We recently worked with Gordon Tulley at Respect Direct Funeral Services to refresh the look of their A5 double-sided leaflets in order to promote a greater awareness of their business and the quality services they offer.
About Respect Direct Funeral Services
Respect Direct Funeral Services based in Gainsborough offers a wide variety of funeral and cremation services to communities in Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Yorkshire, and the surrounding areas.
The company’s two woodland green burial parks provide a natural, eco-friendly environment where people can lay their loved ones to rest, and an alternative to the traditional municipal cemeteries. One is based on the border of North Nottinghamshire and South Yorkshire, and the other – in Lincolnshire – is the largest green burial park in England.
From traditional funerals tailored to specific needs through to direct cremation, direct burial, and green burials, Respect Direct Funeral Services provide a range of funeral plans to suit everybody, and the company has won several awards in recent years for their quality of service.
The Requirements
Respect Direct’s owner Gordon Tulley is very experienced and understands the cyclical nature of the business and what to focus on when promoting their services.
Until recently their advertising strategy has been concentrated on having a centre-page spread in Life’s community magazines.
Gordon decided to supplement that with the distribution of 80,000 leaflets twice a year in targeted areas, which promoted their key messages and raised awareness of their services.
He explained: “We had advertised in the magazines before and got some feedback and insights from it, so we decided to try some leaflets and it was a positive response.”
While speaking to Life about the magazine advertisements, Gordon mentioned the leaflets and so it was agreed some refreshed designs and messaging would be created, and the leaflets would also be printed.
The Activity
The first place to start in the leaflet design was focusing on the call to action that Respect Direct wanted.
Gordon said: “A key thing for us is to promote the burial grounds, and so about 70% of the leaflet needed to be really highlighting those, as they are more beneficial to us as a business. We needed them to be at the forefront.
“We had a design for a few years with a coffin on the front of it. It’s a willow coffin which a lot of people liked, and so we asked Michael (one of Life’s senior designers) to tweak the original design.
“Michael interpreted it very quickly. What I like about Michael is that you can explain what you want, and he understands it and delivers what you need in a very clear and concise way.”
– Said Gordon
“He understands his job and what the client wants, and that saves me an awful lot of time, which is very important to me, especially at our busiest times of the year.”
Outcomes and Results
As well as refreshing the design, which included the backgrounds, the leaflets really brought home the message about the green burial parks in the areas Respect Direct Funeral Services wanted to target.
“Life ga“Life gave us a fantastic layout and improved design,” said Gordon. “They printed it for us as well, and they were able to be used in other magazines and newspapers.
“I would absolutely recommend them, it has definitely been worthwhile, and is working well for us in terms of increasing awareness of our services and the company.”
“I’m struggling to think of how we could improve the design for the future as it has real longevity.”
View from the Designer
Life’s senior designer Michael explained how he was given a very clear brief for this work, but he still worked very efficiently and accurately to ensure that his client’s time was minimised.
“The advert and the leaflets were all developed at the same time, and then they were printed and distributed together, so it was a real double whammy,” said Michael.
“The brief was quite prescriptive, but we still needed to ensure that the green burial sites were at the forefront of the leaflet, and they needed to be accurate.
“Gordon is very busy, so they needed to be right, but the proofing process went very well, which was great.
“It’s all about providing excellent customer service because we need to ensure the customer is happy while also making the process as smooth as we can.”
