Big Frey Promotional Products

So many of you have heard us talk about the Group Buy concept.  It is something very new to our service offering and a powerful tool that helps clients leverage buying power within an organization.  The Group Buy offering has many advantages for both promotional product buyers and management.

What is Group Buy?  Basically, Group Buy connects buyers within an organization so they can leverage their buying power and take advantage of economies of scale. For example, a sales person for firm X is interested in purchasing a branded pen with their information imprinted on it. They can place the order through us and we will create a “group buy” that can be sent to fellow colleagues in any department within the organization.  The original buyer sets a time period for purchases to be made by colleagues – typically the time range is a week to 10 days.  Each colleague can order the set minimum quantity, put their own messaging or brand on the product, have the product shipped directly to them and receive separate invoicing. As more pens are added to the order amongst the various departments, the price drops for everyone involved in the Group Buy. At the end of the Group Buy, everyone who ordered gets the lowest price achieved. Group Buy saves everyone involved time and money!

Group buy can also be used by management to “bless” products that meet cost limitations and brand guidelines. Through Group Buy, management can pick out certain products and release them to promotional product buyers for a set period of time. Additionally, upon completion, management can create promotional product tracking reports to help management plan for future promotional product spending.

When utilized, group buy is an effective tool that saves money, controls the brand, spreads creative ideas, and manages cost reporting.

We just wanted to let you know that most of our factories in China are currently on a holiday. This means that we are currently unable to get pricing, production times, or products from them. The product most affected by this holiday is USB memory drives because the vast majority of them are produced in China.

Please bear with us for the rest of the week until we can get back in contact with our suppliers on Monday. Please contact us if you have any further questions.

When it comes to customer service, Big Frey has many advantages on the competition.

As is often the case, many clients do not have long lead times and need product quickly. With the competition, such circumstances can lead to rush charges on top of all the other fees associated with the purchase.  We want our clients spending their money on products that help achieve their goals and not on service fees!

Because we turn over large volumes of product through Boundless Network, we have special relationships with vendors that allow us to get our customers the products they need, when they need them and without the rush charges.

The Big Frey Rush Service is simple:

• Product turnaround within 24-hours;
• No additional rush charges;
• On Time Delivery!

We know our clients can rely on us to get them their creative promotional products even with a tight turn-around.  Our high volume also gives us access to a host of other benefits that helps make our client’s job easier so stay tuned!

This is not a typical blog for us but it is one worth sharing.

A student organization at Loyola University – Chicago recently asked us to help them with a unique, and inspiring, idea.  Their goal was to create a September 11^th memorial on campus and post an American flag for every life lost on that fateful day. With little time to spare, we quickly sourced 3,000 flags for them and the memorial successfully went up on September 11th, 2009.

Here is an excerpt from their website about the memorial.

“Today the Loyola College Republicans remember the nearly 3,000 victims of the terrorist attack on our nation eight years ago. We join together with all Americans in commemorating the lives of those who were lost in that tragedy, and celebrate the enduring spirit of freedom that we witnessed in the days, weeks, and months following. Our memorial on campus of one flag for each victim speaks to the sentiment that ‘we will never forget.’

We also honor our servicemen, police officers, and firefighters today, who so bravely put their lives on the line each and every day protecting the American people. We ask that everyone take the time today to thank these people for serving their country. And remember that these are just a few of the reasons why America is a shining beacon of hope to the rest of the world.”

More pictures can be found at http://bit.ly/LJlh3.

Big Frey is always on the hunt for new creative products to help our clients effectively build brand.  Just like our clients, we too attend trade shows to help educate ourselves on the new trends in our industry.  We recently attended the Advertising Specialty Institute show in Chicago and were privy to many new and innovative products.

We want to share with you the products that won awards in Chicago this year.  Let us know if any of these products peak your interest.

Most Unique

• Towel Cakes – a towel that “looks like” a cake!

Best Green Product

• New Corn Tumbler & Mug – tumblers and mugs made from 100% U.S. corn plastic, made in the USA and biodegradable.

Most Staying Power — Two Winners!

• 25 oz. Stainless Steel Wave Water

• The Notebook Buffer – the ultimate laptop accessory, the Notebook Buffer facilitates airflow underneath your laptop which allows heat to dissipate away, keeping the machine cool and you comfortable

Best Bang for Your Buck — Two Winners!

• Stainless Water Bottle Gift Set – Our foam insulated Stainless Steel Tumbler pairs with our slide-open, battery-powered Executive Calculator to create perfect gift set for every client.

• PLAPen – made of the new PLA material, this environmentally friendly annually renewable material produced from plants, presents a viable alternative to traditional petroleum-based materials.

Most Likely to Build a Buzz

• Spirit Hair & RallyHawk

Most Popular Wearable

• All Over Sublimation -  A digital sublimation process embeds your graphics, (even photographic images), directly into any of our synthetic and recycled polyester fabrics without affecting the technical wicking characteristics of the fabric or having any ink lying on the surface of your garment.

Please contact us if you have any questions about these unique promotional products!

The holiday season is just around the corner – are you making your list and checking it twice?

As you prepare for holiday gift giving for your colleagues and clients, keep in mind that as you continue to build brand awareness with these audiences you can also find products that will give you a great return for your dollar.

If you are responsible for giving gifts internally, keep the demographics of your colleagues in mind. The gifts you give need to be applicable to all of your employees and that can be difficult. We offer a few ideas for you.  To start, drinkware and desktop items make great internal gifts because they touch a broad audience and are universal.  We also recommend gift cards that can be redeemed for a variety of preselected gifts.  The recipient will receive an expansive catalog and is free to shop till they drop!

You might also be responsible for purchasing holiday gifts for clients, customers or other external relations.  Whether you are trying to build brand awareness, recruit, or just say thank you to existing clients, holiday gifts can go a long way. For example, some recruiters have used holiday themed exam survival kits to help their recruits make it through final exams. Holiday gifts are also an effective way to thank clients for their patronage.

Whether you are looking for unique or simple ways to “give” this holiday season, we have a plethora of ideas to help!  The holiday’s gifts are a great way to show appreciation while also effectively building brand.

Are you looking for a way to get thousands of repeat impressions for your brand at an inexpensive cost? Consider playing cards.  Playing cards are effective as a giveaway because of the tremendous amount of impressions they receive.

Think about it, most people don’t throw away a deck of cards. Usually, after the game is over, the deck is put away until the next game. Because of this, your brand will receive a lifetime of impressions with a very low cost per impression.

Another benefit of playing cards is that both sides of the card can be customized, and each card can be printed differently. A client of ours is printing their brand on the back of every card in the deck AND each card will have a different fact about the company on the face-side – 1 brand, 52 facts per deck!  They are giving the cards to their recruits so they can have some fun as they prepare for interviews at the company.

Playing cards are an excellent way to receive a ton of impressions at an inexpensive price. To check out the different options we offer, check out Our Products.

As we have stressed time and time again, promotional products are an excellent way to build brand because of the number of impressions they receive. But on some personal items like apparel, the user doesn’t want to feel like a walking billboard for your brand. So how can you give away personal items and still build brand? Tone-on-tone branding can be used to more subtly display your brand on personal items.

Tone-on-Tone branded items can certainly add lifetime to personal products because the product will not SCREAM a company’s brand. Sometimes, the quieter you are, the louder you are heard. Using techniques like tone-on-tone for personal products can increase the lifetime of the product and, hence, increase the ROI of your promotional spend.

Stay tuned to BigFrey.com for more creative ideas that insure you get the best return on investment from your promotional products.

We recently attended an industry tradeshow to touch, feel and see some of the old promotional products and learn about a lot of the new promotional products and creative ideas.  Every summer we attend this show in Chicago, and, this year we noticed a new trend in industry – a strong emphasis on cost effective promotional products.

While we certainly found some really cool new products (which we will blog about in a later post), we also noticed that there is an emphasis on lower cost items that can yield a great return.  The reason for this is two-fold, on the one hand, in response to the need to find items that fit a tighter budget, there are amazing deals happening now.  On the other hand, there is a surplus of inventory that must be gone in order to “house” the new products.  With that being said, now is a great time for you to pick up great giveaways at an excellent price. Contact Us to take advantage of these amazing deals!