face-to-face The polished Gem
Katie Rawlings talks to Toy World about Gem Creative’s beginnings, core services, and what the future holds.
What was the deciding factor in setting up Gem Creative? Gem Creative was officially launched in 2008 as an additional arm to the already existing in-house marketing team. This team houses several skilled graphic designers who continuously work alongside key individuals within the Gem’s marketing and sales teams, helping to evolve the full retail service offering to both partners and customers. It was identified that the unique element to Gem Creative meant far better value for money within a creative capacity, and opportunities to create bespoke product bundles, in- store POS or simply have a far more cost-effective use of an agency without compromising on quality.
What does Gem Creative provide as its core services? We can’t forget that Gem Creative’s primary function is that of Gem’s marketing department, offering Gem’s core partners the services of a traditional marketing team, ensuring that our vendors are clearly visible in the channel, and that retail are fully aware of the products and services that we offer. Running alongside that, we offer the full capabilities of a traditional creative and PR agency, from POS creation, planograms, social media management, conceptual design (packaging or in-store visuals) to PR, media
buying, design and digital content. We do this on a project-by-project basis, without the added cost of a monthly fee. Our rates are extremely competitive given the backing of Gem, which in essence is a great feat for our clients.
What makes Gem Creative such an important company in its field? Gem Creative is important not only to Gem but to companies we work with, to offer clear differentiation to retail. With current times proving difficult, Gem Creative can come up with great ways to help retailers entice the consumer to purchase goods, whether it’s bespoke packaging, cross-product bundling, using digital to enhance the physical merchandise, or utilising social media to promote and launch new or existing products. We are experts when working with retail, and can utilise all areas of the Gem group of companies from creative and digital solutions through to logistics and licensing. There aren’t a lot of companies out there that can offer such a varied amount of services. Gem Creative can work with companies and pull all of these elements together.
How is Gem Creative’s business faring right now? Gem Creative has gone through a fair amount of
change over the years, whilst continuously evolving its offering and adding resources to the team to ensure a best in class service. We’ve recently won several accounts from more traditional agencies due to our speed, efficiency and the reduced costs on projects and materials, so we are definitely looking to build our client base whilst retaining the personal touch of being a smaller refined agency.
How do you see Gem Creative developing going forward? We are conscious that the requirement for digital solutions is increasing at quite a pace, the benefit however of working with Gem Creative is that we can utilise Ztorm, our digital distribution company which has the ability to pretty much offer any online solution our clients are looking for, from simple web development through to dedicated redemption sites. We’re also looking at introducing virtual simulation capabilities to enable retail stores to utilise space, record footfall, redesign shop floors and capitalise on ensuring full product ranges are displayed which will help to achieve those all-important sales.
This issue’s features focus on the Hong Kong and Nuremberg trade shows, what do you think about trade shows and their importance to the trade? I have a mixed opinion on trade shows, when they’re good they’re great but some trade shows I have attended have simply been a waste of time, due to attendance levels but also the lay-out and ‘purpose’ of the event. It would be nice to see more people who know about the industry working on the stands and booths rather than being greeted by ‘hired’ personnel to help manage the hordes. As I say, when the shows are on form they are of great benefit to meet new contacts and find new products or services, but when they’re not, it’s questionable on their longevity.
34 Toyworld
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