As a business owner who is interested in maintaining or developing a reputation for quality and integrity, you may be stumped as to how to choose a promotional item or items that will reflect positively on your business. This concern is appropriate. There are thousands and thousands of promotional items that can be purchased and the quality varies substantially. You may think you are ordering quality promotional items, only to find out when they arrive, that you wouldn’t even give them to your dog.

Many business owners seem to shy away from using promotional pens because they have seen the low end of quality being given away at various times. This article is being written to dispel the belief that promotional pens are cheap giveaway items. Yes, you can buy incredibly cheap low quality promotional pens but, you can also buy promotional pens that may run in to the thousands of dollars range. Surprised? Read on to find out a little bit about the differences between promotional pens made of plastic and those made of metal.

To set the stage, let it be known that plastic pens can be of very good quality and pens that you would want to seriously consider. Now that this has been said, let’s talk about some of the differences between metal and plastic pens.

Many times people like to have a cup or a holder on their desk that has their promotional printed pens in it for people to take away with them. Plastic promotional pens are perfect for this kind of distribution because people may take them away with them but, they often lose them or forget them when they have used them to write a check or sign for a debit or credit card purchase.

Having your promotional pen be left behind or lost is a great distribution scheme in and of itself. When your pen is found by another person, they will look at it, read your name, see your logo and your business information and you have had free advertising. You really can’t ask for much more, can you?

If you are interested in your promotional pens being something that your customers will value and be more conscientious about not leaving behind or losing, you will probably want to consider buying metal pens for that purpose.

These metal pens can also be put into a cup or holder in your reception area and people will take them away but this may not be the most cost effective distribution plan. People do not expect to find high-quality promotional pens in reception areas or at cashier counters so, they will not automatically tie the quality of the pen, provided them to write their check or sign for their purchase, with the quality of your business.

Use metal pens when you want to personally give someone your promotional item. Metal pens appear to be a higher quality than plastic pens to the general public. This may not necessarily be the case but it is difficult to change an individual’s attitude or value regarding what a product is made up. The best thing to do in this case is to just go along with misperception and order and distribute metal pens when there is a personal contact between you and the customer.