Sydney agency BMF has created a whole new way for Random House Australia to package a book that encourages readers to donate the book when they've finished with it.
Existing book buyers understand the value of literacy. But most books, once read, end up sitting on shelves or in bookcases. Random House wanted to get them donated to The Footpath Library, an Australian charity which shares the gift of literacy with the homeless by providing them with books - before they had become broken or old.
The Footpath Library treats the books as gifts and only takes those that are in good condition. The idea had to also make it easy for people to protect and deliver the books after they'd read them.
The agency wasn't printing the books themselves, so the covers had to be flexible and able to work with any existing titles. It also had to comply with existing postal regulations. The design had to be simple and appealing to shoppers while protecting the books on delivery and also feeling like a treasured gift to recipients.
So BMF created a new type of dust jacket and called it Mailbooks For Good. When readers have finished their books, they are instructed to flip the cover inside out, turning the book into a pre-paid, pre-addressed parcel. The parcels are then ready to send directly to the charity for distribution. The agency took design cues from classic postal envelopes and gift wrap to replicate the charm of receiving presents in the mail. Many different stocks were tested for their protective, tactile and aesthetic qualities before the final one was chosen.
BMF's Mailboxes for Good were printed by STI Lilyfield Printing in Sydney. Printing was done in CMYK on 2 sides, on 150gsm Botany Natural and they were die-cut to achieve a standard book-friendly shape, 295 x 420mm.
The initiative ran in Sydney with a launch collection of five different adults and children's titles by prominent Australian authors including Peter Fitzsimons, Nick Earls and Stephen Dando-Collins. The dust jacket design is pending global patent.
An international roll-out by Random House is planned for the near future. Mailbooks titles continue to outsell their regular counterparts.
