Business Facelift
Mastercard
Issue 49 | December 2018
Agency
McCann Worldgroup Poland
Creative Team
Creative Directors Bartek Klimaszewski, Marcin Sosinski, Catalin Dobre Copywriters Natalia Karawajczyk, Magdalena Banasik Art Directors Bartosz Wlodarczyk, Jaroslaw Michalski, Sylwia Rekawek-Michon, Grzegorz Karwowski Designers Jaroslaw Michalski, Bartosz Wlodarczyk, Agata Pietraszko, Agnieszka Le Hong
Production Team
Partners Traffic Design, Miastodwa
Date
September 2018
Background
In many countries, small businesses and their artisan products were riding a huge wave of success. The situation in Central East Europe, however, and especially in Poland, was almost the exact opposite.
While their products were often highquality, crafted with soul and personality, small businesses were slowly going out of business in favour of big brands.
Small business owners simply did not have the budgets and expertise of the big retailers and large brands.
In the previous ten years, over 100,000 small shops had disappeared.
Idea
Mastercard saw an opportunity to get involved in local communities, supporting small businesses while also making Polish streets look better.
‘Business facelift’ was a programme that connected small shop owners with designers and retail specialists who offered them free design makeovers and business management workshops.
Participation was contingent on one condition: to step into the ‘future’ and upgrade with Mastercard POS technologies.
Small businesses were reassured that research proved that cashless payments led to higher revenues and smarter-looking premises increased footfall.
Results
The campaign reached five million Poles in the first month and over 100 small business owners registered to have a makeover. All this while also initiating a debate in Poland about signboard aesthetics, regulations and the need for specialised help for small businesses.
Our Thoughts
It’s not just the UK, where online retailers are squeezing the life out of the high streets of many country towns.
So, it’s heartening to see Mastercard step in to try to do something about it in Poland.
It may look like altruism but, actually, they need to preserve the businesses that bring them much of their income.
For me, creativity is finding solutions to problems and urban decay is a really big problem. Simply making shops look brighter and nicer is an invitation to shoppers to park their cars and come on in. It doesn’t take much more for regeneration to begin.
Offering free business skills training is also a solution to another problem, which is that many small businesses simply don’t know what to do. With the right help and advice, they can prosper and their communities begin to flourish around them.
Good work from Mastercard and McCann.