The promo industry is uniquely positioned to assist small businesses by donating products and services that can help attract customers and generate funds. It’s a long-term solution, too, and it gives small businesses one fewer thing to worry about right now. Here’s how a few South Florida businesses used donated promos from DiscountMugs…
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Decoration Diaries: How Classic Print Company Overcame Dye Migration to Deliver a Complex Jacket Decorating Job
For the first installment of Decoration Diaries, Qais Arabo tells us how his company completed a complex jacket project for a luxury department store with its in-house screen printing and sewing capabilities, and in the process overcame a few challenges including dye migration and hand sewing…
Read MoreHigh Score! This Distributor’s Brilliant Self-Promo Has Generated Six Figures in Sales (and Counting)
WHOOPLA, a distributor based in Encino, Calif., sends out two to three self-promo kits a year. Its latest, meticulously crafted and fully themed in ’80s arcade branding, is already a smash hit, generating multiple orders totaling six figures in sales with 100 of the 200 total mailings still to go. Here’s how it came together…
Read MoreAll in the Family: Jennifer Stromberg Is Bringing Big Ideas to StrombergBrand Umbrellas
In January of this year, Jennifer Stromberg was named vice president of the company—a third-generation family executive with 15 years of outside experience. A few months into her role, she’s working on strategic plans for company growth, evaluating the full scope of StrombergBrand’s business inside and out…
Read MoreCase of the Mondays? Nick Lateur of IMAGEN Brands Has the Promotional Products Cure
Each week, Nick Lateur posts a video. He picks a product—something unique or quirky, maybe a top-seller—and looks for any funny twists that would translate to video. The results, some of which may or may not involve Lateur wearing a superhero costume with shiny gold tights, are delightful…
Read MoreDelivering Experience: Starting Out, Growing Up (or Maybe Not) and Making Something Great in Promo
When we look back, it feels as if our baby is “all growed up.” But we realize there is so much ahead for Brand Fuel and this amazing industry—despite the threats in our SWOT analysis. Alibaba, Amazon, Wal-Mart, Costco, Pete The Promo Peddler—we exist because we realize we are what they aren’t. Differentiation is a part of our DNA…
Read MoreSpotlight: Amerifoam’s Lisa Bascom on Leadership, Running a Family Business, Community Work and Local Stardom
Lisa Bascom has a secret identity. By day, she’s president and owner of Brooklyn Products International Inc., parent company of AmeriFoam – The House of Foam, the promotional products supplier based in Brooklyn, Mich. But by night, she’s a superhero, a real-life Doctor Strange with the ability to stop and manipulate time. That’s the only possible explanation for Bascom’s remarkable and diverse list of professional and personal accomplishments, anyway…
Read MoreSpotlight: Inside an Iconic Promo Industry Brand’s Logo Redesign and Refresh
The Koozie brand, especially in the promo industry, is about as iconic as it gets. It’s one of those brand names, like Velcro and Kleenex, that’s so synonymous with a specific product that it often gets used to describe similar products, regardless of the brand. It doesn’t get much bigger than that. But even the best-known brands can use a refresh from time to time, and that’s the situation BIC Graphic found itself in…
Read MoreSpotlight: Josh Appelbaum Is Leading Hit Promotional Products Into Uncharted Apparel Territory
Hit Promotional Products, relatively speaking, is new to apparel. A giant in the hard-goods space, the Largo, Florida-based supplier topped $397 million in 2017 revenue, but began offering apparel only three years ago. As it looked to scale its soft-goods business, it knew it needed a pro…
Read MoreSpector & Co’s Loic Lefebvre on His First PPAI Expo Exhibitor Experience
When Loic Lefebvre went to bed Tuesday night, he did so feeling “very productive.” That description sounds incredibly apt, given that he is approaching his one-year anniversary as vice president of sales, North America, for Spector & Co. (booth No. 4737). Appearing at his initial PPAI Expo, the ambitious go-getter is eagerly taking in attendees’ reactions…
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