This week at Capital & Regional we launched our ‘BACK TO’ campaign, to welcome back guests returning to school, the office and their local community shopping centre. This campaign aims to safely drive footfall and spend for our retail customers as well as support and bring together our local communities by celebrating what they are looking forward to getting back to. As we enter an entirely different version of the back to school period, changed by new social distancing guidelines and guest shopping patterns, it is important to acknowledge that incentives to shop in-store are now much more nuanced, requiring businesses to rethink their strategies for capitalising on one of the most significant shopping periods in the retail calendar.

While many of our previous promotional campaigns have focused on increasing average transaction value, understanding both the caution and financial pressures currently facing many people within our communities means we need to widen our focus and help drive footfall and spend in general. Any guest who spends any amount within the centre will have the opportunity to win daily gift cards plus entry into a grand prize draw. 

Further reflecting the current situation, and for the first time, this campaign will be run digitally with guests uploading photos of their receipts via the centre websites, eliminating the need for physical contact at our Ask Me Points and Guest Services desks. The only physical aspect of the campaign will be shopping in store where we kindly remind our guests to wear a face mask for their protection and the protection of other guests, retail customers and employees. The campaign will be promoted in-centre with floor decals and posters, but predominantly across our digital channels where our guests can also easily find information about when best to shop at less busy times. By focusing the campaign online, we can better understand where our guests are purchasing, helping us to tailor future campaigns to the needs of the community.

Above all, we recognise that extra efforts are required to engage our communities during this year’s back to school period and to reassure our guests that we are following Government guidelines to ensure their safety. However, we appreciate that some of our guests cannot currently shop with us and so an additional element of this campaign will run on our social media channels. Guests can draw a picture of what they are looking forward to getting back to the most and share their entries with the hashtag #BACKTO for a chance to win a £100 gift card. All of the entries will be collated and used to produce a piece of mosaic artwork to be displayed within the centres.

We are excited to announce that 96% of stores in our centres are now open - in time for back to school and back to work. This period is a reminder that, while Covid-19 continues to disrupt normalcy nationwide, we must continue embracing new concepts to restore shopper confidence in our communities.