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Friday, January 25, 2008


The Sun: light bulb distribution project a big success
In a high innovative collaboration which involved Scottish and Southern Energy, Tesco and CoolNRG, the UK's biggest newspaper, The Sun, has distributed 4 million energy saving light bulbs in a single day.

Their special offer was heavily promoted for the week leading up to the distribution of light bulbs last Saturday.

This is one of the best examples in the world of a media organisation using its ability to communicate with large numbers of people to explain the benefits of using energy saving light bulbs and helping ordinary people to become actively involved in efforts to tackle climate change.

Congratulations to The Sun for doing something different, which was such a huge success!

Their innovation even helped them to increase their circulation by 10% to 4 million. This isn't anything to be sniffed at, especially in an era of declining newspaper circulations.

This is how the Media Guardian reported on what happened:

Saturday's edition of the Sun, which offered readers two free green lightbulbs, was a promotional success, boosting circulation to nearly 4m copies.

Sales soared by 408,000 copies compared with the previous Saturday after the Sun offered readers two free energy-saving lightbulbs, which they could pick up at newsagents and supermarkets selling the paper.

On Saturday the Sun normally sells in the region of 3.5m copies, but Saturday's sale was 3,908,000.

"We practically sold out," one Sun executive said. "We are gobsmacked."

The Sun turned half of its front page green for the promotion, which offered the eco-friendly lightbulbs to readers who bought the paper at more than 4,000 independent newsagents and stores including Tesco, Asda, WH Smith, Sainsbury's, Somerfield and Morrisons.

"Help save the world - and £13 into the bargain," the paper told readers, saying that the £4 pack of light bulbs, provided by Southern Electric, could lead to power bill savings of £9 annually for each reader.

The Sun also offered readers the chance to win an eco-friendly Toyota Prius Hybrid.

Last July, when the Mail on Sunday gave away Prince's new unreleased CD, Planet Earth, the paper sold an extra 600,000 copies, hitting a circulation of 2,800,846.

But the following week it lost most of those extra sales, selling only 31,000 copies above its base sale the week before the giveaway.

Last weekend the Daily Mail attempted a spoiler, offering readers two free energy saving bulbs "worth £6".

But the Mail failed to put in place a distribution deal and readers had to send for their bulbs in the post.

The Sun's promotion could not have been better timed to impress News International's new boss, James Murdoch, who arrived at the company from BSkyB in December.

Earlier this month Murdoch pledged to make News International carbon neutral.

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