With the Holidays about 2 months away, we have been getting quite a few calls and emails inquiring about the best options for choosing Christmas and year-end gifts...so I decided to break these areas down for you to make gift-giving simple, and even fun,this year for you.
Here are 7 things to consider when choosing your Christmas gifts for employees and clients:
1) Why are you giving out Christmas/Holiday gifts this year? Is it expected of you from past years of gift giving? Will it be missed if you did not give a gift this year? Are you looking to make an impact on a client, prospect, employee, donor, sponsor, etc.
2) Who will you be giving gifts to? If it is an employee gift, will you be giving the same gift to everyone--regardless of length of tenure, salary, job title, etc.
If it is a customer gift, will you stagger your gift giving so that clients who order a certain dollar value will get a group at one dollar value, and those who purchase more get a gift at a higher dollar value?
Setting up tiers for your gift giving can help you to maximize your budget.
3) Another thing to think about is distribution. Will you be handing them out at an event? If so, then size and weight and fragility may be things to consider. If you will be mailing them out individually, then size and weight can greatly affect pricing.
Another thing to consider is if you want to pay to ship the items to you first - then ship each one out-- or have a company like ours also do all the fulfillment for you- making things simple.
4) Packaging: One of the most popular trends is to brand not just the promotional item, but also the box or packaging it comes in for greater branding impact. This holds true both for internal gifts, as well as external gifts to clients and prospects. Custom packaging can also replace the need for wrapping paper if designed properly.
5) Price or Quality? When it comes to most of our items, whether it is the newest hoodies and jackets or latest stainless tumblers or fleece blankets, the more you spend, of course, the better the quality. That goes without saying. The big decision is whether or not is better to give fewer quality gifts to the right recipients or take a hit on the quality and go for quantity...or set up tiers of 2 or 3 levels of gifts.
My philosophy is any time you give anything with your logo on it--it better positively convey your brand. Give a cheap item that falls apart after the first few uses, and people will not think highly of your brand. My suggestion is to decide on a budget-- maybe setup up 2 or 3 tiers or levels of gifts so you can maximize your spend-- then let us help you narrow it down so you can have quality gifts and have it fit your budget.
6) Individually Personalized or just Company Branded? If you are 100% sure of the recipients' names and spellings (and possibly nicknames)-- then adding a personalized name to a product may have great appeal. But if you are not sure, I'd leave it off. After all, I would not carry around an item with your logo that has my name marked as "Bob" or "Robby"--when I go by "Robert". But if you nailed it-- more power to you and your branding efforts.
7) Who will be making the final gift selection? The concept of a committee sounds good---in theory. In practice, however, it just tends to drag on, and on and on--with the more people in the group, the longer the decision process usually takes. It may be best to brainstorm as a team or committee, then have one point person work with us and let us take it from there..so we can add our 2 cents to it-- or help find options within your parameters. After all, we have been doing this for 61 years and know what trends, styles, colors and features people really want. Let us become a part of your gift selection team-- not just a vendor.
It is not too early-- nor too late yet - to start finalizing your Holiday and Christmas gifts.
Please let me know how can we be of service?
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