Replogle Globes Rebrands With New Catalog and Binder System

Replogle Globes, a cataloger of globes and other classroom tools, encountered several problems when it came to its 24-page catalog. The book wasn’t updated frequently — the last issue was dated 2004-2005 — and the layout made it difficult for buyers to find what they were seeking.

“The products went from most expensive to least expensive in the catalog,” says Maureen Kehoe, Replogle’s direct market manager. “By the time educational purchasers got to the back of the book where there were products on an entry level, they’d probably lost interest.”

Replogle, a B-to-B cataloger that only sells to dealers, hired Madison, Wisc.-based Planet Propaganda, which had redesigned its Web site, to continue the rebranding process by tackling Replogle’s catalog and marketing materials, Kehoe says. The Broadview, Ill.-based company offers about 100 different types of globes with “huge price point differences,” Kehoe notes.

“Our next immediate need was print,” she says. “We needed a print piece that reflected the new brand that everyone was seeing on the Web. We didn’t want there to be a disconnect between the print and the Web.”

Replogle chose to produce binders that would be a reference tool for dealers but could be easily and affordably updated. Because Replogle is positioned as a high-end product, Kehoe says high-quality materials were used. The binders cost just less than $10 each to produce.

Five tabs separate the pages. The first tab contains information about the company and includes a “thumbnail fold-out we call a z-fold,” Kehoe points out. “It’s a very handy reference thumbnail chart that gives a quick visual of every globe in the catalog.”

The remaining tabs split the products into Prestige, Home and Office, Education and Corporate Gifts. “As the product assortment changes, we’ll be sending out new z-fold thumbnails and will send appropriate product pages and lists,” she says.

Upfront costs were significant, “but the cost to have it maintained by our customers in the field down the road will be less,” Kehoe notes. “It’s much more targeted.”

While they loved the new binder system, Kehoe says, it would’ve been too expensive to send to every dealer and prospect. So Replogle also created an envelope that would hold the brand piece about Replogle and the z-fold.

Below are some take-away ideas Replogle used on this rebranding:

1. Focus on your best customers first. Kehoe says 3,000 binders were sent to the cataloger’s highest-level dealers. About 5,000 of the envelopes were produced and sent to prospects and vendors with lower sales volumes. Sales reps use the envelopes at trade shows and meetings.

2. Make budget limits work for you. The binders ate up a large portion of Kehoe’s budget, including photography. So Replogle decided to focus on the products and have them photographed against a white background. Lifestyle photos were eliminated.

The cataloger will also save money in the long run because it won’t have to reshoot photos as often. “You can spend a lot of money on lifestyle shots,” Kehoe says. “But they’re so trendy, they’ll get stale after about two years.”

3. Plan redesign with future distribution in mind. Kehoe says all future marketing materials will be made to fit the binder system. The papers will have the rounded corners to be used with the launch of the binders. They’ll also be sent in the same style of envelope being used for prospects and trade shows.