposal during the live event, instead of just two Hellema reps at a trade fair. What’s more, without the distractions of a trade fair, we were able to deal with the business side of things quickly and efficiently. Above all, we got to chat with many more customers than is usual. This certainly will be repeated!”