Shoppers Drug Mart Valentine's Day Promotion
Deliverables
Email design
Hero banner design
Tools
Figma
Photoshop
Every week, Shoppers Drug Mart sends out promotional emails to showcase new and existing beauty products. During my internship at Loblaw Digital, I was asked to come up with the design concept and execution for the 2023 Valentine’s week.
While still adhering to Shoppers’ brand guidelines, I created a design that simulates cutout cards, aiming to bring uniqueness to the digital media and effectively communicate the spirit of Valentine’s Day to the audience.
Competitor Research
I first begin by researching our competitors’ past Valentine’s Day email designs. Analyzing these designs, I noticed that:
1. Pink is often used, along with heart and flower motifs. This makes sense because it is Valentine’s Day. Hudson’s Bay however, is quite interesting as they evolved from a Valentine theme to a minimalistic style in 2020 and 2021.
2. Competitors such as Ulta Beauty, shifted from a full-coloured background to a white background. This might be due to the readability and accessibility.
Background Research
Through some background research about Valentine’s Day, I discovered that Valentine’s Day cards are the most popular form of gifting.
Shoppers Drug Mart have a diverse consumer base. The idea of incorporating card gifting into the email design could appeal to both the older and younger demographics as it helps them ignite the memories of the past. In the past, handwritten cards are very popular, but not so much today due to the convenience of online communication.
Mood Board
I sourced digital designs that simulate cutout cards. Drop shadows are used to illustrate depth, and hanging ornaments are used to communicate the handmade feeling of cards.
Sketches
I began by sketching the email layout on paper, then digitized the sketches. Typically, emails have a modular structure, but incorporating clouds instead of rectangular borders to separate different sections of the email can help break the modular structure a bit. I’ve also added a noise texture to simulate a paper-like effect.
Colour Palette
I was given the red and pink in the brief to be used as colours in the design. I added a sky blue so it can be mixed with the pink to create a dreamy gradient. I also added a dark blue for copy, ensuring that it meets the AA compliance requirements for accessibility.
Final Design
After some feedback and refining, here is the final design with the products and copy finalized by the team.
Valentine's Day Gifting
I was also tasked to create the email and web banner for the Valentine’s Day gifting email that occurs the week after this email. Since both Valentine’s Day gifting are still technically part of the Valentine’s Day promotion, I rearranged the assets of this concept to provide a refreshed design for the following email.
Learnings
Through this project, here are a few things that I learned:
1. Aesthetic vs. User Experience - Initially, I was thinking of including two products in the email header as it allows for the opportunity to add another cloud to create depth. However, since one of the featured products was a set, including multiple products would require scaling them down, making it difficult to see both the product and the featured brand clearly. As a result, I decided to feature only one product per frame.
2. Less is more - In the early concepts, there were more clouds and ornaments, but they ended up obstructing the products, which are the focal point of the email. To resolve this, I replaced them with blue outlined heart graphics to create a less cluttered design.