It's all happening in the industry!

Well, what a month it’s been in the promotions industry?

There’s news that the industry’s two major trade associations are merging; that’s the bpma and PROMOTA. As you can see, one uses only lower case letters in its title and the other only capitals … and that’s not the only difference, so it will be interesting to see how this pans out. But on the whole, it’s a good move; the new association will serve the complete trade channel – supplier to distributor and distributor to end-user.

Another announcement this month comes from Waypoint, an established exhibition organiser, which has launched a new exhibition in the promotions sector. Incentives & Promotional Marketing Live! will take place at the NEC next autumn. It’s running alongside other established exhibitions whose visitors are very likely to have a requirement for promotional and incentive goods and services, so good cross over audiences can be expected. The show is being run by Stephen Richards, who is well known in the promotions industry.

With reference to our feature, Richard Branson plays with real trains and planes (well train and airline companies) but lesser mortals have to make do with lesser toys, however there’s a good selection of these in our article on Executive Toys.

Also, Carl Blackshaw of 4imprint has given us his Top 10 Tips on how to buy executive toys and other business gifts, which ties in very neatly!

And looking ahead to the season of goodwill, business baubles is offering a lead time of only four weeks on its range of Christmas baubles and has introduced a low minimum order of just 250 pieces. Which links in with next month’s feature is on Christmas Gifts.

So, it only remains for me to tell you that next month’s feature is on Christmas Gifts. If your company supplies promotional Christmas gifts, then just let me have some copy and a pic and your products can be included. If you have a comment on the industry news or some news of your own, send it to me and we’ll share it with our 21,000 subscribers and 60,000 visitors.

Carole Bull

Editor

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