How do you keep multiple furniture retail advertisers happy during their most important time of year? You may want to sit down for this one — preferably on something new and comfy.

At the Dallas Morning News, our furniture retailer clients challenged us to help them at a key time of the year. With 15% of furniture purchases traditionally occurring in the month of February and 11% in the month of March, the first quarter is key to their yearly success. It was clear that we needed to create a single solution that would engage North Texans with their local furniture retail stores and be equally successful for everyone involved.

“We know one thing about North Texans: They just need an event to give them a reason to go shopping,” says Kim Alvarez, senior account executive at DMNmedia.

With that in mind, we thought about other consumer events that happen around the Dallas area. For example, DFW Restaurant Week and Spa Week are dining and service event weeks that are driven by local retailers. We also have the state-organised Tax-Free Weekend, which saves shoppers 8% on their purchases. This weekend floods the malls, and is considered a major holiday to many Dallasites.

LB|RB, the strategic advertising team at The Dallas Morning News, invented Dallas Furniture Week to be that next excuse to go make some purchases. The inaugural event not only shared home furnishing information through the power of The Dallas Morning News and dallasnews.com, but was also a rally for North Texans to visit participating local home products retailers.

Dallas Furniture Week was an event with accompanying special section advertising that brought Dallas residents to our furniture retailers.
Dallas Furniture Week was an event with accompanying special section advertising that brought Dallas residents to our furniture retailers.

The team created craveable content, design, and photography for a special section that we ran in digital and print, delivered to dallasnews.com visitors as well as The Dallas Morning News, briefing, and Al Día subscribers. The event and publication were promoted to consumers with data-driven digital, print ROP, e-mail, and through an inviting social marketing campaign.

We helped our clients at a time they needed us most. We were able to communicate the messages of our sponsors (Ashley Furniture Homestore, Freed’s Furniture, Furniture One, Village Furniture, BOVA, The Leather Sofa Company, and Nebraska Furniture Mart) to a highly engaged and receptive audience.

It was a win for everyone: One retailer client attributed their full first quarter success to their participation in Dallas Furniture Week, and The Dallas Morning News gained incremental advertisers dollars as well.