Elevated Marketing

When brainstorming effective marketing tactics, the name of the game is visibility.

That means doing whatever it takes to get your company’s logo and contact information out in the public eye. And for Spring-Green Lawn Care, that means putting your company’s name in the sky, literally.

With the help of a multi-colored hot air balloon, the national lawn care franchiser has taken its marketing approach to a new level – several thousand feet above the ground.

Making its first appearance in February 2001 at the Hot Air Affair in Hudson, Wis., Spring-Green’s inflated marketing tool has appeared in at least 15 ballooning events around the country. The balloon, which stands seven stories high and boasts more than 1,000 square yards of fabric and more than two miles of thread, can fly at altitudes of 10,000 feet. However, it typically floats only a few thousand feet above ground to hover in public view.

Spring-Green’s flight team includes experienced balloon pilots, one of whom is a Spring-Green franchise owner. George Ibach, Rochester, Minn., has flown hot air balloons for more than 20 years and was the mastermind behind Spring-Green’s balloon purchase. At a franchise advisory council meeting back in the summer of 2000, Ibach proposed the corporation take a fresh approach to its marketing by investing in the balloon. Less than a year later, the Spring-Green balloon took its maiden flight.

But, what has the green, yellow and blue marketing tool added to Spring-Green’s bottom line?

“It’s probably not a measurable response,” observed Tom Hofer, president, Spring-Green, Plainfield, Ill. “We can’t say, ‘The balloon flew and business went through the roof.’ It’s a gradual thing.”

Although the balloon was a costly investment for Spring-Green, the Illinois-based corporation sees the expense as a necessary step toward increased visibility in the lawn care industry.

“When we did this, we realized that we didn’t have the funds to fly this balloon all over the country,” Hofer shared. “But we decided if we had the balloon and could fly it in some events and duplicate the [balloon] shape or symbol through all of our marketing materials, people would start to associated that balloon with Spring-Green. People may not remember the Spring-Green name, but they will probably remember the balloon.”

The Spring-Green balloon is a memorable item, agreed Philip Talbert, owner of Spring-Green franchise in Fayetteville, Ark. Funded with cash from Talbert’s own franchise budget, the logo-laden balloon has made its way to the northwest-Arkansas area where he does business.

Talbert and others who have used the balloon in their areas insist the real value is in the balloon image, not in actually flying the marketing tool. “We have balloon decals on trucks as well as on our business cards and invoices,” Talbert explained. “We are basically using the balloon as an icon.”

Many franchisees display miniature, blow-up replicas of the balloon at home shows and other industry-related events in their areas. The 8-foot balloons allow Spring-Green to keep the balloon image in public view.

However, marketing with a hot air balloon means unique challenges. For one, Hofer explained, the weather can interfere with scheduled appearances. “The balloon is very weather sensitive, but I guess that comes with the territory here. That’s the chance you take when you invest in something like this.”

And then there are the basics of balloon care, storage and transportation.

“It’s a lot of work flying the balloon, a lot more work than we anticipated when we got into this a few years back,” Hofer noted. “Storing and hauling the various elements is a large responsibility as well.”

With the initial balloon purchase, Spring-Green also invested in a unique trailer to store and transport the components of the balloon. The balloon, which spans 90,000 cubic feet when fully inflated, folds compactly into a small, canvas bag.

Hofer and his Spring-Green team also discovered that there are certain unwritten rules of the ballooning world that the corporation had to adhere to. For example, children who attend balloon events like to collect a trading card for each balloon they see.

“We give trading cards away at all our balloon events,” Hofer recalled. “Obviously, ours has a picture of the Spring-Green hot air balloon on it – with size and color specifications. Little kids run around collecting them like baseball cards.”

The author is Assistant Editor-Internet for Lawn & Landscape magazine and can be reached at aanderson@lawnandlandscape.com.