It all began with the peat briquette – a measure of quality time. From there, with the vision and enthusiasm of Ken Waldrop, and some progressive thinking, we had three new TV ads to bring the peat briquette back to the forefront of Irish minds; as well as Irish fireplaces!
As we know, many Irish families will have a rather colder fireplace this year, and it was decided to help keep the homefires burning with St Vincent de Paul.
Speaking after delivering the good news to Hector live on 2FM, John Keogh of Bord na Móna said “We are delighted to help this incredibly important campaign with a donation that will help many vulnerable families put a fire in the hearth this Christmas. We also want to see lots of people go online and donate to Saint Vincent de Paul and give what they can to their urgent appeal- if enough people make a donation we’re promising to double the pledge to 20,000 bales”.
The appeal was a huge success, the public donated in their droves, and ten truckloads – 20,000 bales – of peat briquettes left the Derrinlough factory shortly after.
The natural place to promote our peat briquette and the traditional Irish fire, was with Hector O’ hEochagain on RTE 2FM. With Hector at the helm, a text competition to win a break away or an ultimate prize of a family ski holiday was a roaring success, with competition entrants each day outdoing the talent of the previous day.
This method of getting people to share their story in the space of a text fit very well with the #ShortStoryLongNight hashtag competition taking place on Twitter. The Twitterati (as well as Facebook users) are invited to share their fireside tales in only 140 characters, for their chance to win a prize or to be published in our upcoming Short Story Long Night book!
On Facebook, there is an opportunity also for those who let their fingers do the talking. Fans (almost 4,000 of them in the first five weeks) who don’t feel that they have a story to tell can still have fun with our FireMagic game – a fast-paced demonstration of just what you can do in the free time you’ll have when using FireMagic Fire Maker to light your fire. All those who make it onto the leaderboard are entered into a weekly draw to win a year’s subscription to Screenclick, a popular DVD rental service.
