• by Sarah Mahoney  @mahoney_sarah, April 13, 2022

America’s preoccupation with decluttering our lives may eventually slow down -- but not if the Container Store has anything to say about it. The Coppell, Texas-based retailer, which recently launched a new loyalty program and brand campaign, thinks even the most organized consumers are ready to level up. Felipe Avila, vice president of marketing, tells us about the company’s latest efforts.

Marketing Daily: Organizing and decluttering have been a primary obsession for much of the pandemic. As the months tick by, how are you changing your approach?

Felipe Avila: We've defined a new purpose for our company, and that has helped us determine our direction. And we introduced a new brand campaign. We launched it on 2/22/2022, which we called the most organized day of the century.

It’s themed “Welcome to the organization,” and the goal was to make our stores even more approachable. The idea is that people can shop with us and take that one small step, and ultimately that will end up transforming your entire life.

Marketing Daily: Let’s back up to 2020. How did the pandemic change the business?

Avila: Consumers started to realize what we've known for years -- that organizing your life just feels better. And of course we increased our focus on digital marketing channels, promoting online services, curbside pickup, virtual design. And we saw a big uptick in custom spaces.

Marketing Daily: How did that change moving into 2021? Did people get tired of sorting and organizing?

Avila: So 2020 had this explosive online sales growth, and that continued -- and in every category. And we focused more on partnerships, like our collaboration with Marie Kondo.

That helped us deliver our messaging to a much wider audience. We were able to remind everybody that as a brand, we’ve been here with solutions all along -- even before the pandemic.

Marketing Daily: Please explain the new loyalty program -- and what you hope it will accomplish.

Avila: We think of our loyalty program, the Organized Insider, as the way we want to welcome people into the organization. We know that there are easier projects to start with.

But we want to let [customers] know that as they move deeper into organizing, we’ve got products and solutions for that, too. [The program] provides more benefits than before, while also being easy to understand and easy to access.

Marketing Daily: Most loyalty efforts are aimed at rewarding existing customers. But you’ve also said this effort will attract new ones. How?

 Avila: Our previous effort was not very upfront in terms of what benefits you would get. We believe we will attract new customers by being very upfront about benefits -- both transactional and experiential. If you shop casually with us, it’s easy to sign up and get benefits right away.

The early results that we've seen so far is that it’s working. We are signing up new customers. New members get $10 off a $75 purchase.

And our app makes the three tiers very clear, not just about offers available now, but what you need to do to reach the next level.

Marketing Daily: What’s an easy project versus a hard one?

Avila: Everybody has a junk drawer. Even I have a junk drawer, and my house is very organized. So maybe you start there. An advanced project might be a custom closet. That takes a lot more time and planning. Maybe you have a collection you want to displa

Marketing Daily: What’s in your junk drawer?

Avila: You can see it on TikTok! I made a video for our #ShowUsYourDrawers challenge. Pens. Markers. Old keys. All kinds of stuff from my kids.

Marketing Daily: How did the TikTok challenge work out?

Avila: We’ve gotten more than 8.5 billion views. It’s important to me that we’re always clear about our objectives in any effort, and what we’re trying to communicate. We were lucky enough that we've connected with partners that understand this platform very well, including Preacher, our agency of record.

It was the message we wanted to put out there -- but delivered in a way that was appealing to consumers.