FRESNO, Calif. – Have you heard the fish story of EducationalEmployees Credit Union pulling in over $28,264,000 in new loans?Well unlike other fishing stories this one is 100% true. Designedby Hollister, California-based brand consulting firm RedbeardCommunications Inc., a fishing themed direct mail campaign hashelped the $1.15 billion credit union open 1,574 loans in just twomonths. “We thought our goal of $24 million would be a stretch forus since loan growth has been harder for us to achieve this year-soto end up with over $28 million is just amazing,” said EECU VicePresident of marketing Scott Ingram. “We like fun, unique campaignsand this one had it all because the member response was great.”With the slogan, “It may be the greatest catch you've ever made”,the campaign featured a unique montage of aged photographs of cars,boats, and RVs mixed with fishing design elements includingdriftwood, fishing lures, bottle caps, ropes, sea-sponges andnetting. According to Redbeard President Greg Hoffman thecollage/scrapbooking techniques used in this promotion marked afirst. “From a design standpoint it was a fun yet challengingproject -once we had the layout on paper we set out to find all thevarious elements we'd need. We wanted the pieces to have a rusticflavor so ultimately many of the dimensional elements came fromantique stores and surplus houses,” said Hoffman. “My wife andbusiness partner has quite a bit of experience in the scrapbookingfield so she handled the actual layout working with the artdirector. The goal was to visually and creatively break through thepromotional noise that consumers are exposed to and we're pleasedwith the end result.” At a price tag of $32,000 the campaignincluded banners, teller signs, poster displays at all 10 EECUbranches and direct mail sent in two waves to some 20,000 targetedmembers.