Gifts, easier to bride?

So, Wanying and I were discussing if we could include free gifts into our indie publication in the future. It was initiated with the inspiration from JP magazines. If you've ever been fashion-conscious, then you know what I'm talking about. Many Taiwanese magazines such as Choc, Ami, ELLE, BAZZAR, Marie Claire (TW editions) got the influence from Japan, and they all share one thing in common: FREE GIFTS! 

Since successful cases have pointed to some directions, why not look over them before we take any path? Hence I asked myself: "What do free gifts mean to me (and to general readers)?" "Can I recall any outstanding past examples?" "What's the value in it and how does it influence?" My restless mind pushed me to do a trace back investigation and had a bit of afterthoughts.   

THIS is the first image popping up in my head!

Does the "Cher" pattern ring any bells? 

Perhaps you still have no clue about Cher the Japanese fashion brand which was (and still is?) prevalent 5 years ago, BUT ... I'm sure you must have seen girls carrying cher-patterned ecobags a while back. As for guys, maybe you're not awared ... but back then you could have taken sweethearts that carried the same bag on a picnic or amusement park date, oops! Pretty as the bag is, the price is unpretty to teens. Yet, what pains overseas consumers is a lack of access to become one of the collectors. And THAT comes to something worth discussing: where did people get Cher bags?      

In early 2008, Cher ecobag first appeared as a free gift given by the leading fashion magazine Sweet (below). The bag was soon seen in photos being carried the JP fashion icon, Rinka. Well, aren't things easier for fans now? You buy the magazine, and you get to shine like other Cher girls. The streets are instantly awash by girls falling for the craze. The Cher X Sweet crossover boosted the sales of the magazines and Cher company's brand visibility; that is, there's a positive effect as the mag and Cher both define and affirm with each other's market value.  

  

Let's reverse time to an earlier period, about 10 years ago. People who once been slaves of street fashion are familiar with the brands "X-girl, (below)" "BAPY, (below)" "A BATHING APE," "X-Large" etc. It was quite some time when Ura-Hara style (うらはらじゅく) was popularised in JP and made its wave to Taiwan. I was no exception to fashion wannabes, but without the magazine MINI, I guess I'd always be a fashion cannotbe.    

I remember MINI (below) was the first street fashion magazine introduced to Taiwan. It had free gifts of supreme brands X-girl, BAPY, MILKFED that girls ever crave for. The marketing's manipulation technique was simple, and paved the way for the abovementioned Cher X Sweet crossover. We know that girls wouldn't have 5000 NTD pocket money without a reason, but in the meantime, an 100-NTD MINI presented itself like a Santa sending kids gifts. And once we kids receive gifts, we remain loyalty and appreciation to Santa ever since.  

                                  # MINI (X-girl pouch as giveaway; Fujii Lena on the cover)
                               

But magazines today seem to be too generous by giving brand name products. It surprised me that SPUR had Chloe as a cooperating client (below), and in InRed and non-no I found Marc Jacob's logo (below). Some brands even published catalogue-like mooks (magazine + book) and gave personal-owned products every season, e.g. Harrods (below), agnes b and PAUL & JOE.

While I think fancy goodies are too over the top, there are life/art-centred magazines appear to be my cup of tea. For example, who wants to get a MOOMIN stuff for free? The リンネル mag focuses on a popular subculture in JP - the "mori style" (girls who look like they live in the forest), and amazingly I found a real-sized MOOMIN bento bag as a FREE gift.

When the value of the gift surpasses the publication itself, any impulsive purchase can be justified ;)

# Not just a toy bag fooling readers around. Make something yum and let MOOMIN do its job!

Another gift that I'd treasure as a possession of mine is the totebag from Lisa Larson.
I first knew Lisa Larson through a cat-shaped mini camera she did with the LOMO company Superheadz (below 1). I became her fan and wanted to buy that camera. It turned out I didn't buy it, but who knows right now I only need to buy a mook and ... I can carry the kittens with me every day (below 2)?

The lifestyle magazine giorni also casted Lisa Larson's famous LION icon, and made it into cup pats as gifts (below 1). Wouldn't you say "KAWAIIIII" at the first sight?

                          

If you enjoyed c'est si bon or 蘑菇手帖 by Booday (and hopefully you can read Japanese), you're going to love ku:nel. ku:nel created a "little black man" as the icon for magazine (upper right side on the cover), done by the promising character designer Sakazaki Chiharu. They give all kinds of gifts (calendar book etc.) featuring all about the icon. Very refreshing, I see a rather smart way in establishing a brand image and employing the known features carefully.  

 

I deeply believe lifestyle/art-centered magazines set a stricter aesthetic standard to choose free gift as a right match to the publication. And that's exactly what Wanying and I are aiming for. Of course, in our mag you can expect to see direct and strong theme in every issue. We put thoughts in the printed form because we've got something more to say. Yet we're not too ambitious, and we'll talk about one thing at a time. We both agree that a magazine without a theme is a book without soul. We want to give out gifts, and we insist that the given present should correspond to the theme. For example, if the theme is "nostalgia," the gift need be something that triggers readers' nostalgic emotion, be it a vintage camera keychain or a totebag with the iconic freckle-faced Wendy from Wendy's. We may invite some uprising artists (we've had one or two possible candidates now) or underground brands in Taiwan to cooperate with us for the free gift. Always, there's always a way to conduct it creatively.

People who have ever been in publishing industry would know that the editorial process alone is achingly stressful, not to mention making the giveaways as part of the concern. But points have been made that gifts help to increase the value-added, and approach to the target readers. It also objectises the style of a magazine. In our viewpoint, if the whole thing is cleverly combined, free gift adds to the completion of a magazine. It's the finishing chapter, summing up everything talked about in the book.

It's very likely we end up with quarterly magazines, because small team like us would like to take time examining everything we sell, including the words and any physical extras. Yes! We take the reader-publisher relationship as information sharing between friends. So, when we give friends gifts after finishing interesting stories, we'd never ever embarrass ourselves with a downer!