The Pro: Angela Millin, Director of Business Development, Harper+Scott (asi/220052)

Client: Coty Inc.’s Covergirl brand

Job: Covergirl needed a special product to send to beauty influencers and media contacts to help announce the brand’s cruelty-free certification.

Reach: An attractive mailer with the perfect product shipped to approximately 5,000 important beauty influencers worldwide.

Step One: Amp Up the Strategic Hustle
Angela Millin is energy personified. As Harper+Scott’s director of business development, she built her thick book of business from scratch with no prior relationships in promo. The firm’s second employee, Millin engineered the impressive feat through countless hours of identifying ideal potential clients, researching them, and then using what she’d learned to fuel strategic, persistent prospecting that has led to many wins. Such was the approach the sales star took to get her foot in the door with global beauty company Coty Inc. – and it worked. When Coty’s Covergirl brand needed eye-catching retail items for its Times Square store, decision-makers called on Millin. So successful was the order that when Covergirl had another opportunity with an international scope, the brand again turned to the Harper+Scott pro.

Step Two: Understand the Client
The international initiative aimed to announce a commendable Covergirl achievement – namely, that it was the largest makeup brand to be 100%-certified as cruelty-free through Cruelty Free International’s Leaping Bunny program, which is a gold standard in such matters. The client “wanted to highlight that the brand underwent a rigorous audit of its entire supply chain to ensure full compliance and raise awareness that the CFI certification and Leaping Bunny logo stands as a guarantee that no Covergirl products or ingredients have been tested on animals, either by Coty or its suppliers,” says Millin. And whom did this important, brand-bolstering message need to reach? Some 5,000 influencers, bloggers and reporters within the beauty space located throughout the world.

The vegan plush bunny and custom recyclable shipper boxes that Harper+Scott created for Covergirl.

Step Three: Make the Solution Specific tangible, memorable and ethically in line with the ethos of cruelty-free certification – Millin was determined that the product had to embody all those elements, and it did. The clever package was a mailer with a white, plush, completely vegan bunny as its centerpiece. Around the cuddly rabbit’s neck, Harper+Scott added a special black ribbon hot-stamped with the Covergirl and CFI Leaping Bunny logos. “Our creative team designed an insert card explaining the certification, and created custom recyclable shipper boxes for fulfillment,” says Millin.

Speaking of fulfillment, Harper+Scott handled that too, providing a headache-free experience for the client. “We drop-shipped to more than 5,000 international locations,” says Millin.

Step Four: Collaborate & Crush the Deadline
Sure, the campaign was a smashing success, but it wasn’t without logistical hurdles. Timing was tight. The client contacted Millin on October 1 and everything needed to ship by November 1. Normally, that window would be a cinch. However, the uniqueness and volume of the bunnies meant they had to be sourced from overseas. Furthermore, Harper+Scott had to provide all essential testing to ensure the plushies were truly cruelty-free. If the bunnies weren’t cruelty-free, the consequences for Covergirl’s campaign and brand image could be dire. Fortunately, the bunnies tested out properly. The Harper+Scott team’s collaboration and creativity took care of the rest by the aggressive deadline. “Our in-house creative and production teams’ ability to work together in tandem made this a seamless experience,” Millin says. “We were able to update renderings, specs, proposals, etc., within hours (or, at times, even minutes) to ensure approvals were met at the speed required to stay on track.”

Step Five: Enjoy the ROI
For Covergirl, the campaign netted ample return on investment. “The bunnies were shared all over social media, both by the recipients and Covergirl’s channels directly,” Millin says. “Covergirl’s message of believing cruelty-free beauty choices should be available and affordable for all was powerful and noted by the whole community. The mailer helped establish Covergirl as a leader in the cruelty-free beauty space.”

Given such results, it’s not surprising that Millin’s relationship with Coty has grown so that she and Harper+Scott are working on projects with divisions across the multinational firm, including Covergirl, OPI, Sally Hansen and Clairol. Says Millin: “We’re happy to support them.”