Spring is on us and a new month means a brand new set of promotional item specials. Check out our monthly deals where you get huge value for money products. This month in our specials we are offering a huge offer for promotional items. For custom printed post its we are offering:

- Purchase of 7.5 x 7.5cm Get Free Gift of 5 x 7.5cm post its for half your order
- Each Purchase 12.5 x 7.5cm a Free Gift of 7.5 x 7.5cm post it pad
- Each Purchase 15 x 7.5cm Get a Free Gift of 5 x 7.5cm post it pad
- Each Purchase 15 x 10cm Get a Free Gift of 5 x 10cm post it pad

On top of this we have our new best kept secret Aussie businesses in budget custom branded flashdrives. Our specials are not run out or clearance items. They are genuine discounts on some of our best selling ranges of quality promotional items. Throughout this week we will be offering even more september specials as we head towards the final quarter of this year. So check back to find out more!

There is more than one place to decorate when it comes to embroidery on Polo Shirts.

The left hand side on the chest area is the most common request for our branded jobs but there are also other areas which can be embroidered as well. The collar is actually a good location to embroid a business logo and can often look very sleek. It is also good location to brand to avoid the awkward looks one may get when trying to check out a business’s branding (which is on a ladies chest!). Another place to decorate polo tshirts are the sleeves, especially for co-branding. Remember MasterChef? Well it was obvious that Qantas had sponsored MasterChef, their Qantas sysmbol was on the sleeves of the contestants branded shirts.

Back of the Promotional Polos you may ask? Screen printing Yes, but not for embrodiery. Embroidery on such a large space won’t look good we always recommend screenprinting instead.

What other promotional products would be suitable for embroidery? Promotional Caps, Branded Scarves, Beanies, custom towels and promotional bags. All fabric products would be suitable. Don’t forget, with embroidery you can have full colour logos. Pricing of embroidery will be based on the stitches required and not based on the number of colours. This could be more cost effective than to chose printing. Contact us if you would like to discuss your decoration options when you need promotional products next time.

Customised Post it notes have always been one of our most popular selling products. The most popular personalised post its are:

7.5 x 7cm Promotional Post Its
7.5 x 10cm Promotional Post Its

These 2 sizes are the standard square and rectangle sizes that you may typically find in any retail shop. The pricing shown on our website for these post its include branding of your logo.

However custom branded post its dont need to be square. We can have post its custom cut to your desired shape. Choose from an existing shape we have done in the past for a small extra cost such as:

Truck/Australia outline/Star/Balloon/Dog Bone/Jelly Bean/Sedan car/Circle/Jean back pocket/Heart/House/Hexagon/Brain/Ipod outline/Bomb/Normal Phone/Foot/PIggy/Fish

Alternatively you can create your own custom shape post it. For most shapes the die cut tool outline to create your shape will cost around $900 so it is a process best recomended for larger runs where the initial cost can be split into a lower cost per unit. Give us a call today to find out more!

It never too earlier to start planning. Today I’ve received numerous calls from clients requesting promotional products to be custom branded by first week of May. However with the Easter & Anzac Day public holidays plus Labour Day in QLD, this has meant the number of working days available to customise promotional merchandises in time is limited.

May and June is a time for many upcoming conferences. June is also time for end of year budgeting spending!
Get in quick with your promotional items requests and this will help you with:
- ensuring you get the stock you wish including quantities and colours.
- if we don’t have the colours now, at least we can organise more to be stocked
- ensure we have the capacity to schedule your job in time
- offer you options to have your promotional items custom made using an indent service thus saving you money and better buying power.

So its never to earlier to plan ahead for custom branded merchandise, in fact we encourage you to contact us today so that we can help you plan ahead!

We have 2 category of promotional bags which typically confuse a lot of our clients. This is the promotional non woven bags vs the eco promotional non woven bag. So whats a non woven bag? Well we like to call them Woolies bags as they seem to be the first corporate to really saturate literally the whole of Australia with this type of promotional product (which they sell to you incidentally as opposed to handing them out). Custom branded non woven bags are more friendly to the environment than disposable plastic bags… but… and this is a very very big BUT.

In order for custom printed non woven bags to be eco friendly they need to be re-used at least 1000 times. Why? Well it takes 1000 equivalent disposable plastic bags to create 1 non woven bag. However this does not take into account the landfill issue of course and in many instances non woven bags are reused many times over.

Non Woven bags are made from plastic which is a derivative of petroleum. The plastic is then woven into a fabric like material. They do stretch a bit but not by much. They can also withstand quite a bit of weight too which make them ideal to reuse. Our promotional non woven bags have been a hit in many tradeshows because they also keep their shape and comes in a huge range of colours meaning they are quite attractive and always attract attention.

So whats the difference between
1) Normal branded non woven bags &
2) Eco branded non woven bags?

Our normal promotional non woven bags are made from raw materials. Therefore petroleum and other chemicals. These are all safe of course. Whilst our eco promotional non woven bags are made from recycled plastics. Things such as your recycled coke bottle typically will be processed in Australia and turned into little plastic pellets which are shipped to China where they are melted down and re-used in this instance to create your promotional non woven bag. Because of this process it the eco branded non woven bags are typically a little bit more expensive. Hope this helps clarify what a non woven bag is!! Just in case you were curious yes, cotton calico bags are a more eco friendly alternative howver they are quite floppy and the colours not quite as exciting.

I’ve been hearing more and more about Kogan televisions in various websites and blogs lately. For those who dont know Kogan is a young Australian fellow who sells Kogan branded T.V sets online. What I found curious about him is that he really makes dramatic statements regardless of authenticity and his comments more often than not are really really out there! This makes him perfect fodder for the media to latch on and in the process this gives him free publicity.

Securing free publicity is not easy and never happens instantly. However no matter who you are you it can be accessible to you and consistent efforts will help you get some rewards.

I recently read about Justin Herald who grew a $50 outlay selling t shirts at Parklea Markets to a multi million dollar enterprise. One aspect about him was that he managed to build publicity momentum. How? Well he had an odd type of personality & in his words “ In a quarter of an hour, you could email a pitch to five journalists, place three follow-up calls, or research a new media outlet to see whether it might be a PR opportunity for you. ”

He first appeared on an Alan Jones radio segment, later he realised that journalists often found their next story by checking out their peers….. this led to his next interview with A Current Affair. The next morning he got heaps of calls from retailers wanting to stock his products.

Here are some tips that may help you garner some PR for your business:

1) Persevere and put in the time to develop new ideas to spark media interest. Then follow up with journalists that you want publicity from.

2) Start small. Locally in fact. Its easier and gives you credibility as you are already a local.

3) Alternatively focus on one area. Eg. Marketing Press or Engineering Press only.

4) Write down what you achieve and 3 things to do to achieve them.

Ultimately persevere and focus. Its a daily task to follow up and to strategise. Pitch and follow up with phone calls to journalists!!

After working on literally every logo imaginable from companies to government bodies we have learnt quite a bit on logos and design. I would like to share with you some of th things we have learnt. This is Part 1 of a series of posts which I will use to provide handy hints and tips on logo design and what works best not just for promotional items but for branding in general.

I will focus on Usability & Flexibility today!

Usability and flexibility of your logo means how many different ways can you use your logo but still keep the overall aesthetic and design integrity. You see your corporate logo wil be displayed and viewed by your customers through many different mediums such as:

1) Internet Website
2) Newspapers
3) Television
4) Promotional Products (anything from corporate umbrellas to promotional pedometers)
5) Business Cards
6) Glossy Magazine Print
7) Sponsorship banners
8) Sponsorship flags
9) Clothing apparell
10) & more (I’m sure I have missed a couple here)

What all these mediums have in common is that they are all different. They have:

- Different brand areas
- Different brand orientation (portrait/landscape/diagonal etc)
- Different ability to accomodate colours!

This means that your logo must be flexible to suit all these needs yet still maintain its core design to be recognisable. We have been lucky enough to work with multi national companies and it amazes me the amount of resources they devote to enable their logo to be represented in different formats. (in fact we recently did work for one of the worlds largest banks and their brand guideline was a stagering 40 pages…took me ages to read through it).

However for something a bit more practicle for the average business I can recomend these 4 tips for you to have a flexible logo:

Tip 1: Have your logo available in a black & white format
Tip 2: Have your logo available in a single spot colour. (no shading and no half tones)
Tip 3: Design your logo so it can have a portrait as well as a landscape format
Tip 4: Have an alternative design where it can be visible when shrunk to a very small size

The designer of your logo should be able to create this readily for you at a resonable cost. By having these 4 formats available your logo will be able to be represented in virtually any format and allows you flexibility to engage in any marketing activity easily.

Stay tuned… I’ll cover more on core design principals in upcoming posts!

(ps if you were looking for promotional items and weren’t sure about your logo we also offer graphic design as a service too!!)

Even for us who work in the industry of promotional items and advertising it is getting increasingly difficult if not impossible for us to identify what images we see on magazines or online that have been digitally altered or not. Photo shop essentially now allows creators of ads and content to manipulate images naturally to virtually anyone and anything. Its really smoke and mirrors X 100!!!. Check out the image below of Madonna with a pre and after photoshop touch up!! (sorry its kinda small due to our blog limitations)

Did you know that not all promotional mugs are the same? You see printing logos and images on items is a relatively straight forward process (although you do need the equipment and the technicians as well as the computer operator to brand properly) However when it comes to printing on personalised mugs its a bit trickier. Other than branding we also take an extra step to fire the mug in a kiln. This ensures a durable print as well as a safe image when placed in a washing machine. Unfortunately not everyone does this extra process as it costs a bit more. The bad bit is that the purchaser of these mugs would never ever know. So if you are on the lookout for customised mugs give us a call today as we go the extra mile to make your purchase a value for money purchase.

I’m too busy to ….. is a comment that I make a lot of the time and I am sure you do too. Its one of those things if you are at work then you will more likely than not be snow ball’d with work. For those lucky enough to cruise at work at a leisurely pace then I envy you… BIG time. Here are 10 tips to get the most out of your personal and working life.

1. Scheduling - It always works. Just list out what you want to accomplish. This gives you a pretty picture of all your work and to choose which one to jump into first. Then Tick …. Tick & Tick the completed items.

2. Take Notes - A personalized sticky note will help. Custom printed notebooks will also help. Jot down meetings, phone calls or any ideas wherever you may be.

3. Organize Your Workspace - A Clean desk will make you feel and work better.

4. Brainstorm with colleagues. It makes people feel part of something but more importantly it generates creativity and productvity (note this is quite different to mindless zombie meetings)

5. Hard Tasks or Big Tasks First - It will make the day easier!!

6. Responsibility - Pass this on to team members. You need help? Then ask. It will help everyone in the long run.

7. Run Around Get your heart Rate Up and Exercise!!

8. Let People Know what you are doing - Communicate. Be transparent so you can point the finger at who stuffed up!! … haha just kidding but it helps in terms of coming up with solutions as a team. More brains is better than 1 brain when a solution for a problem is needed right?

9. A work day has 8 hours + depending on what you do. Yes some of those hours will be more productive than others… you simply work better. Identify those hours and jump in. For me its between 10am - 12pm

10. A Big Big Task - just get stuck in it. The quicker you get started the quicker it gets done!!