Press releases
Games promoted directly to women - for the first time
07/11/2003
The first nationwide marketing campaign to promote video games specifically to women has been unveiled by GAME, Europe’s leading specialist video games chain – with the Company assigning around 20% of its UK Christmas marketing spend on the campaign.
In the two initiatives, in partnership with Microsoft and Codemasters, GAME will target the millions of women who will be buying games presents this Christmas, but know little about the products. This is in addition to the growing number of female games fans who do know what they’re looking for.
Dancing Stage Fever (PlayStation 2), Dance: UK (PS2), and EyeToy: Play (PS2) have hit the stores during the last few weeks, in addition to many other female friendly titles.
This momentum is set to continue into the Christmas period with the release of Pop Idol for PlayStation 2, PC and GameBoy Advance SP (from Codemasters), released on 14 November, and Grabbed by the Ghoulies on Xbox (from Microsoft) on 21 November, all designed to target women and children.
Both campaigns will break in mid-November and run until the beginning of December. Pop Idol will be advertised in Take A Break, What’s on TV, Woman, Now, Womans Own and Chat, with the ads taking readers step by step on how to play the new game. Grabbed by the Ghoulies will be marketed in various national press supplements, including ‘M’ and Femail.
Anna Macario, Marketing Director at GAME said “We’re absolutely thrilled that we finally have the opportunity to talk directly to women gamers, and mums of gamers. These two products are perfect to kick start our first push to these demographics.
“These are exactly the kinds of campaigns that we need to raise the awareness of games to a wider audience. Together, we’ll be reaching a total of over 15 million females in a very short, concentrated space of time, with each campaign reaching around 50% of our target market.
“These promotions will achieve our objective of reaching a wider range of shoppers in the run up to the Christmas season.”
About GAME:
GAME is Europe's leading specialist retailer of computer software and video games. The Group (formerly called Electronics Boutique) currently operates from over 340 stores in the UK and Eire, 30 GAME stores in Sweden, over 90 CentroMAIL stores in Spain and over 55 ScoreGAME stores in France. It also offers on-line shopping and game play services.
For further corporate information log onto www.gamegroup.plc.uk, and for the new look on-line store log onto www.game.uk.com
For further details please contact:
Simon Soffe / Lisa Artemis – GAME PR Dept
01344 464442 / 464512
Background:
- Grabbed by the Ghoulies
An adventure game situated in a haunted house, full of 25 different types of Ghoulies. The player takes on the role of Cooper, a kid whose mission is to rescue his girlfriend, who has been grabbed by the ghoulies. Available on Microsoft Xbox only. Priced around £39.99.
- Pop Idol from Codemasters
Available on Sony PlayStation 2, PC CD and Nintendo GameBoy Advance SP, takes after the hit ITV series, currently in the second series. Players sing and dance and match the buttons pressed on screen. Over 40 songs are available, from Brittney Spears and Will Young, as well as featuring Simon Cowell, with over 60,000 comments and insults. All games priced between £24.99 and £39.99.
- MJ Media acted on GAME’s behalf to buy the media space.
