In Australia, Christmas falls inside the summer school holidays, so an attraction shop serves two kinds of buyer in the same weeks. One is choosing a festive gift for someone who is not there, and the other is a family on holiday, looking for a keepsake of the day and something practical for the sun. A single range can serve both when it is planned as one range, with the festive pieces and the holiday pieces designed to sit together on the same wall.
Gift buyers and holiday visitors
A gift buyer decides quickly and needs a product that reads as a present at a glance, which favours plush, mugs and magnets, and anything that arrives with a finished swing tag or box. A holiday visitor is usually buying for themselves or for a child who has spent the day at the attraction, and tends to pick headwear, drinkware and apparel that can be used straight away.
Seasonal artwork on year-round product
The most flexible way to build a festive range is to put seasonal artwork on product the shop already carries. A festive print on a cap, tee, tote or mug uses the same product and the same decoration methods as the main range. A year printed into the design limits it to one season, where the same artwork without the date can return the following December. A plush in seasonal dress is a separate piece with its own pattern and sample. Our design team adapts artwork per product and per decoration method, so one festive concept can be carried across whichever pieces the shop chooses.
Approvals and the calendar
The date the range has to be on the shelf is fixed, and the steps in front of it are concept, artwork approval, sample, production and delivery. Working back from that date gives the order in which decisions need to be made.
Where the range includes a licensed character, the licensor approves the artwork and the sample. Approvals are the stage that most often sets the timeline, so a festive version of a licensed character is best put forward before the rest of the range is finalised.
Changes close to the date
Our Sydney print floor handles work that has to be decorated close to its delivery date. A late change to an event date or a sponsor's logo can be applied here without the stock going offshore and back.
Stock through the holidays
Stock for the Australian market is held in our Sydney warehouse and reordered from there. That lets a shop start the season with a modest range and add to it as the holidays show which pieces sell, instead of committing to every line in the first order. Mock-ups are free with every quote, so the festive pieces can be seen in their artwork before anything goes into production.
