Christmas is two days away. Do you have your Hatchimals?
If you haven’t yet heard about the Hatchimals craze or are still in need of picking up a present for a child in your life, check out 40 Best Christmas Gifts for Kids That’ll Top Their Wish List. And in the meantime, here’s a photo from 1979 when my brother and I got some big items from our wish lists — TVs and bean bag chairs! Not sure how many kids are asking Santa for these items this year.
Happy Holidays from the Clairemont team!
We’re running out of time! Christmas is just a little more than two weeks away, and somewhere young Harper and Zephyr’s Christmas fate might just depend on YOU helping us get a note from Santa in their sweet little hands.
In a letter dated December 5, 2015 on quite fancy stationery, Santa Claus disclosed that Harper and Zephyr are currently on the Nice List. However, he ends the letter with “I’ll be watching,” after saying to be good by sharing and listening to Mommy.
Could Harper and Zephyr possibly be teetering on the slippery slope of naughty and nice? Will they take their toys and retreat to their own selfish play and turn a deaf ear to Mommy’s polite requests to pick up their dirty socks off of the floor if we don’t take to social media to find them? At the very least, wouldn’t it be a shame for the beautiful calligraphy work of Mrs. Claus to never be admired by Harp, Zeph and Mommy? We can’t rob them of this heartfelt holiday keepsake!
Santa’s letter is a mystery. It was found on Glenwood South in Raleigh on Saturday. Did it fall from Santa’s sleigh as he was doing a pre-Christmas fly-by? Was it the victim of an overstuffed mail bag of holiday cards? Perhaps it was delivered to the children that morning. I can imagine Harper reading it to Lil Z and insisting on carrying it along for Saturday errands with Mommy. As they were released from their car seats and clasped hands to skip to The Cupcake Shoppe, it fell to the curb, caught wind and drifted up the sidewalk, just as Mommy’s gaze drifted down the street to the The Raleigh Wine Shop. Oh wait, maybe that was me…and then I found a letter from Santa!
Please help us find Harper and Zephyr by sharing this post on your social media channels. We want to be good little Santa’s helpers and deliver this letter to its intended recipients.
Christmas comes with snow flinging. Christmas comes with children singing. Christmas comes with little elves. Is Christmas leaving Starbucks’ shelves?
As Thanksgiving nears, companies are ramping up for the Christmas season. There is a plethora of brands that change their marketing efforts to appeal to customers in different seasons, and there are certain brands that take it to the next level–like Starbucks and its iconic red holiday-themed cup.
Since 1997, Starbucks’ holiday-themed cup has created countdowns to the release date around the world. The Starbucks cup signifies the official start of the season and serves as a symbol for Christmas. But with the 2015 switch to plain red cups, critics are lashing out at Starbucks on social media, stating that the brand shift is a “war on Christianity.” But does the shift in marketing harm or enhance the company’s brand? Here are a few reasons I think the new holiday design is here to stay:
Big ideas are more important than ever. Although it seems harsh to consumers, Starbucks didn’t badger us with TV commercials or any media relations efforts about the new cup. Most big ideas tug at the emotions of the consumer. I think Starbucks used this to its advantage. Although there is negative backlash on social media, the big idea of the cup change is grabbing all of the attention and keeping Starbucks relevant in conversation.
Starbucks vice president Jeffrey Fields explained that the company “wanted to usher in the holidays with a purity of design that welcomes all of our stories.” According to USA Today, it is also rumored that the plain character of the cup offers customers the opportunity to create their own holiday designs on the cups.
Consumers can be a source of great thinking and ideas. The new cup allows for creativity and a sense of community with its customers, an opportunity for them to write their own message and share it on social media. Free marketing and community relations? I say yes.
What do you think? Do the red cups help or hurt Starbucks’ holiday brand? Are you planning to play Picasso with the new cups? Follow Clairemont on Twitter, and send us your thoughts!
