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Schwag Conundrum

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Categories: Commerce and business

Word count/read time: 432 words; 2 minutes

Having attended a fair number of trade shows, my schwag bin is not hurting for contents: hats, clothing, toys, drinking implements, keychains, all the usual suspects and more. Plus the stickers. It's literally an adult trick-or-treat!

Do these marketing trinkets work? Does anyone need another pen? Keychain? Even if it is eye-catching people generally put it "aside." Most tchotchkes sit in a box. Clothing, hats, and fabric goods might be next in line for rags or work clothes, ouch!

There's still the lingering question about the fate of schwag or literature I give out. You can't attach a list of demands when they're given away so it lends a certain urgency to find a suitable home.

Unless schwag can transcend some unspoken boundary, it probably has no useful life. It must be unique, creative, and suggestive enough (at least to a few senses) to have collector value, if only in principle. Because that's how marketing works.

Back to the shows. Some are three or more days, allowing enough time to work the long game for the unadvertised giveaways. These reps are carting around samples, displays, and more. Sometimes it's easier for them to give it away.

At a family show, a little something for the anklebiters out there would endear many parents. An age-appropriate miniature foam boomerang or balsa plane would be cool. Go on the cheap and learn to do balloon animals. Something innovative or costly is not required; the experience lingers longest.

Is this whole schwag thing a symptom of overblown capitalism? Are the keychain manufacturers the only ones making money after all expenses are tallied? Egads, don't infuriate the conspiracist in me! It's not sustainable so more consumption isn't the answer.

Food works. Properly use the power of a survival instinct. Make the branding an identifiable part of the treat. At one show a company had a substantial chocolate bar shaped like their logo. The chocolate was made proper to say the least.

Another rewrapped rolls of hard candies with their company name - someone pointed out this doppelganger to me after a dozen rolls and two days in, totally ignorant in my sugar high. A third had custom extruded lollipops with their name cleverly inserted into the center.

No matter how tasty the treat, what story does it tell? For instance, one had sinister gourmet candies. Their logo wasn't anywhere - for that matter, the chocolate company's wasn't either - so it was all about the bonbons. Strangely, I can't recall their names but those were exceptional chocolates. Stay away from the chocolate covered cherry and jalapeno anchovies....

Posted by M: December 10, 2018

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