Producing a fundraising strategy for Trekstock was a great way to explore the field of PR more as well as photography and styling. Trekstock is a very current and refreshing charity who targets the same demographic that I fall into. As I have been in the situation where somebody I am close to has had to deal with the effects of cancer in their family, I understand just how sensitive and emotional the process is. For this reason, from the beginning I knew I wanted to create a campaign that was modern, uplifting and just all round fun.

My initial idea was extremely simple and heavily inspired by the already existing Trekstock campaign that is the Everpress 50/50 t shirts. The concept for the idea was to produce t shirts that had illustrations from different popular meme’s on them. To differ from already existing similar products, the illustrations would be simplistic and trendy, rather than just printing a picture onto a t shirt. After exploring this idea further, I decided that it was too similar to what had already been done, and was too simple.

I wanted to keep in with the theme of using meme’s as the root of the strategy, as I feel that this is a huge trend on social media and it is what the target demographic are interested in, as well as being fun and simple. The concept is to team up with Cheap Monday, to create a small limited edition clothing line in which 25% of the proceedings would go to Trekstock. As well as this, I intend to have a competition where you donate £2 or more to Trekstock to enter your own meme’s, and the best meme wins a £200 gift voucher for Cheap Monday. I chose this clothing brand, because it is a young and trendy brand that would grab Trekstock’s demographic attention, and as they have not done teamed up with a charity as of yet, I would hope that they would be interested in the collaboration for either free or a small sum of the budget.

My final outcome was a mini look book/leaflet showing the mini collection that would be used as promotion for both the clothing line, and the competition. These would be sent out with Cheap Monday delivery parcels before and during the competition, targeting the demographic directly. As well as this, it could also be placed in universities, coffee shops, and other local places. The budget given was £10,000 and as budget isn’t something I had ever done before, or ever had to be aware of, I made rough estimates as to where the money would go. I decided to allot £5000 of it to the production of leaflets; everything from the photoshoots, to the postage costs would come under this. For promotion and social media advertising, I allocated £4800. Social media advertising doesn’t have a specific cost and it is mostly done by bidding. The more you’re willing to pay, the more people will see your advert. The last £200 were left for the winner of the prize for the competition. Overall the idea is to create profit by the sales made from the limited edition collection, and also from the competition. Alongside this, Trekstock would create and post their own wellbeing/health related meme’s stamped with the Trekstock logo, raising awareness for their brand.

These were the Trekstock meme’s I came up with, keeping in with the theme of health and wellbeing.

FINAL LEAFLET TO PRINT-ryefs1

After getting some feedback on my ideas, I came to realise that there were a few things about it that wouldn’t necessarily work. To begin with, the whole concept in general, has been done a lot by many brands, and even by Trekstock, making it something dated and not very new and fresh. As well as this, teaming up with Monki was my first initial thought, however realising I want to target both male and female, Monki was not the best brand to do this with as they only stock and sell female clothing. My new and refined idea, is team up with a different brand that still caters to the same age and style demographic, but stocks both male and female clothes so it doesn’t limit my target. The new concept is to collaborate and create a small limited edition collection with Cheap Monday, where 25% of the profits of the sales would go to Trekstock. I choose this amount, because it would mean Cheap Monday aren’t losing out on a lot of money, making them more interested to collaborate. In addition to this, I inted to do a competition, where people can donate £2 or more to Trekstock to enter their own meme’s and be in with a chance to win a £200 gift voucher for Cheap Monday. I intend to create a mini look book or information lealet, where you can see the limited collection, and also find information about the competition. These leaflet would be sent out with Cheap Monday deliveries prior and during the competition as a form of promotion. The new idea is still in keeping with the theme of meme’s, but it is more interactive, fun and unique.

Taking inspiration from the Alexander Wang x Do Something campaign and the exitsing Trekstock campaign 50/50, my initial idea is to create a series of limited edition t-shirts with designs from meme’s that monki will sell on their website, with the proceedings going to Trekstock. The idea to create aesthetically pleasing t-shirts that people actually want to wear, and are trendy rather than being t-shirt’s that have just had a picture printed onto them. To produce this, I would gather the most popular meme’s that are currently on the internet and have the most interest, and turn them into engaging and current illustrations, to then either print or stitch onto t-shirts. These could sell for about £20 each, and half of the proceedings could go to Trekstock. I feel that Monki would be interested in this partnership because they are a young and trendy fashion brand, and the PR they could gain from joining up with a cancer charity would be great for them as well as Trekstock. The main point of this product would be to produce meme t-shirts that people would actually want to wear.