In 2002 Victor Footwear, an Australian owned manufacturer of safety work boots launched a new brand range called Mongrels. The name proved popular and in a relatively short time a decision was made to rebrand all Victor Boots as Mongrels. 

 

Victor’s market strength at the time was in NSW, particularly in regional areas with direct consumer sales through shoe shops and agricultural supply specialists.  In the major metro areas Victor sold mainly through Safety distributors. 

 

 

Until 2002 – advertising for Victor was restricted to safety magazines and small support campaigns for country field days using the Land Newspaper. 

 

In 2003, Griffin Advertising with the assistance of Network Outdoor (now Ooh Media) recommended a regional outdoor campaign in NSW. The campaign had two key objectives – motivate consumers across regional NSW to ask for Mongrels and secondly allow the Mongrel Salesman (their actual title) to increase distribution throughout the state. No other media was used apart from the continuation of minor support in the Land Newspaper.  

 

It was decided to allow Network to select sites randomly. We used a mix of Supersites, mini supersites and 6 x 3 sites. The later being by far the majority.  

 

"That NSW campaign with creative refreshed bi-annually continues to this day and accounts for 95% of our consumer effort in NSW. Within 18 months we began a similar campaign in Victoria and more lately Qld and WA. In WA we target the mining industry – both the miners themselves and those in charge of supplying boots to employees. We have used signage in regional airports and around mining towns. Apart from 4 appearances in Australian Mining – outdoor is our prime medium. In Qld we have two key market sectors – mining – the far north and along the coast for general safety boots. We also used the medium alone to launch a new range of Mongrel Riding Boots with considerable success.  

 

Mongrels’ is today a very strong contender in the highly competitive safety boot market.  The building of the brand which is more about a good and trusty Aussie made friend than about toughness – has been possible because of the ability of outdoor to deliver regional markets with continuity that is not affordable via any other media in our opinion.   

 

Victor Footwear has seen a dollar sales growth of around 250% since 2003.  Based on the success of Mongrels the company has recently moved into a new purpose built plant in Auburn NSW.  Today outdoor represents approximately 70% of the total communication budget – and more than 90% of our consumer communication nationally. 

 

Perhaps the most interesting pointer to the continual success of Mongrels and outdoor is that the client can track response to the website as the signs are moved. Requests for local stockists around where signs are placed shows relates to the locality of the signs. Outdoor, along with creative that is tuned to a regional audience is a very powerful and affordable combination. It has been a key element in building a strong Brand Character for Mongrels and its owner Victor Footwear." 

 

George Donovan (GRIFFIN ADVERTISING) Managing Director