There is very little chance that a company who makes promotional gifts will make up a brand new item for your particular needs. Most of the time a company will have a selection of stock items, upon which your logo or some text can be printed. Many different companies stock the same items, with only small variation in the selection you get. With this in mind it is always best to shop around for the best deal on the types of items you would like to order.
How Much Should They Cost?
Promotional items can vary a huge amount in price. Depending on what type of product you are marketing, who you are marketing to and how many individual items you will need to buy, you might need to spend quite a large sum of money to get your promotional products out to the biggest possible audience of potential customers. If you are going for heavy market saturation with small, inexpensive items it is always a good idea to look for items under $1, or if slightly more try to get a bulk discount.
Most companies who manufacture promotional gifts will charge you less and less per item depending on how many different items you order. The price can vary hugely if depending on whether you order only one case of items or a large bulk order of thousands of individual items. Most companies will have a minimum order that you need to make, but this is usually around $500 - $1,000 worth of items or at least one batch (typically 500 individual items).
How Should They Be Distributed?
Distributing promotional gifts carries its own costs, and requires a certain amount of planning. Handing out a high volume of items is all well and good, but if you do not hand them out to the right people you run the risk of spending a large sum of money for nothing. Try to find areas or events where people who might be interested in your product might gather, and hand your items out here. If your product appeals to the masses you have a much easier job – simply find high traffic areas where your distributors are likely to find a lot of people interested in your products.
Unless you want to stand at a traffic intersection yourself handing out free samples and pamphlets, it is advised that you hire people to hand out your promotional gifts. Handing out samples and items in public generally pays between $10 - $30 per hour, and these are the rates that most people will expect. If you want to save on the trouble of finding students to hand out your items for you, there are many companies who have loads of students looking for temporary work. These might charge you slightly more to cover their fees, but this takes a lot of the work out of finding people to hand out promotional gifts.
