|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
| . | |||||||||
 |
|||||||||||||||||
Rangefinder
Magazine Pets & Jewels by Victoria
Mal
Wyndham-Leigh Portraiture is a lease department of Neiman Marcus. For Christmas 2002 Neiman Marcus, celebrating 95 years in business, was pulling all stops decorating their flagship store in downtown Dallas, Texas. Ignaz Gorischek, head of visual for Neiman Marcus, asked the portrait studio for help with a display/exhibit. The idea was to tie in precious jewels, with a display of old master style portraits of pets wearing jewelry. They envisioned monotone portraits in ornate frames. The portrait studio specializes in the look of the old masters style of photography. Wyndham-Leigh Portraiture took on the project with Neiman Marcus [NM] visual, jewelry, and PR departments. The visual department planned for 20 wall portraits: 16 dogs, three cats, and a chicken. PR was assigned to select the customers to be invited to bring in their pets. The jewelry department would coordinate jewelry with the type of pet and deliver the jewelry to the studio. Wyndham-Leigh Portraiture [WLP] was to photograph the pets in precious jewelry and produce framed images ready to hang. The studio promised the store manager not to solicit business from NM customers coming to the studio with their pets. WLP could only sell if the customer initiated the conversation. The store, by design, is very protective of their customers. WLP felt the quality of photography would encourage questions and sales—which turned out to be the case. The store would hang the exhibit at Christmas time in the precious jewelry department, supplying WLP with a sales/display table in the area of the exhibit. At the end of the exhibit the customer would receive the wall portrait of their pet, with special pricing on the frame.
The photography took place over several days with armed
guards delivering jewelry for each sitting. Million dollar necklaces,
bracelets, solid gold cuff links, belts and The pets were photographed in color on Kodak Portra NC 4x5 sheet film using a view camera. The studio’s old master backgrounds by The Backgrounders were used, as well as the studio’s antique furniture. Neiman Marcus brought in props like silver trays and Erte vases. Approximately six images of each pet were taken. WLP photographic artist, Ryan Dahlin, photographed 32 dogs and a cat wearing precious jewels.
The 33 selected images were digitally printed by Portrait City by Custom Color. Sizes of the images included one 40x60, one 40x50, one 24x54, two 36x48, five 32x43, eight 30x40, one 28x36, three 24x30, and 11 11x14s. The prints then went to Wyndham-Leigh artists who added highlights to the eyes and coat, and enhanced the sparkles & highlights in the jewelry. The images were mounted on canvas and masonite, sprayed with several coats of high-gloss spray and framed in various styles and tones of ornate gold frames. The store hung the framed pet images among framed mirrors on the walls of the precious jewelry department as part of the Christmas décor. Spotlights lit the display. The exhibit dates were November 23 through December 24. When it was to come down, several of the store customers requested it stay up a while longer as they wanted their friends and neighbors to view the exhibit. Popular demand and the store obliged and the display was still hanging in mid-January, when this article was written.
WLP knew they had a hit when studio owner/president Don Swift was delivering the images to the store. The delivery entrance was across a sidewalk, people stopped on both sides to watch the display being delivered to the store, oohing and ahhing, pointing and voicing opinions on which pet they liked best, asking was there going to be a display and when. When the exhibit was hung, many of the pet owners called the store requesting permission to bring their dogs into the store, so they could stand in front of the portrait on display and take a picture. Permission was, of course, granted by the store. This happened several times adding excitement around the exhibit resulting in word-of-mouth advertising. The store asked Operation Kindness, a pet outreach program to bring some live pets to encourage adoption. The representatives from Operation Kindness wanted to hear all the stories of the pet photography and relayed them to customers petting their pets—adoptions and people wanting their pets photographed resulted.
By working together with various Neiman Marcus departments, Wyndham-Leigh Portraiture was able to successfully market pet photography, generating sittings for the first six weeks of the year. The Pets & Jewels exhibit also created traffic and sales for NM’s jewelry department. This project was a labor of love, fun for all involved and profitable.
An exhibit is always good studio PR. A well thought out exhibit with a theme that creates the interest of the general public results in sittings. Marketing brings the customer in the door; then customer service and sales take over for the bottom -line advantage. Victoria Mal, project coordinator of the Pets &
Jewels project, heads up operations & marketing as general manager
of Wyndham-Leigh Portraiture at Neiman Marcus. She travels between the
seven store locations in Texas and Virginia. You can reach Victoria by
e-mail at: vickiemal@aol.com. |
|||||||||||||||||
|
Marketing
is not always aggressive. Sometimes marketing is listening and helping
others reach a goal. And other times a marketing goal takes on a life
of its own. Such was the case in the win-win project of “Pets and
Jewels.”
The
sittings were booked for September. The chicken was a no show. The three
cat owners preferred not to be involved, and the dog owners brought more
than one dog! The cat photographed was from the studio. Visual and Neiman
Marcus felt a cat was necessary for the exhibit—cat owners are vocal
about prejudice. You can see the project started taking on a life of its
own early on. 
estate
jewelry were all part of the shoot. Owners brought in their pets fresh
from the groomer. Most pets were very well behaved. A few were a challenge
especially when one large sized puppy started eating a $36,000 pearl/coral/14k
gold necklace. The necklace was quickly recovered as everyone in the camera
room; especially the jeweler, caught their collective breath.
The
studio selected the image, the negative was scanned and worked on in Photoshop
by Gabriel Alonso. Various shades of brown tone and black-and- white test
prints were obtained from the lab. WLP worked with the image in Photoshop
selecting a sepia tone color for the subject and background, leaving the
color only in the jewelry.
Since WLP specializes in portraiture and is not a commercial
studio, the pets were photographed as subjects wearing jewelry rather
than an image of jewelry displayed on a pet. By bringing out only the
color of the jewels, the images were able to maintain the old masters
portrait look of a pet, which happens to be wearing fabulous jewelry.
The
marketing benefits to the studio unfolded immediately. Pet owners were
impressed with the studio with some requesting to view the previews. Even
though the pet owner knew she would be gifted with the wall portrait on
display, the sales averaged over a thousand dollars each. 
Taking
advantage of this opportunity, WLP developed a pet promotion to take place
the first six weeks of 2003. Advertising was via a postcard printed by
Marathon Press. The postcard was available during the store exhibit and
then mailed to WLP/NM customers in early January. Some folks viewing the
exhibit asked if they could buy the postcard. WLP representatives smiled
and gave them the advertising as a complimentary gift. A drawing was held
for a 16x20 portrait. This fish bowl drawing accumulated a significant
number of names of people interested in having their pets photographed.
Many asked if people and children could be in the portrait also. “Of
course.” was the immediate answer.
The
display of pet portraiture drew people who would otherwise not stop at
the desk. The drawing enticed people who wanted family groups or who had
questions like “I don’t have a pet, can my husband and I be
photographed?” This scenario held true in the stores with only a
4x5 pet portrait in a gilded gold frame on an easel display with the postcards
on the desk next to the portrait.
Studios
not affiliated with a department store, can also create excitement with
exhibits. This is just a twist on the usual photo exhibit. Photographing
subjects of a certain type, pets, children, babies, community leaders,
etc., using the same style of photography. Finishing the portraits alike
is effective—all on canvas, all using the same medium, all with
similar backgrounds and props; framing in a like manner. Galleries exhibit
work of an artist in similar ways. A live person was present to answer
questions, gather information, follow up with a call, and actively pursue
a sitting. The added enticement of winning through a drawing adds names
when a representative is not present. 