Proline National Launch

In 2003 Proline’s customer base was a combination of retail sales direct to contractors, mostly in San Diego County, several private label customers and one online retail portal.

Based on my research, which included: industrial leaders, senior media editors, select customers and their competitors, we discovered Proline’s unique selling proposition: a thin durable urethane that allowed the use of handles on very large concrete stamping tools would be our  juggernaut  for their marketing campaign.

The competition’s stamps were thicker, therefore they could not make stamps as large as Proline, because the stamps weight, handles would easily rip out. These competitors decided to make their stamps smaller than Proline’s.

The first campaign we launched was: Love Those Handles:

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This campaign theme was then used to launch the national campaign was as if quoting Julius Caeser:

“. . . if Rome was to be built in a day, I would only use Proline Tools.”

This ad was used to launch the company during the 2005 World of Concrete 

Branding Scope of Work included:

– Market Research

– Marketing Plan

– Branding architectural program: Icon or mark, Wordmark, tagline

– Print collateral included: 54-page catalog, national advertising campaign, Portfolio brochure and corporate stationery

– Photographed of over 150 stamp SKUs

– Designed their first web site

Product Developement

– Created a marketing strategy to design and manufacturer border tools that have become a hallmark for Proline and a very profitable profit center. As an example, their radius stamp brought over $400,000 in 2010.

Manufacturing and Operations Involvement

In preparation to the growth I anticipated, I was integrally involved is hiring the first phase of staffing. as I started working with Proline of 2004, they had three shop employees. By the time the WoC 2005 arrived, we had seven new staff to handle the increase volume that was occurring during the traditional slow down period of winter.

I also brought in an ISO expert to review the potential unseen product flow and procedures.

Distribution Channel Development

Part of the rebranding and repositioning strategy was to convert private label customers to the corporate brand and to shift from selling to anyone, instead I created a laser focus distributor-centric policy. This, coupled with the national campaign, created cred

We also helped them establish relationships with major retail chains. Proline tripled their sales in under one year.