The Redbows Promotional Gifts Blog

When we quote lead times for promotional items these are always from the approved artwork stage of the ordering process. If any stage can cause a delay in delivery, this is it and to help improve our customer service we introduced an ‘in-house’ Design Studio at Redbows last year. This has helped our customers tremendously and we get rave reviews from them post sale – see the comments from our customer satisfaction surveys.

So, what is the actual problem? Well we have access to millions of pounds worth of printing equipment for the various processes and products but without suitable artwork they simply do not run. Delays typically occur at the artwork stage for various reasons: (1) no artwork exists and our design team has to generate it from scratch, (2) there are several people/clients involved in the artwork sign off stage, (3) we need to turn the artwork into a suitable vector file, and finally (4) where numerous amendments are made to the artwork resulting in several approval forms being generated.

Of them all (3) is the easiest for us to solve rapidly and (1) typically takes a couple of hours in design time. (2) however is another matter, and for this all we can offer is a professional design service that responds to your inputs, and (4) well as you can imagine this can be a nightmare, and costly.

So, how can you get your gifts quickly ? Let us help you get your artwork right first time! 

What is our advice on what to put in a promotional gift’s imprint area ? Keep it simple. The basics often suffice and we recommend, logo, web address, phone number and marketing message. It all depends on how big the print area actually is and the number of them. For example, pens have print areas on the barrel and clips. Why is less more ? Well when you have a small imprint area, you may only be able to get all the information in using a very small font. Here the problems of readability and ink flow arise.  Think about your clients and their age range (for this read ability to view without glasses). Make what you print as big as possible, so that anyone can read it. Make the font too small and the ‘ink’ can bleed into the non-print areas. If in doubt you can always ask our Design Studio for a virtual visual and even order a pre-production sample.

There are several areas that a gift supplier like Redbows can play a major part in when it comes to the environment: printed materials, environmentally-friendly gifts and supplying electronic products that meet the WEEE and RoHS guidelines.

When we first got started in the gifts game we would receive literally tens of printed catalogues. Each cost a fortune to produce and post. Today, we still use catalogues but to a lesser degree thanks to electronic communications. The internet provides us with the opportunity to ‘present’ gifts through our websites, with Adobe PDF documents for download. We still have a small printed catalogue but it will only show a small selection of the gifts available rather than the entire product ranges. I am sure that over the next year, as we develop our ecommerce websites and documentation further, paper catalogues will be dropped from our marketing mix.

Redbows currently supplies a limited selection of environmentally-friendly products. A key factor in this is availability – there is just not a great selection available - yet! This will improve and manufacturers will develop their processes to produce an even wider variety. Currently mugs and pens are firm favourites as they can easily be made from recycled plastics. I am not convinced about the coasters made from recycled car tyres though…

Finally for electronic goods, the latest WEEE and RoHS directives apply. These directives apply to electrical and electronics items like USB flashdrives. RoHS is concerned with the materials used in manufacturing like lead-free solder and the processes involved, where as WEEE is concerned with end-of-life disposal of an item. A classic example is a battery – look for the crossed-out wheelie bin. This means that this product should not be simply thrown away at end-of-life but taken to a recycling centre.

So how environmentally friendly can the gifts industry get ? Well we obviously have a long way to go before today’s promotional pens can become part of tomorrow’s coffee mugs!

Well no but the prices are. We are often asked why we change our flashdrive and MP3 player prices so often. The answer is that two variables govern the pricing of memory-based products: the US$ exchange rate and memory chip availability. For example, at the moment there is a shortage of 256Mb chips and this is having a knock on effect on other sizes that use combinations of these.

So issuing price lists for these items can be a nightmare. We tend to take a ‘swings and roundabouts’ approach to minor fluctuations but occasionally a client may see a much larger change. For this reason we work on a short validity on usb flashdrive prices and quotes, and prices can literally vary within 48 hours. The best thing we can advise clients is to use the prices as a budgetary guide if they are not ready to order then and there, and to always check for the latest prices. Sometimes, even in this mad world they fall further than a previous week’s rise.

We like tools that help us get the job done. One of the best we have found for locating exhibitions is available on expoab.com – the website for the exhibition and events industry. They have a page set up to help you locate any type of exhibition anywhere in the world – the data is collated from a massive database.

Off course exhibitions and events are great platforms for the use of promotional gifts and we have written a special guide on what we believe exhibitors need to consider when planning such events – click here for our guide on Tradeshow Giveaways.

When choosing promotional items we sometimes forget how the seasons can play a big influence. We have just added these delicious promotional sweets to our range of products. They will be ideal for summer corporate events and hospitality.

These gourmet chocolates contain real fruit pieces, encased in rich chocolate and packed into pocked sized pillow packs. Weighing 50g these promotional items are conveniently sized and the packaging can have an imprint (your logo and message) of up to four colours. Flavours include blueberry, strawberries, raspberries and even real coffee – available in white or dark chocolate – yummy!

Sometimes you find yourself working in an industry that your family considers boring. What you find passion in, they only find tedious. Well the promotional gifts industry is very different. People love our products and no matter what the day there is always some new development whether it be summer ice packs and can-coolers with branding opportunities, promotional brownie cakes or another great electronic gadget. I have never found an industry quite like it where everyone loves to hear about your day and what’s more see your samples!

So we now have this blog. Ok it is a marketing opportunity but we also want to use it to let you into our world and see what promotional gifts consultant gets up to each day – the problems, trials and issues and how we overcome them to deliver outstanding solutions. Contrary to popular belief we do not spend all day playing Sudoku, throwing magnetic darts, solving sliding-puzzles or seeing just how hot our USB cupwarmers can get! There is more to it and we hope to see others contribute as we build this blog.