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The Fabulous Fifties
By: Audrey Sellers, Associate Editor
Issue: August-September 2009


Maps, toolboxes and stick-on decals played into a retro campaign to boost tradeshow traffic.


Malt shoppes. Car hops. Black-and-white checkered floors. When it comes to recreating a scene from the 1950s, OLFA North America nailed it. That’s because this manufacturer of cutting tools turned to the creative minds at Winters Associates Promotional Products Inc. (UPIC: WIN1941) for help celebrating its golden anniversary while attracting tradeshow attendees to its booth at the International Builders Show.

Brent Slinkard, president of the Bloomington, Indiana-based distributor, decided to merge a 1950s theme with the “macho attitude of the building trade.” More than 100,000 builders and contractors poured into Orlando, Florida, for the tradeshow boasting more than 2,000 exhibitors.

When attendees arrived at the Orlando airport, OLFA representatives were there decked out in hard hats to distribute miniature maps of the tradeshow floor showing the OLFA booth location plus a map of hot Orlando attractions.

At the show, the 1950s came to life with the exhibit booth transformed into a malt shoppe complete with bar stools and straw holders. Models outfitted in carhop costumes invited attendees to experience OLFA and visit the booth for a free OLFA X-treme Cordless Power Tool, which was mailed after the show.

OLFA employees pumped up the crowd by doling out stick-on decals featuring various “man challenges.” Every hour, a randomly selected attendee wearing a decal received a $50 American Express gift card. “By the third day of the show, the aisles were filled with people wearing the decals,” Slinkard says. “These walking billboards drew even more people to the OLFA booth.”

The trip down memory lane resulted in 5,449 customer interactions, up from the previous year’s 132 interactions. Slinkard attributes the campaign’s success to the “cooperative spirit between our client and our creative team.”

He says, “Our best work seems to flourish when the client is working with us to develop the overall strategy and tactics. Great communication throughout the creative process serves everyone well. In fact, we now invite our clients into our internal creative meetings. This has been a successful methodology for our organization.”