Supermarket group Coles has announced it will stock a range of products from social enterprise Thankyou, after a two-week social media campaign that asked consumers to show the major supermarkets their support for Thankyou’s food and beauty products.

Thankyou said it met with Coles on Friday 26 July 2013, and the supermarket delivered its decision only hours later. The Organisation said it was “astounded” by the speed of the decision.

“Veterans of the retail industry advised us that, even if we were able to convince Coles of the considerable benefits of stocking our products, we’d be lucky to get a product approved before Christmas,” said Daniel Flynn, Thankyou co-founder and Managing Director. “I think it’s safe to say we were surprised to receive a call only five hours after the meeting finished,” he said.

Thankyou said the success of the campaign had exceeded expectations and that the social enterprise had been overwhelmed by the support of the public.

“It’s been amazing to see thousands of Australians post on both Coles’ and Woolworths’ Facebook pages in support of the Thankyou range. We’ve been blown away by the level of support,” Mr Flynn said. “We set a goal to reach 10,000 views of the campaign video by the end of the campaign and we hit that number within the first day. It’s now had over 70,000 views, which is just huge,” he said.

The two-week ‘Coles and Woolworths Campaign’ called on Australians to post on both retailers’ Facebook walls for Thankyou products to be stocked in all Coles and Woolworths stores around the country.

Thankyou said it would be “working very hard” over the next few weeks to get ready for the product launch into Coles supermarkets.

“We are delighted to be adding the Thankyou range to our offering for customers,” said John Durkan, Coles Chief Operating Officer. “Not only will it raise funds for essential projects in developing countries, but they are also great products,” he said.

“We’ve listened to our customers, who told us they would support the Thankyou range if Coles stocked it. Now they’ll have the chance to do just that and make a difference with every product they buy,” Mr Durkan said.

Thankyou said it was meeting with Coles’ rival Woolworths on Tuesday 30 July 2013.

Campaign details

The campaign, which concludes today, involved a stunt in which Thankyou flew two helicopters, each carrying a 10,000 square foot (30 by 30 metre) banner over both Coles’ Melbourne headquarters in Hawthorn and Woolworths’ Sydney headquarters in Bella Vista, with the messages asking both retailers to “help change the world”.

Throughout the two-week campaign, Thankyou said over 13 million people were reached through social media, online traffic and traditional media, and that thousands of posts, including “many creative videos”, were placed on both Coles’ and Woolworths’ Facebook walls by Thankyou fans.

The campaign has been supported by celebrities such as Jules Lund, Chrissie Swan, Andrew Gaze, Rebecca Morse, Peter Helliar, Nicole Livingstone, Tim Costello, Dean Geyer and Dylan Lewis.

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