The lifestyle brand and popular pop-up store Pony Friday are offering up 400 free pairs of socks for arts market attendees at the historic St. Louis Hotel in Calgary’s East Village.
Pony Friday’s Elise Russell says the rules of the game are simple.
“We’re rewarding our customers for being brand ambassadors. They come in, they get a picture with the pony, post it to their social feed, tag us and Market Collective and we reward them with a free pair of socks.”
Russell says that people are having fun with it and most are surprised to learn that unlike some giveaways, the quality is great and the socks are designed locally.
This isn’t their first giveaway of this sort. It's become part of Pony Friday’s marketing strategy.
“We’ve had some correlation between our following and the sales transactions, but I’d have to say its more about the stickiness of our brand. People get to know Pony Friday and they have a positive association with the brand which is really hard to achieve when you’re just posting a paid advertisement.”
This type of social media is attractive to other businesses at the Market Collective’s St.Louis Hotel summer takeover event.
Jesse VanDewal, who runs Grizzled Bear, a new menswear company specializing in longer-cut pre-washed garments, says this is a strategy that works well for small business.
“It’s a great campaign that Pony Friday is running, it makes a lot of sense because they’re targeting a lot of local people, its the best way to spread the word.”
He says that as a business owner he’s always looking for new and innovative ways to actually get out and reach customers.
“Especially when you’re dealing on a local level its not always the easiest thing. When you can come up with little initiatives like this, its really good, the word of mouth spreads quickly.”
Nestled between the National Music Centre and the new Central Library, the Market Collective's summer takeover will run every weekend this June, July and August.
