UK based non-profit, Green Thing, capitalizes on a few consumer insights with their current fund raising effort Glove Love. Glove Love, if you haven’t heard or read, is an effort by which people donate lonely single gloves (whose partner gloves have been lost) to Green Thing. Green Thing then “lovingly washes” each glove and pairs it with a new mate. These newly paired gloves are then sold for £5 GBP ($7.90 USD). Simple, fun, interesting.
First off, as a sustainability-based non-profit trying to “inspire people to lead a greener life”, they definitely take a new approach to the “reuse” portion of recycle, reduce, reuse. And, they do so in a novel way, which creates an engaging story for audiences. This story is supported on the web with social media (facebook and twitter) as well as some great videos on youtube.
(yes, that was Emma Thompson doing the voice over)
Secondly, this appeals to another consumer desire, the desire for truly unique products with their own story. To facilitate this, Glove Love actually asks people to name the gloves they donate as well as describe where exactly the lonely single was saved. That way, each pair has a story of their own. Each pair is truly one-of-a-kind.
While Green Thing certainly will not make millions off this idea, it’s a great program to gain awareness for their cause. By providing one-of-a-kind items with individual stories, they offer shoppers great WOM content to share with their circles of influence.
How many times might each Glove Love owner tell the story of their mismatched gloves? 5, 10, 20 times? If only big brands thought about story-telling this way. How do they, beyond their brand history or product benefits, create stories that their users would want to share with their friends? What might those stories be?
