When OneShare.com—a company that sells individual, framed stock certificates in popular publicly traded companies—came to Mortar, its brand positioning was lackluster and confusing. 

Giving the gift of one framed share of stock was promoted as a way to start investing, a baby gift, a collectible item, and a tool to learn more about stocks. The company lacked a clear marketing message.

Armed with internal data indicating 90% of sales were gifts, we suggested repositioning Oneshare as an innovative present–further complementing the gift-giving experience by adding witty engraved  messages to each framed share. 

Buyers might add “I wouldn’t trade you for anything” to a share of eBay. “Think outside the blue box” (Tiffany & Co).“May the only holes in your portfolio be donuts” (Krispy Kreme). 

Next our PR team crafted a media outreach strategy aimed for magazine holiday gift guides. 

We grouped the shares into fun packages to maximize interest (the Planes, Trains and Automobiles package was aimed at men’s magazines and included Harley-Davidson, Boeing, and Ford).

We pushed the strategy forward with mat release partnerships.

Oh, and we crafted a long-term outreach plan to secure feature stories whenever a popular stock disappeared, taking full advantage of feverish media interest surrounding soon-to-be collectible stocks like Toys-R-Us and most significantly Pixar.

What happened?

In six months we generated 270 stories. The mat release alone generated 70 artciles.

OneShare calculate that 15% of  2005 Q4 revenues were directly
attributable to holiday PR coverage.

But our biggest win came in the Spring when Disney announced it was buying animation film studio Pixar — creators of Toy Story —  eliminating Pixar shares and creating a collectible market overnight.

We pounced with an Associated Press feature that was picked up in virtually every major American newspaper.

That release alone generated a 200% gain in Q1 sales.

Prompting Byron Beach, OneShare’s vice president of marketing, to comment “The PR program, when combined with Mortar’s creative team, helped us reach a new level as a company and has paid for itself many times over”.