California Avocado Merchandise Orders Increase by Triple Digits Near Holiday Season

California avocado merchandise, available on Shop.CaliforniaAvocado.com, is a very visible and effective means of driving brand awareness year-round. The online merch shop, which was launched in fall 2020, was updated in fall 2021 with new merchandise designed to pique consumer interest prior to the holiday shopping season. The new California avocado merchandise included a “Best Friends Sweatshirt” perfect for cozy moments, the “Avo Head” hat suited for athletic and outdoor events and the “Tasteful Apron” that can be worn for any avo-casion. To drive consumer awareness of the new items, which primarily showcased the 2021 take on “the best avocados have California in them” campaign, the California Avocado Commission launched integrated social media and digital promotions leading to a 500+% increase in November and December orders as compared to the preceding two months.

Interacting with consumers on social media requires a delicate balance — providing fresh content and merchandise promotions that engage your audience without causing burnout or oversaturation that leads them to tune out. The Commission crafted social media posts showcasing people wearing the newly released California avocado merchandise while engaging in a variety of activities that evoke the California lifestyle. These everyday-lifestyle posts, which are some of CAC’s most successful social media content in terms of engagement and driving traffic to the site, complemented those created by CAC’s influencer partners. In the off-season, the posts also were tied to cultural moments — like Black Friday or Cyber Monday — to drive increased buzz and engagement for the holidays. In addition, the Commission also used paid support for select social media posts on Instagram and Facebook to boost views and engagement beyond CAC’s main followers during key shopping moments. To make it easy for consumers to purchase the items, many of the social media posts included direct links to the merch shop item featured in the post. The social content shared in November and December to support the launch of new merch reached nearly 339,000 consumers and yielded nearly 5,100 engagements, including nearly 4,000 link clicks to merchandise items.

The CaliforniaAvocado.com website is popular with people looking for California avocado recipes and serving tips and tricks. Therefore, to catch the eye of site visitors the Commission featured some of the new merchandise on the landing page’s header. During the holiday shopping season, the “Free Shipping on Orders over $60” messaging was extended through December 31.

In the near future, the Commission will feature these merchandise items in specialized collections inspired by different regions of the state, drawing even greater attention to and a connection with California avocados and the West Coast lifestyle embodied throughout the state.