Save & Learn
Almacenes Éxito
Issue 59 | June 2021
Agency
Sancho BBDO
Creative Team
Chief Creative Officers Mario Lagos, Sergio León, Hugo Corredor, Giovanni Martínez Executive Creative Directors Andrés Luque, Jhonny Victoria, Jairo Rubiano Creative Directors Felipe González, Andrés García Creative Copywriters Camila Ordóñez, Mario Betancour Art Directors Andrés García, Andrés Felipe Guevara
Production Team
Digital Content Specialist Camilo Fajardo Social Media Coordinator Melissa Rojas Content Producer Daniela Sendoya Director FLARE Juan Gómez Co-director & Photographer FLARE Francisco Giraldo Producer FLARE Ángela Rodríguez Motion Graphic & Animation Andrés Felipe Guevara
Other Credits
CEO Carlos Felipe Arango Business VP Natalia Pérez Planning VP Andrés Carvajal Head of Planning Juan Camilo Laverde Business Operation Manager Luisa Niño
Date
February 2021
Background
As a country, Colombia trails much of the rest of the world in proficiency in English.
Learning to speak it can be expensive.
Almacenes Éxito, the largest supermarket chain in Colombia, wondered if they could do something to help.
For years they have communicated their deals and offers through regular catalogues.
In the pandemic the catalogues helped people shop more safely as well as economically.
Reaching almost every home in the country, no other catalogue offers so many products.
Idea
As well as helping their customers save money, Almacenes Éxito set out to help them learn English. The catalogues became basic English text books. In each catalogue, over 300 products were described with nearly 4,000 words of English shoppers could learn. Every edition included practice exercises.
Results
140,000 catalogues were printed every month, totalling 50 million pages printed. They were distributed through 338 stores in 63 cities of the country. The idea was extended into digital, gaining 200,000 digital views.
The catalogue sold out from all stores.
Our Thoughts
In the virtual world, I’ve long repeated the mantra that if you’re not useful, usable or delightful then you are merely contributing to digital flotsam. The same rule of thumb applies to print. Most catalogues are usable, definitely but turning a shopping manual into a dictionary is useful and usable and because it’s innovative it’s also delightful.
One day, when sound can be embedded in print, as it almost certainly will be, then we’ll see the entire print industry rise up again and IKEA UK, who abandoned their print catalogue in December after 70 years, will be among the first to go back to this effective form of selling.