Thursday 18 December 2008

GNM CHALLENGE : MAKEOVER MILLS & BOON




Following Mills and Boon's recent appointment of St. Luke's to develop its first advertising campaign in six years, Guardian Media has challenged its readers to come up with their own ideas for the campaign.

Suggestions so far include a reality TV show where the winner stars in the next M&B book. St. Luke's Creative Director Al Young is currently undecided whether Guardian Media Ed Stephen Brook's creation Caspar Campbell-Jones should have his own starring role in the campaign.

Mills and Boon, which sells 7 million books in the UK each year, has also tasked St. Luke's with redesigning the iconic book covers.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well done all for landing Mills and Boon!

www.stlukes.co.uk said...

Thanks frances!

Liz Fielding said...

Looking forward to a new look for the covers. I think it'll be my eighth makeover :)

Anonymous said...

Hi Liz!

I know, so exciting. What's been your favourite cover so far?

Liz Fielding said...

Of mine?

My first -- AN IMAGE OF YOU. Gorgeous African savannagh scene with a hero exactly like I imagined him. And the US version of A SURPRISE CHRISTMAS PROPOSAL. I hated the UK photographic covers.

There was a lovely Shirley Jump cover that was just the hands of a bride with a bouquet. Very pretty.

I've got a cute cartoon cover on a German edition this month, too. :)

Anonymous said...

that's nice. the japanese ones are manga-fied...

Kate Walker said...

It's going to be interesting to see the results of the cover makeover will be. Like Liz, I've been through about 8 variations on a theme of romance.

There's been a bit of a discussion of this on my blog if you wnat to see what some of the readers think.

Kate

Donna Alward said...

I'm new, so this will be my first makeover! The covers for the Romance line have been lovely the last few years. It'll be neat to see what is going to come next!

I think my favourite cover might be my first one, for Hired By the Cowboy. The one for The Soldier's Homecoming was great as well.

Anne McAllister said...

I'm very curious to see what you'll do, too, as I have written for several Harlequin lines over the last 25 years, and some of the 'makeovers' have been disasters (go check out the Harlequin American covers that were made over starting summer 1989 for a
'disaster' example)and some have been great.

I agree with Liz that the photographic covers generally didn't work, especially if they had people in them. They were too specific and very often not at all like the characters in the books.

Of my M&B Modern covers, I liked an oldie, FINN'S TWINS, and one from last year, ONE-NIGHT LOVE CHILD. They're very different, but what they have in common, I think, is that in both cases the cover art evoked a particular mood from the book.

Fingers crossed for brilliance at St Luke's in this makeover! Happy New Year!

Anonymous said...

Welcome Kate, Donna and Anne, many thanks for commenting and happy new year!

If you have any thoughts on how you think the covers should reflect the differences in each genre, it would be great to hear them.