Furniture retailers offered ‘Game Night' promotion

Marketers team with board game giant Hasbro

Clint Engel -- Furniture Today, September 9, 2009

A portion of a sample print ad for the upcoming Hasbro “Friends, Family & Fun Game Night” promotes an in-store event that blends home furnishings with board games.

MINNEAPOLIS — Bill Napier and other industry marketers have teamed with board game producer Hasbro to offer furniture retailers an in-store "Friends, Family & Fun Game Night" promotion that includes games, furniture makeovers, cash and other prizes for consumers.

The promotion, which will run Jan. 18-March 12 will include short-version game challenges of Monopoly, Scrabble Slam, Pictionary, Boggle and Catch Phrase.

As with the previously announced "Ice Age 3" promotion, Napier, of Napier Marketing here, is working with Imagine Advertising to develop the creative elements. R&A Marketing and The Lively Merchant are handling related Web marketing initiatives including social media campaigns.

The group will provide more information about the promotion at next week's Las Vegas Market in Napier Marketing's space in the WHFA Retailer Resource Center, World Market Center C-510.

Napier said this new promotion capitalizes on the "re-nesting of America" and should help drive traffic into stores on traditionally slow days.

"Times are tough and people are staying home. They're scheduling more family time and fun time with friends," he said, and this promotion plays to that trend.

Napier pointed to a Fortune magazine report that said board games sales were up 23.5% in 2008 to $808 million and are expected to grow more this year.

"The whole idea is to create some traffic and excitement in the store with programs that are relative to the home and furniture," Napier said. "That's really what this is all about. You know how much I hate these tent sales and clown noses and stuff. This brings some national brand power (to retailers)."

Consumers who register and play the in-store games can win prizes and are automatically entered in a drawing for a family vacation to the Beaches Resort in Jamaica, where they'll compete in an "Ultimate Challenge Match" with a chance to win more prizes.

Napier said nearly 100 Canadian stores have verbally committed to the promotion and he's hoping to get 100 to 200 U.S. stores signed on by the time the offer closes Dec. 28. The promotion will be exclusive to one retailer per market on a first-come, first-serve basis.

He estimated that the cost to retailers would start at about $400, not including ad placements, but including deep discounts on board game they can promote as giveaways with minimum purchases.