UK Greetings has a great excuse to have a right laugh over the coming year – the 30th anniversary of Giggles. The publisher is firming up a fun-filled smorgasbord of events, initiatives and promotions aimed at consumer, trade and UKG staff to mark the momentous milestone of this evergreen range.
Ben says that while the essence of the range remains “quintessentially Giggles” the range’s longevity – and ‘must have’ status for so many retailers – is due to its evolution, rather than revolution. “We do of course tweak the design styles, add contemporary references, and ensure there are new funny punchline jokes introduced to keep it as fresh and relevant as it was when Giggles first burst on to the card racks in 1987,” said Ben.
“While the themes of many of the jokes have remained the same over the last three decades of Giggles, namely ageing, drinking and farting, the references change. Five years ago there wouldn’t have been any mention of Prosecco or Game of Thrones, for example.”
As part of a full programme of events to mark Giggles’ 30th anniversary, this October will see ’30 Days of Giggles’, an extended social media campaign which will bring the essence of Giggles to life though multi media activity, including posting jokes and humorous videos in all manner of channels. In preparation of this, the ‘Giggles humour team’ took the ‘Giggles joke shed’ on the road recently, installing it at The Great Yorkshire Fringe festival in York where many comedians performed.
“We go to the festival every year anyway to see the comedians and get a feel for the direction in which humour is moving. This year, with it being Giggles’ 30th we invited people into ‘our joke shed’ to tell us their favourite joke which we then videoed,” explained Ben (see videos below).
“It was great fun and very shareable. We’re looking forward to taking the ‘Giggles joke shed’ on many more outings planned for coming months, so get your jokes ready!”
