Right as rain!

The seemingly endless rain that has covered the UK over the last few months has been good news for some companies in the UK, with suppliers of promotional merchandise seeing significant growth as brands, companies and businesses use the weather to their advantage to raise awareness of their brand, service or message.

Manufacturers and distributors of branded umbrellas, ponchos and marquees have all seen huge increases in sales with Stay Dry, for example, reporting a 60% increase in sales which includes products for London 2012 and a massive 13,000 ponchos supplied for the Diamond Jubilee picnic basket. Figures from online promotional merchandise service Sourcing City also show that ponchos have been the fastest growing product over the last six months, with Emblem Print Products showing a 423.1% increase in enquiries over the last 90 days, in comparison with the previous 90 days.

Another success story has been the Umbrella Company, with Sales Director Steve Reeve commenting: “It has been a fantastic year for us so far. We would normally see our first peak in sales for the start of the golf season then, when the weather gets warmer and customers go on holiday, umbrella sales would normally slow down until September. This year we have seen sales levels normally associated with September-November in April-June. There is no doubt that the rain and weather will be as bad in the winter months so it is looking like we will continue breaking records and running at full capacity all year round!”

Gordon Glenister, Director General of the British Promotional Merchandise Association (bpma) observed: “That these companies are achieving record sales levels shows that promotional merchandise is viewed by marketers as an effective way of maximising brand awareness whatever the weather. Our recently commissioned independent research reinforces this as it showed that 83 per cent of senior marketers plan to increase or maintain spend on promotional merchandise from this year to next, 73 per cent of buyers use merchandise at promotional events, and over three-fifths (63 per cent) of buyers use it for brand awareness and re-branding.”

About the BPMA
Established in 1965, the British Promotional Merchandise Association (BPMA) is one of the UK's leading industry bodies dedicated to promoting best practice around the sourcing, manufacturing and distribution of promotional products.  With more than 600 members, the BPMA is a creative and vibrant organisation setting the benchmark for expertise, quality and professionalism across the promotional marketing industry.

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