Despite mattresses being excluded from the government’s current GST/HST break, Sleep Country-owned brand Endy is stepping in with its own promotional offer through a creative marketing campaign. The brand is offering a 13% discount on all mattresses during the same period of the GST/HST break, until February this year.

“We know that for many Canadians, getting enough rest can be a challenge – one-third of people report not feeling satisfied with their sleep, Julia Cooper, Endy’s VP of marketing, tells strategy. “Now that the busy holiday season is over, January is the perfect time to hit the reset button and prioritize rest. With the ongoing conversation around the GST/HST holiday, we saw an opportunity to tap into that moment and encourage Canadians to invest in better sleep this year.”

According to Cooper, January tends to be a slower sales period, especially after weeks of Black Friday and holiday promotions. At this time, customers often feel overwhelmed by so many ads. “We wanted to break through that fatigue with something bold and unexpected, something that felt fresh and different from the usual post-holiday noise. For this campaign, we chose to feature a large, oversized receipt, which adds a fun, playful twist, particularly coming from an online-first brand like ours,” she says.

The campaign also takes a different storytelling approach to its previous work, which broke with category conventions by focusing not on sleep, but on the opportunities to live each day.

To promote its work, Endy will publish a full-page letter from its president in this Saturday’s issue of the Globe & Mail. It is also publicizing the oversized receipt through social media ads, emails and SMS.

Cooper notes that the media plan represents a different channel mix for the company. “While we’re an ecomm-first brand, we recognize the lasting impact of tactile, analog advertising – print is far from dead… And across print and digital, the open letter from our president, Jason Cassidy, is a way for us to use long-form storytelling to engage new audiences and our existing community.”

Cooper adds: “We are in fact spending more on this campaign than we typically would to promote a regular sale. There’s a larger conversation to be had about investing in your rest, and from our perspective, that storytelling component is worth its weight in media.”

In 2018, Sleep Country Canada bought Endy and left it to operate as an independent subsidiary. It was born as a DTC company that was first digital and today includes a product line of beds, sofas and other furniture beyond mattresses.

The brand handled both creative and media buying for this campaign.