Season Finale: Easter

A look back on seasonal trends, email activity and standout B2C marketing:

Start to finish: The first reference to Easter was on Jan. 4 from Lillian Vernon. The last was from Sportsman’s Guide on April 7.

The distribution curve: Retailers sent the majority of Easter-themed emails after March 26. The biggest days for Easter emails were Thursday, March 19, and Sunday, April 1.



Most interesting email: My favorite email this season was an April 5 email from eBags (Members: EXTRA 15% off + see the most searched for items at eBags). Playing off Easter egg hunts, eBags gives its subscribers a list of the most hunted-for items on its site by mining its search engine. This is another helpful way of presenting products, just like displaying highest rated products, product under a certain price point, or products of a certain size or color. Furthering the egg theme, eBags also gave subscribers a dozen deals.



Surprises: I was surprised to see this seemingly Easter-themed March 17 email from Kmart that really had nothing to do with Easter.



A couple of weeks later in an April 2 email (Special Easter Offer Inside), Kmart used the same background. However, this time the email was actually about Easter so the background made a whole lot more sense.



Unexpected relevance: I like it when unexpected retailers go after seasonal dollars. I expected Lillian Vernon, Oriental Trading and many others to pitch their Easter wares, but I didn’t expect to see Musician’s Friend among them. (That said, I don’t know if Musician’s Friend made a similar pitch last year). Musician’s Friend included a small banner promoting its Easter goods in a March 28 email (Musician's Friend: Private Offer - Save Up To $150) and a few subsequent emails. If you clicked through, it took you to an assortment of inexpensive, colorful children’s instruments like kazoos, recorders, tambourines and—my favorite—egg shakers.



Standout subject lines:
FTD, 3/29 — Send Somebunny an Easter Gift and Save 15%
Lillian Vernon, 2/11 — Save 10% and Fill Everybunny's Basket
Harry & David, 4/2 — FREE Eggs-press Upgrade for Easter - Last Day! [interestingly, this followed a March 29 email with the subject line “Free Express Shipping Upgrade in time for Easter!” which didn’t use the all-caps on “free” and “Eggs-press” pun]
Blair, 4/3 — Treat yourself to a basket-full of these values
RedEnvelope, 3/26 — Be a good egg this Easter.

To read previous posts about Easter emails, click here.