*Each Monday, Prophet’s Chief Curator and Provocateur, Andy Stefanovich, or a member of our innovation team shares an on-ramp to Monday with Prophet employees across the globe. We’d like to share the inspiration and expand the footprint of these weekly jump starts by sharing them here. This week’s post was written by Joanna Chow in our Chicago office. Happy Monday!
This year marks the 100 year anniversary of LL Bean, the purveyor of high-quality outdoor gear and apparel based in Freeport, Maine. To celebrate the occasion, LL Bean has created the “Bootmobile,” a giant replica of the iconic “Maine Hunting Shoe” on wheels. The company is sending the Bootmobile around the country on a “Million Moment Mission,” collecting one million customer stories of great outdoor moments.
The project speaks to the power of stories to connect customers to products through shared experiences.
The campaign delivers on multiple levels. It’s a celebration of company heritage and a reaffirmation of their commitment to high quality products, customer service, and social responsibility. And it’s also a great PR and story-gathering vehicle (pun intended) that will only help to further fuel LL Bean’s understanding of their customers. (LLBean will then donate $1 for every moment shared to the National Park Foundation’s programs that are dedicated to helping underserved kids experience the outdoors - check it out here.)
This is a company committed to the customer - one example includes a customer service representative who drove a canoe down to Boston from Freeport, ME to help out a customer in a bind. There are no locks on the doors of the flagship store in Maine because the store is open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Free shipping and a total product guarantee remain hallmarks of this brand. (LL Bean has so captured the hearts of their loyal customers that when founder Leon Leonwood Bean passed away in 1967, over 50,000 letters of condolences poured in.)
Consider your brand’s products and services that are out in the world right now creating stories. If we set out to collect these tales what type of narrative would they create?
