OC Post, the new shorter, smaller daily newspaper from the Orange County Register, has started a marketing push to promote a weekly automotive section called Drive.
The paper is using several tactics to promote the section, including giveaways, grocery store ads, newspaper rack cards, online advertising, e-mails and sponsoring radio traffic announcements on Clear Channel Communications Inc. stations.
The marketing team at Irvine-based Freedom Communications Inc., which publishes the Register and the OC Post, created the work, said Debbie Holzkamp, OC Post publisher and senior vice president of sales and marketing at Freedom Orange County Information.
The paper is holding about 10 events at auto dealerships throughout OC where people can test cars and get a free ski lift ticket, Holzkamp said. There also will be food, music and a racing game.
The catch: “They must look inside the OC Post Drive section to find out where the events are being held,” Holzkamp said.
Advertisers in the 12-page section are giving away offers on service-related items.
Drive, a bid to boost auto advertising at OC Post, publishes Fridays and includes details on local auto events, consumer tips and dealerships.
It’s one of the sections that OC Post recently introduced to boost advertising and readers. The paper packages the Register’s stories and columns in a shorter, easy-to-read format.
OC Post’s circulation is 110,000, the bulk of which are at-home deliveries as part of a “ZIP code sampling,” Holzkamp said.
The paper also is available at more than 1,000 newsstands for 25 cents.
“The number of new subscribers continues to grow each week, which tells us more people are becoming aware of OC Post over time and enjoy reading it,” Holzkamp said. “Total distribution of 110,000 exceeds our expectations for what we had planned at this point in the year.”
A handful of Register subscribers have switched to OC Post or decided to subscribe to both, Holzkamp said.
“But for the most part cannibalization of the Register has been minimal,” she said.
Prior to launching OC Post, Holzkamp said the paper spent months researching target readers: “busy people, both casual and infrequent newspaper readers, who would find OC Post useful” but don’t “have time to read a traditional newspaper like the Register.”
“We learned there was room for two daily newspapers in Orange County” targeting different readers, Holzkamp said.
Not every reader is enamored.
N. Christian Anderson III, OC Post editor-in-chief who’s also chief executive of Freedom Orange County Information, said some folks “absolutely hate it.”
“That speaks to why we created it,so we weren’t offering only a one-size-fits-all newspaper,” Anderson said. “The fact that some people hate it means we’re differentiating products appropriately.”
There’s also been mixed responses from advertisers.
“Many have found instant response from their OC Post ads” while “others are waiting to see how rapidly paid circulation grows,” Anderson said.
Overall, Anderson said the launch of OC Post “has gone extremely well,” particularly with the challenge of producing two daily papers side by side in the Register’s Santa Ana headquarters.
“We’ve had a few hiccups on Friday nights when our pressroom is particularly busy,” Anderson said. “But the pressroom associates have overcome those problems and are performing beyond expectations.”
D.e.m.o. Changes
Anaheim-based teen clothing retailer Pacific Sunwear of California Inc. is making big changes to stem slumping sales and to lure shoppers.
I recently outlined marketing moves it has in the works for its dominant PacSun chain, which sells surf clothes.
But the company’s smaller hip-hop and street wear clothing chain, d.e.m.o., is set to see its own changes.
D.e.m.o. is revamping displays, bringing in clothes from popular brands and testing out store redesigns that have an updated logo and layout.
Jeff Van Sinderen, analyst at B. Riley & Co., said PacSun recently opened two d.e.m.o. “lab” stores in Connecticut and New Jersey, where it went with a design and layout that’s “more sophisticated” and plays up glamour and fashion.
The move “should help the company differentiate from competitors,” Van Sinderen wrote in a recent report.
Elizabeth Pierce, analyst at Roth Capital Partners LLC, said d.e.m.o.’s girls’ business also should see a boost. The company plans to bring in styles from Kimora Lee Simmons’ Baby Phat brand, a hot seller, she said.
“There were some tactical merchandise mistakes made on the girls’ side of the business this year,” Pierce wrote in a recent report. “New merchants at d.e.m.o. have learned from these mistakes and are trying to reposition the girls’ business for holiday.”
Hotel Work
Irvine-based Integrated MarketingWorks just picked up a client.
Balboa Bay Club & Resort in Newport Beach tapped Integrated for marketing work to help raise its profile.
Integrated’s other clients include Sunkist Growers Inc. and The Flower Fields in Carlsbad.
