54blue
Bringing Brands to Life

On a Saturday morning, an avid NFL fan walks into a large sporting goods retailer to explore their offerings. Amidst the bustling crowd of shoppers, a trail of strategically placed creatives leads them to a mesmerizing display showcasing a selection of limited-edition Oakley NFL sunglasses that demand their attention. The captivating experience culminates in a purchase, and the fan leaves as part of the tribe and a loyal customer in the making.

Across Oakley's sprawling network of retailers, the same immersive ambiance was meticulously crafted for this strategic release. The backbone behind this engaging brand experience is 54blue (54blue.com), a powerhouse from Canada that approaches trade marketing on a hyper-organizational scale.

54blue shoulders a brand’s responsibilities for translating their stories and master creatives into impactful, consumer-centric retail campaigns. They manage thousands of projects annually for leading brands, ensuring that their timelines are met. Using its proprietary brand management software, Regulator (brandregulator.com), 54blue seamlessly synchronizes elements like engineering, design, and logistics to develop countless unique consumer-centric collateral down to point-of-purchase materials.

“54blue is the megaphone that gets put to the lips of the brand to amplify their message and speak clearly to the consumer,” says Jamie Calon, CEO

Crafting Captivating Store Experiences

54blue’s mastery of trade marketing and its specialization in sports brands has its roots in Calon’s experience as an athlete, retailer, and factory sales agent when he noticed that many brands struggled with trade marketing, identifying it as a significant weakness. While companies excelled in creating products, they frequently encountered difficulties in supplying essential sales tools like fixtures, signage, promotional materials, and staff education to support their products.

The brands we support with Regulator have a huge advantage over the competition

This issue is consistently apparent to him, even very recently during a personal quest for basketball shoes. His journey began online when he came across the shoes' digital advertisements. However, after visiting a local store to make the purchase, what he observed on the shelf didn’t match the creative marketing and hype he saw online. This made him doubt if he was considering the right product, and the uncertainty led him to leave the store and buy the exact same product online instead. The retail store lacked the promotional materials needed to link the product to its online advertising, causing uncertainty and a lost sale at the retail level. When brands fail to represent themselves in the marketplace properly, it dramatically decreases their market success.

With similar insights and entrepreneurial spirit way back in 2001, Calon set out to address this problem head-on through 54blue, along with his business partners Marc Walton, General Manager/Partner and Greg Stewart, Co-Founder and CTO of its sister company, Regulator.

In the physical world, where marketing demands a more hands-on approach, 54blue handles design, fabrication, printing, logistics, consulting, and more for creative projects.

It designs planograms to create the most eye-catching product presentations, based on a deep understanding of the specific brand and its target consumers for in-store retail displays and pop-up shops. To enhance consumer experience in retail outlets, it innovates engagement methods like tiered loyalty programs and specialty programs. Providing robust support for these initiatives ensures a brand’s products are displayed optimally across stores, powering customer engagement that translates into improved brand imaging and ensuring the brand is 100% present and never lets the consumer deviate in the final seconds before purchase.

“The brand figuratively needs to hold the hand of their consumer and guide them through the entire experience, but it is most important when the wallet is going to be opened,” Marc Walton GM/Partner 54blue.

Regulator Maintains Brand Integrity in Real Time

The Regulator platform assists clients in organizing and managing project data like creative assets, approvals, and expenditures while establishing an effective feedback loop. The software facilitates a well-defined and integrated brand cycle, including crucial trade marketing components while tracking and coordinating all market activities with precision.

Brands like CCM use Regulator to expertly handle thousands of projects annually, from campaign conception to post-launch insights. The software keeps the projects organized, on schedule, within budget, and consumer-oriented—a vital advantage, particularly when design translates into physical structures or complicated fixtures that require engineering, industrial design, and logistics, which is difficult to coordinate and execute at this scale.

Regulator takes a granular approach to collecting and organizing this data. It helps the client efficiently order and manage sales tools like window fronts, fixtures and displays, POP, and promo product overseeing all aspects for brand integrity and visual consistency. The software also aids in tracking details such as color consistency and window front condition, allowing clients to monitor something as simple as UV color fading and take corrective action, as needed.

Beyond playing a pivotal role in deploying physical assets, Regulator is adept at tracking its impact on sales and constantly evolving. Current development is looking to account for variables like the retailer's neighborhood demographics and local weather all driven into AI to provide a clearer understanding of real sales performance and allows data-driven decision-making.

The trade management software has turned the tide in many situations where speed and accuracy are essential to protect brand integrity. Take the case of a prominent athlete who was Oakley’s brand ambassador. In the face of a scandal, it became imperative to quickly withdraw his image from thousands of marketing displays across North America.

With the push of a button, Regulator provided Oakley with precise information about the outlets featuring the athlete’s image and a cost estimate for replacing it with new images. With 54blue’s agency’s support, Oakley was able to make the transition in a lightning-fast way.

Similar situations are common in the complex marketing landscape, from reasons including contractual issues, linguistic nuances, or public relations concerns. Regulator makes image management relatively straightforward and excels in navigating these challenges, allowing brands to respond promptly and effectively to shifting circumstances while maintaining control over brand image and data.

“The brands we support with Regulator have a huge advantage over the competition. Imagine playing a game where your pieces are spread out over thousands of locations and with potentially hundreds of variables per location. The scale is impossible for the human brain and spreadsheets to control. We fix all of that,” says Stewart CTO of Regulator.

Elevating Brand Identities
54blue closely collaborates with the client's internal team, typically with the trade marketing and merchandising divisions, to establish a connection with the brand and understand their story and messaging. Rather than adapting a client’s strategy to fit the standard agency structure 54blue works with the client’s established processes and guidelines to build impactful consumer experiences that capture and successfully convert targeted audiences into loyal customers.

54blue's achievements are grounded in a diverse and highly skilled team with a wide range of expertise. This includes teams that focus on graphics and art, Digital and web development, Industrial design, Print, fabrication and prototyping, Trade marketing services, procurement, and of course brand consulting.

Operating out of 10,000 square feet in Calgary, and equipped with state-of-the-art machinery like a full complement of printers, CNC tables, and laser cutters, the team has the capacity to prototype designs before manufacturing them all over the world.

54blue's team members are encouraged to consistently venture beyond their respective divisions to gain insights into the entire process. The cross-functional work culture yields an understanding of how minor design iterations can significantly impact manufacturing efficiency, leading to better design quality, efficiency, and accuracy.

Staying Agile in a Shifting Retail Landscape

54blue positions itself as a consumer expert, primarily focusing on brick-and-mortar environments, including large events and trade shows. Its specialization spans various industries from Sporting goods, Outdoor, Automotive, Electronics, Alcohol, Premium fashion, Home goods, Travel and tourism, and Medical.

The team invests significant time in understanding these domains, touring the marketplace and engaging with consumers and retailers. The insights gathered from these interactions play a role in fine-tuning brand positioning and strategy. This value-added service is provided without any additional charge to clients, underscoring 54blue’s pledge to understanding market dynamics.

Empowering companies to successfully navigate the challenges of trade marketing and brand management, 54blue is a strategic partner for brands seeking to solidify their position in retail markets.