• by Emily Burg , February 7, 2007

Hanger Network In-Home Media has a new take on the last mile: the interior of the bedroom closet.

Targeting consumers in the intimacy of their bedrooms, bathrooms and closets--inner sanctums that advertisers have been trying to reach--while they are getting dressed in the morning, In-Home Media has partnered with advertisers including L'Oreal, Revlon, Dunkin' Donuts and Phillips-Van Heusen, as well as 35,000 dry cleaners across the country, to provide marketing-message-branded, environmentally friendly dry-cleaning hangers to replace traditional wire hangers.

Advertising campaigns appearing on the EcoHangers include traditional advertising ad couponing, CEO Bob Kantor explained. "We are working with category leaders that are more relevant, who want to reach an adult man or woman in the privacy of their bedrooms while they are dressing and grooming."

Leading shirt manufacturer Phillips-Van Heusen is a natural fit for this emerging media model, Kantor said, and has been rotating messages for two of their bigger brands on the EcoHangers. "There is no better way to reach a man who is a dress-shirt wearer than while he is putting on a shirt that is coming off a dry-cleaning hanger."

Similarly, In-Home media is running a second program for Mitchum antiperspirant from Revlon on the EcoHangers that "reaches the consumer at the time when the application is most motivating," Kantor said, when they are about to put on their dress shirt.

"You wear deodorant because you don't want to sweat and stain your shirt because if you do, you'll have to dry clean it, and dry cleaning is expensive."

Advertiser Dunkin' Donuts' campaign delivers a coupon for their coffee. "They are reaching consumers in their homes in the morning as they decide where to get their coffee. Having the coupon [in hand as they get dressed] is a great incentive," Kantor explained.

The EcoHangers are made from 100% recycled paper, actively reducing the 3.5 billion wire hangers that end up in landfills every year and giving marketers the added bonus of a green angle to their marketing message when they advertise.

The hangers are paid for by the advertisers and are distributed free to dry cleaners, which enables both an efficient and targeted media campaign, Kantor said. In-Home Media's cost-per-thousand basis runs between 4 and 5 cents per program, and its hangers live in customers' closets for an average of 7.5 weeks, which gives advertisers an extended lifetime for their ad campaigns.